Today we got moving early and decided to head up to do some errands in Hilo, and stop by the Mauna Loa macadamia factory. I placed a call to a woman in Kalapana who was interested in participating, but we didn't need another participant, and a landlord in Kapoho to get permission to talk to her tenants and be on her property.
We filled up with gas and gave into the dark side by stopping at the next-door McDonald's for their "sale" Peach Mango pies and iced macadamia nut coffee. The pies were pretty good, and the coffee was okay. I do love mango!
The Mauna Loa facility boasts 250,000 macadamia trees on 2500 acres, and you could definitely see them alongside the road as you drove to the factory. They had some cute videos with anthropomorphized macadamia nuts, which talked you through the process of processing the nuts. One of the sections of video/viewing was closed off due to painting (we think). The nature trail was also closed... Inside the store, the workers were all busy stocking the shelves, which might have been due to a tour bus just having left. There wasn't anyone manning the free sample station, so I finally requested to try the shortbread from someone who had been behind the free sample area until she snuck away. It was pretty good, but not macadamia nutty. In all, we liked the Hamakua Plantation macadamia tour and facilities better. LOTS of free samples, and super friendly workers. We'll have to go back there!
We headed further north towards Hilo to pick up some supplies and then decided to stop by the Hilo Bay Cafe for lunch, as they had gotten high ratings for fresh, organic, ingredients in the Hawaii Revealed book. We couldn't agree more. The food was really good and presented nicely. Seth had the bbq brisket, and I tried out the catch of the day sandwich- fresh Ono on tomato basil foccacia. The fish was surprisingly edible for someone who's not a big fan of fish, though I ended up switching with Seth and eating the brisket, as that was really good. I decided I don't like big hunks of meat in my sandwiches, but prefer shavings or slices... something I can recognize as always being the case. I think too large of a piece of meat is just bland and rubbery to me, but smaller bits are more enjoyable. I don't know; I may just be crazy. We were members of the clean plate club and headed off to our 1 p.m. appointment.
This participant was a coqui hunter! They have a large wrap around lanai on their house, which is large enough to support multiple 2 x 10 feet gardens, which is where the coqui hang out. I guess she killed 50 frogs the other night (only 2 of which were calling). She sprays the frogs, squashes, or freezes them to kill them. We found a dried frog on the driveway, which she said later was probably one she had sprayed with lime the night before. I kind of wonder if the coqui catching is half sport for her, but don't really think so, as she just saw all of them and took action. They did have 50lbs bags of citric powder and lime in the garage, though, so they pump through a lot of that stuff.
We finished around 3, after picking up the sticky trap from the first property we did the other day, and headed out to sample the "freshest air anywhere". We drove to the lighthouse on the eastern-most side of the island, where air travels thousands of miles over the open ocean. We took some deep breaths and enjoyed the air. I guess they monitor air quality here as in indicator for how things are changing globally.
Next we headed to the Champagne ponds, which is accessed through a 4WD dirt road. We were surprised to find several groups of people out in this secluded tide pool, but didn't hesitate to join them. The water was a neat mixture of cool patches, to warmer areas, and of varying depths. We hung out for about an hour while Seth practiced floating (something he found harder than me) and I worked on treading water. It was a gorgeous area that I'm sure we'll go back to. I didn't take pictures this time, as I was anxious to hop in, but I'm sure we'll have pictures to share. It was extremely peaceful.
We drove back to the neighborhood and were a little early, so decided to pick up the sticky trap at our second property from the previous day. The house next-door is for sale, and there was a man working on the property. He started chatting with us, and ended up using his fancy coconut knife to allow us to try some coconut juice on some of the coconuts he'd recently cut down. He owns his own environmentally friendly landscaping business, runs his truck on homemade biofuel, and is working on refining the fuel and selling it at a larger scale. He was a pretty young guy, but seemed to be doing quite well for himself. He gave us his card so we can stay in touch with our coqui findings, but we just may contact him to talk more about his biofuel initiative. We had to cut our chatting short, since we were going to be late for our second participant.
