Sunsets

This our last full day for this trip. I thought I would end with a couple of sunset pictures. Watching the sun go down is a thing here. People gather on the beach, their lanais, or a hill with a great view and watch and take photographs. I have plenty of photos, but here are a couple more - a great way to end this series of posts.

This has been a great trip and we have been able to share our time with family and friends. Back to Minnesota and the lake. 

Goats

One thing you encounter as you travel the Hawaiian Islands is the frequency with which experts will describe the frequency of various invasive species. This is not a new term for me and I understand that invasive species are an issue in the lakes and fields back home. Perhaps the difference here is the huge areas of land in Hawaii that is not cultivated that makes a difference.

In Kauai, there were many chickens running about and an occasional wild pig that we would see as we drive about. There are a few chickens and pigs here running wild here. We see mongooses everywhere and I was told they are egg eaters and this is hard on the bird population. One species we do see running wild as we drive are wild goats. You see these goats in the thinly vegetated lava fields often with a lookout standing on a taller peak within the lava. Like the pigs on Kauai, these goats are hunted during a designated season. 

New snorkel gear

If you haven't recently visited a beach where snorkeling is a big thing, you may not be aware of the newest thing in snorkeling gear.

These are full-face snorkel masks. You breath naturally so there are not really new skills you need to develop. Cindy had one last year and really liked it so she bought one for pretty much anyone willing to use it (translate - no mask for me). Amazon is a wonderful thing.

Our grandkids have experience in the water and in shallow water with no waves most were able to at least look about and see fish. 

You see a lot of these now. Someone told us last year that the concern with these is that inexperienced users find them so easy to use they sometimes lose track of where they are and find themselves floating into water that may cause them to panic. The kids who are swimmers found these masks easy to use. 

Now, we will have to figure out how to get these things back home.

Poke

From time to time, I have described some unique foods we have come to appreciate and associate with Hawaii. While I have discovered it is possible to find these foods elsewhere, these foods are common here and are available in many establishments.

Poke is something I have eaten several times each week. It is typically made from raw ahi tuna cut into small cubes and served seasoned with soy sauce and various other ingredients. It is commonly served with rice and edamame or a seaweed salad. I really have grown fond of the sea week and it is always my choice.

When we returned from Hawaii last year Cindy noticed an ad for a restaurant serving poke In Minneapolis. I think the fish appeals to the healthy food crowd. I searched to find the restaurant and it turns out Minneapolis has multiple places you can find poke.

Farmers (and crafters') market

We are farmers' market people and we have plenty of opportunities in Minneapolis. The Minneapolis Market is gigantic, but unfortunately, produce is not plentiful during the winter and so ....    We go to Hawaii.

The Kauai markets were smaller, but offered unique produce. Hawaii seems to have fewer farmers and more craftspeople. Here are some photos from yesterday's visit.

Death by coconut

I think these guys are following us around. It seems they go from housing complex to housing complex trimming back the palms. This tree was close so I got a good shot eye-to-eye.

Watching these guys climb is intriguing. They seem to be able to go up even the skinniest trunks (see the guy in the background). They remove the oldest palm fronds, but any coconuts that are beginning to form. The bottom fronds begin to break so removing them is about appearance. I thought the coconuts could be a matter of safety. No housing complex wants to be responsible for damage done by a falling coconut. 

I thought "death by coconut" would make a clever title for this post. I thought I should search to see if it was a real thing. It is, but it is exaggerated in those "you are more likely to be killed by a falling coconut than ...." campaigns. It turns out also to be the name of a beer made in Colorado. Colorado?

Sid, Frankie, Mom and Dad

14+ hours on an overnight flight and Sid and Frankie had to go to the pool. Kids have much more endurance than me. I would definitely need a nap.

We did get a call from the downstairs neighbors very, very early this morning because the kids were running around the living room bouncing balls not the floor. The kids can’t tell time and thought it must be noon.

Map and photograph my walk

This is another app recommendation for travelers. I have used the free version of the MapMyWalk app for several years. It is a phone app that is promoted as a fitness resource, but I tend to use it as its name implies - I want to establish a record of a walk. I use a fitbit for fitness and I don't run anymore so the speed with which I get somewhere is not really an issue. I started using this app because I get lost easily and the map of where I have walked offers me a very precise way to retrace my steps.

