Contraflow

I think I write about this experience every time I am in Kauai, but now it has a name. The island does not have many alternate routes to get from one place to another. There is a main road and lots of side roads. Traffic can get heavy and most seems to flow in one direction or the other depending on the time of day. It is something like the lake effect traffic in Minneapolis. It goes North on Friday and South on Sunday afternoon. The situation here is similar except that the change happens each day.  

Much of the road is three lanes wide. With the steep hillsides, building another lane was probably regarded as prohibitively expensive. The solution is evidently contraflow. Now, one way to create the ideal contraflow would be to physically separate three roads with entry points for the middle controlled at the entry and exit. With this approach, you have the cost issue again. How about this idea? We will pay a road crew to separate two lanes from the third lane with traffic cones. They will do this as long as the road is used. Put the cones down in the very early morning (4:15) and pick up the cones to reverse the flow in the early afternoon (11:30). Talk about job security.

identification apps

 I explore tech applications wherever I am. Apps that identify flora and fauna are useful when you are in a unique location. iNaturalist is a good example. You take a photo of what you want to identify with the app and then allow it to use its AI to guess or just leave the photo unnamed in your collection and someone will likely take a look and try to help out. The photo I submitted (not this one) had some local geese in the background and someone wanted to know if I needed to know the name of the geese (Nene). 

I usually am more interested in the sophistication of the technology than the identify of a tree so I pick something I recognize. This is a plumeria. It is interesting because it loses its leaves and often flowers before new leaves grow. It produces the flowers that is typically used to create the leis tourists and Hawaiian dancers wear around their necks. I thought it would be a good test for the app because my photo has few leaves.

I have found the best identification can be obtained with the nonspecialized Google Photo. If you bring a photo into Google Photos and open the image, you should locate this icon below the photo. This will apply Google lens. 

Lens seems to work as well as the specialized identification apps and has the added benefit of allowing immediate search for what it returns as possible identifications. Click on one of the matches and it takes you to the source for that photo.

Here is what the Plumeria flower looks like. Early in the season it can be difficult to find one on a low branch to photograph. People have this need to pick them and when I see one often it is not there when I walk by the tree again. I assume this is an annoying tourist thing.

Anahola Cafe

 It may seem I write many posts about food. Kauai is small, but is populated by so many cultures that there are a wide variety of dining experiences. This is the Anahola Cafe. Because of COVID we mostly eat in open air spaces which luckily are common on Kauai. Anahola is an old community with a unique new area constructed of shipping containers. The cafe is unique in relying on native Hawaiians and focusing on local resources.

My food choice was Saimin - a noodle dish I have enjoyed in the past.

Cliff Hike

 I am more a walker than a hiker. Rough trails with roots and rocks are difficult because lifting my feet high enough is a struggle. I am always stumbling along and this is before I get tired. Walking is different and I will trek a couple miles or so as long as there is a coffee shop I can spend some time at before coming back.

There is this short trail that begins near our condo. It is only .3 miles long, but I have avoided it for years. The trip down took 20 minutes. That is moving at the pace of one mile per hour. The trip up did really get the old heart pumping. 

B-

 Sunsets and sunrises seem to be a big deal here. There are sunset cruises on the ocean and a golf cart sunset tour originating at a nearby country club. Folks pay to follow a guide cart that takes the participants across the course to a cliff with a good view of the same mountains I watch for free. I have to supply my own drink. At our location, the tourists walk past our lanai with their glasses of wine, horderves, and lawn chairs to take in the daily event from the cliff edge vantage point.

Not all sunsets are created equal. On the Big Island I remember trying to photograph the green flash. There is supposed to be a green flash at the moment the sun sinks into the ocean. I continually tried to photograph this flash even resorting to video so I could go frame by frame looking for the flash. I never saw the flash, but I believe it exists because the Green Flash was the name of my favorite coffee shop on that island. If you search this blog for "green flash" you should find the story of my search for the flash.

I have taken to grading the sunsets. Sometimes there are clouds and nothing to see. The best in my rating system happen when there is a cloud bank with an opening just before the sun would sink behind the mountains. This offers some interesting colors. The event last night was pretty "meh". I give it a B-. At least, there was something to see and the view of the ocean and mountains is always impressive. 

If sunsets are your thing, I think the small lake in northern Wisconsin where we have a cabin has some of the best. The colors are spectacular with some reds nearly any evening. Here is a special case. We had lots of smoke in the air from fires in Canada and the Boundary Waters of Minnesota. Not only was the sky red, but so was the sun and the reflection on the lake.