We chatted with the second participant for a while. He actually works for the county, and feels it is more up to the landowners to take action at this point to control the frogs. We chatted a bit about Hawaii time and how much more relaxed it is here than the mainland (he's from Colorado originally).
We drove down the road to the tidepools/marine conservation area, and sat and ate our dinner while the sun set. We plan to bask in these tidepools in one of the coming days.
Both properties had frogs, and the second property had a cool frog calling in a bromeliad. Seth saw one frog calling on the lava at the first property, which would have made a good photo, but he disturbed the frog so it was no longer there later on.
We drove home and took care of getting batteries charged and gear ready for the next day.
Today I decided to try making mango coconut oatmeal. It was really good. Of course, I love mangoes, so I'm easy to please with what I mix them with. We ended up only having one property today, as the one person had asked me to call and see if Tues or Wed worked best, and she requested Wed, so our appointment wasn*t until 5:00 p.m. We hung around the house for most of the day doing work and I made pizza for lunch. Seth and I made oatmeal raisin cookies, which were really yummy and moist!
We headed out mid afternoon and stopped by the Kahakai park down the road, which has a nice view of the shoreline. We drove past the Hawaiian beaches park, and then we went along Mango rd again to pick some mangoes. I ended up picking over 20 this time, and got a few fairly large ones- yum!
We arrived just in time to see the participant starting to drive away... hmm. Well, as it turns out, she forgot she needed to pick up her husband, so she said she'd be back in half an hour. We were a bit skeptical, but waited it out, and, sure enough, she came back in exactly a half hour with her hubby in tow. They were quite friendly and both don't like the frogs. She has a number of potted plants lining the porch, where the frogs like to hang out. After the interview, she picked up a plant and sure enough, there was a frog there, which proceeded to hop across the porch, be chased by their puppy, and ultimately, smacked to death by the woman. I told them they should train their dog to chase them, as it was rather amusing to watch him go after it.
They had a number of frogs on the property, which always makes it more entertaining for us. We headed back to the condo and took care of bugs and data for the next day.
We set the alarm for 5 a.m. so we could get up and see the sun rising. We headed out after civil twilight, and it was really bright out there! It was raining a bit, so we started watching from the second floor, but then migrated out to the picnic table by the ocean. The sunrise was gorgeous, and a very refreshing way to start the day. I decided to make oatmeal pancakes (some with raisins), which worked out okay. They were high in protein, and fairly healthy, but we didn't have syrup, and they were a bit dense, so were a different pancake than we're used to.
Our first participant was scheduled for 3 p.m., so we decided to head up to Hilo to do some errands and check out a few things we've been wanting to see.
We stopped by the Panawea Zoo on the way to Hilo. For a small, free zoo, it was quite nice. They had lots of birds around, including Max the macaw, who knows 40 words. Seth had fun talking to him.
There were also lots of other pretty looking birds, peacocks on the loose (even looking at other animals in the cages), spider monkies, tamarins, a one horned water buffalo, and Namaste, a white Bengal Tiger. We spent some time chatting with the docent about a few questions surrounding the zoo, and about our research. He told me that the zoo had actually traded some coqui frogs with a zoo in Florida for a few of their frogs! I guess there is another use for them, beyond trying to figure out how to eat them...
After the zoo, we decided to head out the Hilo beaches and get some Hilo Homemade ice cream. After sampling a bunch of flavors, I decided on lilikoi (I love that passion fruit) and banana mcfudge (banana, mac nuts, and fudge sauce). Both were really good and very tropical. Seth had the mudslide and the banana mcfudge, which he liked as well. We explored around the Hilo Tropical Garden Hostel, next door to the ice cream, as we almost stayed here prior to finding the house we stayed at. It looked like a great place to camp and explore, and would probably be a nice place to spend some time, though nothing can compare to having your own ocean front house to yourself...
We drove down the road to check out the rest of the beaches until the end of the road, then decided we should come back when we have a bit more time to spend at the beaches. We stopped by the library and grocery store to get grilling items for tomorrow. We made it back to the apartment with just enough time to eat a quick lunch and drive to Kapoho.