This app has some features that I sometimes use on trips. It allows me to collect photos (5 with the free version) and save them with a map of a specific walk. The map and photos can be shared online or just reviewed should you want to revisit what you did at a specific place. The photos are not geotagged to precise locations on the map is kind of a shame because this is very doable, but my walks are not that long so it is kind of interesting to just say "here are five things I saw on my walk".

The following is the home app screen stored after the completion of a walk. The image at the top is one saved from the walk and a small icon on this image provides access to the other saved images. The map saves the route with time and distance recorded below.

The app records a great deal of data some may find useful. The following display shows the pace at different points along the walk overload on a representation of the change in elevation. The data I found interesting is that my pace changed considerably when I stopped to take a picture along the route. 

Images are captured without existing the app. The photos are displayed and then you are asked if you want to retain the image captured as part of the record of that specific walk.

Just for the record, this map was generated while walking to the Frenchman's Cafe for breakfast.

Kona Brewing

Kona Brewing reminds me of Surly in the Twin Cities. Neither are really microbreweries as they produce multiple beers at scale. Both stick to a limited distribution. A couple of beers were my choices in previous visits to Kauai when my kids refused to let me order Bud Light. I have progressed as I like a couple of Kona offerings even when a cheaper Bud Light is available.

Both Kona and Surly have another similarity. The home base has great food offerings and dining in addition to the beer. We have taken all of our guests to Kona for food and have eaten there when we were alone. Last evening was our first visit at night. I must say that Surly does not offer tiki torches and palm trees.

Bye Kona Bali Kai

Our two-month beach rental ended today so we had to move. We are about 1/2 mile away staying in a very nice unsold timeshare, but not on the beach. There is no surf noise here. I will miss going to sleep with that sound. It is too bad the two families coming to stay with us in a couple of days will not be able to experience living with the view and the sounds that we no longer have. Schedules can be a challenge and I am certain we will find plenty of great things to do.

AI and flower ID

For anyone from the midwest, photographing the flowers of Hawaii becomes a constant activity. The flowers are everywhere even this time of year and they are truly beautiful. At some point, you exhaust yourself on the artistic value of your growing photo collection and you start to think beyond the vibrant colors and the huge blossoms. You begin with simple questions. I wonder what this plant is called? You may wonder about other things as well. How does this flower grow in the crook of this tree without having roots in the soil?

I started mixing tech with photography a long time ago. My biology background even plays a role in both my plant photography and my interest in technology. I began exploring apps on my phone that claimed they could be helpful in plant identification. Point your camera at a plant and the app would tell you what that plant was and direct you to additional information about the plant. I have read about face recognition and the role artificial intelligence plays in making this possible. It made some sense that the same technology might be applied to plant identification.

During last year's visit to Kauai, I explored an app called PlantSnap. This year I added iNaturalist to my app collection. Both work in a similar way. You take a photo and the app makes a guess as to what appears in the photo. The app also offers some other possibilities and relies on you to evaluate the first choice and the alternatives. If nothing makes sense, the app farms out your photo to the public that follows the app to see if anyone has an idea. Selecting a choice offers a way to get additional information.

Evaluating these apps presents a problem. You must know what you are looking at in order to determine if the app made a correct identification. Here are three photos I took walking home from the coffee shop and the top choice offered by each app.

[PlantSnap]

[iNaturalist]

[PlantSnap]

[iNaturalist]

[iNaturalist]

I know both apps were correct with the genus. I am not capable of evaluating the accuracy at the species level.

There are other ways to do this. You can purchase a plant identification book. There are even online keys that offer an identification approach based on color. I have decided the flowers are probably easy, but I wonder what happens when the app is asked about a plain green plant. I don't have any examples and I am not certain I would be able to check the responses, but I have a few more days here and plenty of specimens I can photograph.

There may be no post tomorrow. We have to move out of our condo and into a hotel. Two of our kids and their families did not have a Spring break option during the two months we originally booked so we had to find a way to extend our stay. I hear there is still snow and flooding in the midwest so this has worked out well.

Surf is up

I haven't written about the surfers since the first couple of days we were here. The waves for the past couple of weeks have been much smaller and the number of those who showed up to ride the smaller waves diminished markedly. There were always a couple when I went out to the lanai in the morning to write, but nothing like the first couple of weeks. I wondered if the season had changed and Spring was not the time for much action.

This all changed yesterday. We knew things were about to change again because the weather forecast included a high surf warning and the prediction that most of the beaches would be closed. This is exactly what the surfers want. The surf sounded much louder in the night and the morning brought lots of surfers and big waves. It is interesting how technology enables this sport. There are remote cameras on some beaches and apps for your phone that give lots of data some captured from distant buoys that report changes in conditions of the sea.

I put on my telephoto and took these pictures.

Where locals really eat

By now, we have had the opportunity to dine at many different restaurants and diners. There have been few disappointments. We usually make a choice based on the desire to try a place we have not tried before and after checking Yelp, a recommendation from a friend or a friend of a friend, or a map service just to see what is within range. The expression “a popular local hangout” or “where locals like to eat” often carries some weight. It usually means good food at a reasonable price and unlikely to be overpopulated by tourists. If you have been reading my posts you should know that I can get the “locals rate” at my favorite coffee shop so I have taken myself out of the tourist category.

After taking our friends to the airport so they could pick up a rental car, we decided to go to Costco to fill the car with gas, pick up a few items, and get something to eat. The line for food was very long and the many tables for dining were all filled. Just looking at the crowd, I decided that the list of where locals prefer to eat purposefully avoided the obvious. None of the other establishments we visited were as popular as the Costco outdoor dining area. I am a big fan of the giant hot dog and soda for $1.50. Cindy likes the açaí bowls. Now that I can consider myself a local, I might as well admit that I eat where the other locals really eat.

Return to the Place of Refuge

We took Mette and Stan to Pu'uhonua o Honaunau National Historic Park. This was our second visit and I was able to understand a little more about what this location preserves. The park contains two areas - the royal grounds and the place of refuge (Pu'uhonua). These two areas are separated by a massive L-shaped wall that is 1000 feet long, 10 feet high, and 17 feet thick. The place of refuge is bounded on one side by the ocean and the other by this wall.

Before the time of King Kamehameha II a very strict religious code was enforced. The religion specified all kinds of forbidden behaviors and breaking these sacred laws (kapu) resulted in death. These violations would be considered minor by today's standards - casting one's shadow on a royal, setting foot on royal grounds, eating with a woman, eating the wrong kind of fish. Once pursued for violating Kapu, your only chance for survival was to make it to a place of refuge. This also applied to women and children and enemy combatants during a war. Once safe in a place of refuge, you would spend a few days with the local priests to be cleansed and would then be free to go. 

Kamehameha ordered most of the structures inside the place of refuge destroyed and tidal waves also resulted in severe damage to most of the rest. What remains are piles of rubble.

One remaining structure, Alealea, a massive stone platform is still intact.

The Hale o Keawe is the burial site of many royals and is preserved as a sacred site still respected by many Hawaiian people. 

Orchid Island

Hawaiians refer to Hawaii as the Orchid Island. This should not be confused with the Orchid Island which is located near Taiwan. Finding orchids to photograph is fairly easy as groundskeepers and homeowners seem to attach them to trees everywhere. I have been collecting photos since we have been here. Most of the following are from the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden.

If you need more, I found this collection from the 2019 Hilo Orchid Society photo contest.  I wonder what the judges look for in the winning entry. Most entries look similar to mine. I could find no list of the winners.

Grill man

I have watched the grill man as he works nearly every morning for two months.  Several of these two-grill stations are positioned along the ocean below our condo. I assume the salt mist is damaging to these appliances as it seems to be any other metal nearby. The grills are also used nightly. Maybe you treat your grill like I treat mine. When I am done with the steak or hamburgers it is time to eat and I don't worry about the grill until the next time I barbeque. If this is not your approach, I must apologize to all who have dined at the Grabe's for being a slob.