Our 3 p.m. appointment was a young lawyer based out of Chicago. She has two properties in Hawaii, and this property is one she is fixing up to use as a rental for larger family reunions or larger groups of individuals. She had an interesting idea about using song to disrupt the frogs, as she was with a friend and Patsy Klein was singing and hit a high note and it seemed like the frogs were all confused. She was scared of geckos, which they had lots of running around as we were chatting. They had some really neat neon green day geckos that we've seen a lot of in that area.
She had a DSL serviceman out, who turns out is the nephew of Billy Kenoi, who's running for mayor. His uncle is doing work on ways to kill the coqui frog, and is someone who has secured much of the funding for work on the frogs. I thought this was a bit amusing, but also makes sense if you are trying to get elected to office. We set up our 3 points on her property and decided to head out to the tide pools before our 5:30 appointment.
We walked around the lava surrounding the tide pools, and I spent some time watching at least 6 or 7 different types of fish swimming around in the very clear water. We plan to spend some quality time playing in the pools and snorkeling when we're back the first week of August staying right down the road from the pools.
We drove to our 5:30 appointment, but no one was home. We waited for a bit, then I tried calling both the house phone and the woman's cell phone. She's a grad student doing work on hydrothermal vent predictors. No luck reaching her. We stayed there until around 6:10 until we decided we needed to take action if we were going to finish this community today. There always seems to be one no-show per community. I had been excited that this was going to be the first one where that didn't happen, but no such luck. We drove down the road and stopped by a house that I had talked to a woman at the other day who sounded interested, but said she's not often around. I went and chatted with her, and she agreed to participate. She was actually house sitting for someone, but was interesting to talk to, since she used to hate the coqui, but changed her mind after she had been living here for 7 months. She was super friendly and a real lifesaver. We finished her property with perfect timing. I finished up with drawing out the vegetation and setting up the sound recorder while Seth headed to the other property to set up the recorder there, and go to the property from yesterday to get the sticky trap. We saw the people from yesterday walk past with their dog as we were working on this property. We saw a TON of frogs on this property. They were all over the place, including right on the lava again. I chatted with the woman again and her guests, and they all wanted to know how best to get rid of the frogs.
We headed to the next property, and it didn't have near as many frogs, but it still had several. They had sprayed with lime, and the front area was just all grass (though I still saw a frog there). We also so a male calling on a leaf that had lime on it, so was he resistant, or just crafty about avoiding the lime??
We decided to stop by lava tree state park to see how the sound was, since it's supposed to be so loud there. It was loud, but not that bad. I think they may have cleaned more brush out, so we might stop back during the day to check it out later in the summer. We decided to drive through Nanawale to see how loud it was there, as we'd heard it was pretty bad as well. there was lots of vegetation, so it was easy to see how the frogs would like it there, and it definitely was loud, even in areas with less vegetation, though wasn't off the charts loud or anything like that. They had an interesting sign on the way into the community saying the community was radio patrolled and it was illegal to remove any plants or soils. Do people come here to steal dirt?? Maybe, I suppose.
We arrived back at the apartment and took care of the bugs and headed to sleep.
Today we only had to pick up the sticky traps from our last participants in Kapoho, so we decided to have some fun. We stayed around the house in the morning. I made mango coconut oatmeal again, which was yummy. I worked on cleaning up all of my bug funnels from the porch, while Seth got a fire ready for lunch. The rain threatened, but we were still able to grill the brats and enjoy eating them at the picnic table, so that was nice. Seth made some brownies while I continued packing, and then we headed out mid afternoon. We noticed that someone had come to the greenhouse and picked some veggies and watered. I was a little bummed since some of the veggies I had my eye on were picked, but at least it wasn't a wild animal eating them!
We headed up to Mauna Kea for the rest of the day. We watched more of the videos in the visitor center, including one that was more detailed about each of the features on all of the scopes. We then talked with a ranger about the best viewing area for the sunset and stargazing. He chatted with us about the coqui frogs for a bit, as he doesn't like them, though he hears them in Hilo, not up at Mauna Kea, as it's way too cold there. We then went on a short hike to see silversword, and one was blooming! Considering the plant takes 20 years to bloom and then dies, we both felt quite privileged to see the majestic beauty. We were careful not to get close for fear of damaging the fragile root system that is normally quite shallow. We the hiked up a Pu'u (cinder cone) with nice views of Mauna Loa and other cinder cones, as well as Mauna Kea and the visitor center. We made our ascent to the summit, and parked next to other cars at the top.
Not long after getting there, a tour bus came through and told me that we were parked on a road where all the tour services come through. Considering there was no sign, we doubted it, but still moved ahead. Then the people who were parked behind us said we blocked their view (jokingly, for the most part). Guess you can't win. We decided to move the car out of the way (again) after we ate our dinner. We ate our dinner, which consisted of yogurts that had bowed out both ends, and Seth chose to eat his by popping a hole in the top and drinking, as mine exploded when I opened it. The view was absolutely gorgeous from the top! It was freezing, mostly because of the biting wind, but our rain gear helped act as a windbreaker. The only cold things were really my toes and hands. The sunset was amazing, and it was even cooler to watch all the scopes open up and start moving around. They only let you stay up about a half hour after sunset (around 7:45 or so) so you don't mess with lighting for the scopes. We were the last group to head down, and chatted with a ranger for a bit. It sounds like the researchers are in the scopes from sundown to sun up, though one of the scopes is remotely controlled from toasty Hilo (lucky person!).
We headed down and arrived in time for part of the stargazing where they point out constellations. We saw Virgo, Sagittarius, Saturn, Mars, Jupiter, and the milky way was phenomenal. We went inside to watch a video on the Hubble telescope, but didn't get to watch all of it, as they were closing up the center. We went out to check out the scopes and got to see Jupiter and Saturn and their moons, which was really cool. you could even see the stripes on Jupiter, and of course the rings on Saturn. Earlier in the day we had looked at a scope viewing sunspots and solar flare, but we barely saw sunspots and no flares. The stargazing was fun, and we stayed longer than we expected. We started the trek back at 10 p.m., stopping in Hilo for a few errands, before continuing down to Kapoho to pick up sticky traps.
We got back fairly late and crashed for the night.
Today was moving day! We slept in later than usual as we had stayed up late the night before. Seth started the day by working on making new and improved stands for my funnels. They are going to work much better than the previous setup I was using, I just know it.
I spent the morning packing up research gear, cleaning dishes, cleaning the kitchen, loading stuff outside, and transferring the last of my data. I needed to print something out, but we realized that the ink we had bought was not the right colors, so... this means Seth needed to drive back to Hilo to get more ink. While Seth drove to Hilo, I finished up packing, mopping, and cleaning up around the house.
I finished cleaning just as Seth returned from his errands, so I then decided to pick some fruits and veggies around the property. I decided to take a much needed shower, since I was full of sweat, mosquito bites, and dirt, after having trudged through the jungle to get some papayas.
We finally headed out around 5:30 p.m. and decided to stop by the Taco Bell on the way out of town. Seth wanted to see what all the hype was about, since I gave Seth the daily update on how many people were at Taco Bell each time we went past (always packed at all hours of the day!). The food was fine, though I worried that I would pay for it later in smells coming from Seth, though I mostly lucked out.
We headed off into the sunset along Saddle road, and enjoyed some gorgeous views. The clouds were wispy and had an almost eerie effect as the sun was setting. The land melted away and it looked like the ocean was blazing. Later down the road, it was even eerier, as we were driving through a cloud, which made it difficult to see.
We eventually came upon Kona, and were able to easily navigate to our place, with the help of the good map books we've been using. Wow, this side of the island is completely different from the eastern side! People were out everywhere, and the road is lined with stores, restaurants, and bars. Ali'i drive is a main drag down resort central, so it was hopping.
We arrived at our apartment without a problem, and parked and headed in. The place looks nice, just a lot smaller than we are used to. Seth worked on hauling things in, while I attempted to put things away and to get organized. After he finished hauling everything, I made some banana nut and blueberry muffins, which we enjoyed with some chocolate soy milk on our lanai. It seems to be fairly quite over here at this time of night, which did help make it more peaceful. We finally headed to sleep relatively late after the long day of driving and moving house.