Back to the grill man. I have grown to admire the precision with which he executes his routine. Take the cover off. Attach the propane tank. Scrap down the grate and then wipe the grate with paper towels. Here is where the routine grows unconventional. Raise the grate and remove the covers over the series of five burners. Remove and discard the aluminum foil that has been used to wrap the individual covers. Remove and discard the foil that has been placed at the bottom of the grill cavity. Take out a section of new foil from the giant roll and fold it precisely to fit the bottom of the grill cavity and position it in the grill. Wrap each grill cover with foil and replace them in the grill. Test the burners to assure they light. Close the grill and clean the grill top with a solution that probably protects the cover and makes it shine. Fold the grill cover and store it below the grill. 

In the evening about 10, he returns to remove the propane containers, chain and padlock the grill shut, and cover the grill. Repeat multiple times a day and each day of the week.

So goes the life of the grill man. All done with care and precision.

Writer writing

[Mette, Stanley, Cindy]

We have had the opportunity to share our location with a series of interesting guests and family members. Mette and Stan are out first and only international guests. We first met Stan many years ago when he was a faculty member in the University of North Dakota College of Aerospace Sciences. Stan had many interesting responsibilities for the program including as I remember working with countries of the Pacific Rim to send students for nondegree programs. I met him because his graduate work at the University of Illinois was in instructional design. He and I developed the proposal that eventually led to the Instructional Design and Technology (IDT) graduate program. He is a pilot and had written books in multimedia learning and human factors as applied to pilots. Stan moved on, but maintained a residence in Minneapolis as well as South Africa (his home). Our daughter Lynn watched his place on occasion when she was an undergrad at the University of Minnesota and we always have stayed in contact although we did not see each other on a regular basis.

Stan has become a very successful writer of crime novels set in Africa writing with a colleague Michael Sears. You will find their work on Amazon (paper and audio) under the name Michael Stanley. Crime novels are not my highest priority reading, but I have read a couple that Stan has written and I can recommend them as quite engaging. There is plenty of local history and current events embedded in the stories to increase your understanding of this part of the world. In the past couple of years we have spent more time with Stan again after attending a reading with Stan and Michael at a local book shop. This has been our first meeting with Mette who is from Denmark and like Stan a person with a wide assortment of international experiences. They have been a very interesting couple to spend a week exploring this island.

Anyway, so Stan announces he is going to have to get his blog post written. I had no idea he had a blog. It turns out he and Michael share responsibility for making contributions to a blog called Murder is Everywhere. This is a group blog maintained by a collection of crime writers from all over the world. Stan says you can pretty much write about anything when your turn comes up, but your books are pretty much off limits unless you have a new book that has just been released. I was thinking about this group and decided I would be intimidated adding posts by the company I was keeping. I already have a couple of folks who let me know when I have failed to notice a misspelled word, but think of how much worse it could get if the way you develop your stories came under scrutiny. Stan posted recently so if you take a look soon after I offer this post his comments on Hawaii should be near the top.

Green Sea Turtle

The Green Sea Turtles can be observed coming into the tide pools very close to where we are staying. Eventually, some of them move up on the rocks to warm themselves in the sun. What follows are a couple of videos we have captured. Cindy took the second one with a Go Pro by submerging the camera in the water. The videos can easily be expanded for full screen viewing. The turtles we have seen here are much smaller than the turtles we would sometimes see on the sand in Kauai (final picture).

In search of the green flash

The green flash sounds like a comic book hero, but it refers to a meteorological phenomenon most often observed when the sun first sinks below the horizon. I have always assumed this meant the ocean or a large lake, but I guess it is possible it occurs in other ways. According to my source for such factual information, Wikipedia, the cause is the bending of light through the atmosphere and not water as I had assumed. The flash is experienced as a flash or a spot of green light that is very brief - a second or so,

We have the opportunity to view the sunset nearly every night from our lanai. I have been looking. A few nights ago I thought I saw it. I did not experience it as a flash, but as a tiny green dot, a single pixel, on the surface of the ocean. This did not seem to be a flash to me and because I had yet to search online sources for information I thought it may have been my imagination. It is possible to locate photographic examples online and the green dot was there.

Last evening I decided I would try to capture the flash myself and since it seemed unlikely I could capture the exact instant with a still camera, I thought I would try video. I could then go through the video frame by frame to find proof. I had no luck. I did not see a flash again so there was nothing from the video. The atmospheric conditions must not have been cooperating.