(as a disclaimer, this whole previous section was already written, but then was deleted somehow, and lost to never neverland. Sweet.... It's never as good the second time around, but at least I was able to type it up, again.).
We slept late today, after staying up late taking care of things. This is definitely the side of the island where people come to visit and play. I'm sure we'll get used to it by the time we leave, but it will definitely take some adjusting. The day started out with a visit from a dove that flew right on into the livingroom and paid a visit. I was going to take a picture, but, as Seth can attest, I was too busy saying "oh, oh, oh" as I watched the bird take flight in the room, before heading back outside.
We hung out around the house while Seth did some coding. The view from the lanai has the ocean at a distance, and we actually saw a ton of dolphins proposing, which was really, really, cool!
After lunch, we decided to drive to Costco and get some groceries. The place was packed! Lots of free samples later, and a cart full, we emerged to head back to our apartment. We unloaded our goods, and needed to cool off. It's hot here!!
I worked on the computer on the one lanai, while Seth was on the other lanai. I thought he was reading, but when I went to chat with him, he was laying on the lounge chair, mouth wide, and sleeping. I should have taken his picture. He didn't stir even when I chuckled at him. What a rough life!
We went for a swim in the pool for the complex, then decided to roast up some veggie burgers. That's right, Seth gave in to the dark side and agreed to get veggie burgers and chicken brats (pineapple bacon flavored, of course), rather than some heftier choices. Of course, I heard about it all through dinner with comments about "where's the meat?". I will admit the veggie burgers were awful thin (thinner even than the ones I make), but they were still tasty.
We had a nice view of the sunset while we were eating our dinner near the ocean. It's always fun to watch the sun change from yellow, to orange, to red before your eyes.
After dinner, we went on a frog hunt in our next community north of Kona. After an hour and a half of driving through the community, we only heard frogs in a couple of spots. I feel like we need an appropriate "going on a frog hunt" song to play while going on these adventures. We logged the areas on the GPS and came back to our unit to hang out with some margaritas, before crashing for the night.
We took the morning slow today, as Seth worked on the computer doing coding, and I did some work off of the computer. I decided to try out the exercise room with a view this morning while Seth worked. Technically, the room doesn't open until 9 (so say the rules), but the door didn't say anything about hours, so I headed over at 7:45. One of the workers was out cleaning the pool and cabana area, and he didn't seem to mind me using the room. I read while riding the recumbent bike, enjoying the ocean, and watching parasailers. What a nice way to exercise!
We ate lunch here and decided to head out for my least favorite day of the week- recruitment day. I had randomly picked the roads ahead of time, and we had decent success with finding people to agree to participate, though several said that I should call the morning of, because they are retired and don't know their schedule now. Hopefully they will all come through for once, though we have time if they don't. I was nervous with the Fourth of July being this Friday, but we have participants double booked Mon thru Wed, and one on Thursday, so that works out well (assuming they all come through!).
We did a couple of errands on our way home, then worked on grilling out our chicken pineapple bacon brats by the ocean. We put our suits on so we could swim after eating dinner, and watch the sunset. The sunset was even prettier tonight, as you could watch it descend further since there were less clouds. We worked on treading water again (well, I did), while Seth decided, once again, that he cannot float. We tried situps along the side of the pool, as well as pushups, and a few other fun fitness activities.
Some pictures of our place here in Kona, though I didn't take any of the pool area or the exercise area yet. Just a flavor for where we are staying at the moment with the master bedroom, livingroom, kitchen, main lanai, and courtyard view.
We came back to our apartment and I cut Seth's hair, though he claimed I was trying to cut off his ears (not even close...). We noticed that our tire has a scratch on the outside of it, so we're going to call tomorrow and see what to do about it. If it's flat in the morning, we'll just put on the spare for now, though the spare hadn't been being changed out on a regular basis, so it's not worn down like the others. It seems the tires are out to get us on this adventure.
Seth made some brownies while I did some computer work, before heading to bed and getting ready for our two participants the next day.