Day 3: Na Pali Adventurers

We let ourselves sleep in a little, had a big breakfast, and then met the taxi guy who drove us about 2 miles to the trail head of the Kalalau trail. I think we started hiking around 10 am if I remember right--which, as it turns out, is really not quite early enough to start this hike, but we managed okay. We picked up some walking sticks at the trail head (people leave them there for others to use--and thank goodness! We REALLY needed them!) shouldered our packs, and got started. I was so excited--this was really something I'd been looking forward to and training for since we first decided to go to Hawaii.

The Kalalau trail, which winds up and down along part of the Na Pali coastline, is quite simply one of the most beautiful hikes you can possible imagine. You may not think you know what the Na Pali coast is, but trust me--you have seen it. It shows up in movies and the like a lot--in Jurassic Park, for instance, and the creation part of the temple video, and lots of other places. And what makes it even more special is that you really can't see it by
car because there are no roads. People either take a catamaran on the ocean and see it from offshore, take a helicopter ride over it, or hike it on foot. We chose the latter, of course.

The trail is 11 miles each way, which really doesn't sound like that much, I know. But it is a VERY difficult trail. It is constant up and down--you go over 5 ridges and down into 5 valleys in all-- and in the end you ascend (and descend) 4,500 feet--EACH way. The Sierra Club rates it a 9 out of 10 in difficulty. So yeah, it's strenuous. (But OH is it worth it!) I've been exercising and lifting weights a ton in the last few months to prepare (well, that's not the only reason, but that was one good motivation!) and was in excellent shape, if I do say so myself. I found the hike very challenging--but not crossing the line into being unpleasantly so. The annoying thing is that Kevin didn't train at all and kept up just fine--he is one of those crazy "I don't have to do anything to be fit" type of people. Grrr....but I digress.

So we started out around 10 and were quickly challenged by the steep, rocky, muddy, slippery terrain, but also soon rewarded by the views--I'll let the pictures speak for themselves on that. Around 1pm we made it to the first major break point, which was a beach called Hanakapiai--gloriously beautiful but outstandingly dangerous. In the picture you can see a sign that warns people of the dangerous tides and currents and then has a tally mark for every person who has died in the water there--I think the number was over 60! So we stayed away from the water. We had lunch and I used the composting toilet which is setup at the campsite there (sooooo many flies! Ewwwwww!) and we were off again.

Out of the Hanakapiai valley, we went up endless switchbacks up and up and up...and then down again. And then we did it again! During this interval we spotted several mountain goats climbing around on the cliffs--the ones in this picture really picked out a good view for themselves! We also saw some wild pigs during the hike, but we didn't get any pictures--they were too fast!

The next stopping place we reached was a valley called Hanakoa, which also has some incredible water falls. (You can see the falls in this picture, barely--they're really super long off in the distance.) If we had had more time, we would have made the hike out to see them up close, but we didn't have any time to spare--in fact, we were starting to feel worried about whether we'd make it to the end by dark. We had some food and rested a little bit (good thing, because by this time we were pretty beat. But it's amazing how much better you can feel with some more fuel in your belly.)

We then embarked on the stretch of the trail that is notorious for being treacherous--the trail is narrow, the cliffs pretty steep, and the trail is totally unprotected, so people with a fear of heights do not do well here. We actually found it not as bad as I'd read about--we kept waiting for the really hard part, then laughed when we realized we'd already passed it! (BUT, we soon learned it is much harder when it is wet--more on that in the next day's post.)

By this time, we were tired, I had blisters, and my knees were really starting to give out. The very last portion of the hike is doooown into the Kalalau valley, which was tough on my knees. But we had to keep going, so we did. We didn't have any time to stop for pictures any more, as dusk was approaching fast. We finally entered the valley just as the sun went down, and barely had time to revel in the fact that we had *made* it before we immediately went to work putting up our tent (in the dark). We ate a quick dinner (we opted not to pack a stove in the interest of weight, so all our food was cold stuff) and got ready for bed as fast as we could. We had to refill and purify our water (which we had done a few times on the trail too), and learned that the waterfall in the Kalalau valley is a very popular hangout spot for frogs--Kevin had to dodge them everywhere as he waded over to the falls. When that was done, we laid down to the sounds of HUGE crashing waves.

I was actually rather worried at this point, because my knees had gotten so weak by the end of the day's hike, and I had two large blisters. I was thinking it might be better to rest a day in the valley before heading back out again, but Kevin REALLy wanted to get back that nice bed in the vacation rental. Plus (and this was the clincher), the forecast was for heavy rain to start in the afternoon the next day. The Kalalau trail crosses many little streams and three bigger rivers. (Well, okay, they are actually streams too, but in New Mexico, we'd call them rivers.) The "rivers" often swell up with heavy rains and become very dangerous (they sweep you out to those dangerous seas that the sign was warning about), so they can become impassable to hikers--we didn't want to risk getting stuck in the valley for several days, so we decided we'd better head out early in the morning. So it was with a little bit of dread of the next day's journey that I went to be that night. But we slept pretty deeply, in our sleeping bag liners, but without sleeping bags (no point in bringing those!)

Hawaii Day 2: Who knew there was a Grand Canyon in Hawaii?

Early, very early, the day after we arrived in Honolulu, we set out again to catch a morning flight from Honolulu to the island of Kauai. Kauai is the oldest of the major Hawaiian islands, known as the "Garden Isle" because it so wet and green. Since it is an old island (the volcanoes on it are long dead), it has had lots of time for erosion to make amazing canyons and cliffs. Kauai is less populated (except by chickens--more on that later), slow paced, and spectacularly beautiful.

Once we arrived at the airport (a very open-air building, by the way--kind of strange that birds can fly in and out around the gates!), we picked up our rental car. They told us they were having a manager's special and for $5 a day more, we could upgrade from our compact to a convertible Mustang. We jumped at it, and were glad we did--it definitely made viewing the scenery that much better (at least, when it wasn't raining it did.) We didn't get any photos of our sweet ride, though--sorry.

We set out at once for the Waimea Canyon, which is sometimes called "The Grand Canyon of Hawaii." It really did look a lot like the Grand Canyon, except, well--greener. We drove around these windy roads to the very end of the road, where there is this overlook that is supposed to give a breath-taking view of the Kalalau beach (where we'd be hiking to later on in the trip). However, to the right is all we saw. I even followed the advice I read to get there early in the day before the fog rolled in...ah, well. We decided to take a short nap while we waited to see if the fog would clear (we were still tired from that 4am taxi ride), but alas, it only got worse. A second overlook was a tad better, but not much.

So we gave up on the coast overlooks and decided to get back to the canyon. Along the way, we met many MANY wild chickens. They are everywhere in Kauai (well, all of Hawaii really, but especially Kauai). This becomes a problem at 5am when the roosters start crowing, but actually they didn't bother us too much.

Anyways, we did a short hike (2-3 miles or something) along a ridge, which yielded many amazing views. (It was pretty chilly at first, though--I didn't expect to be wishing for a heavier jacket in Hawaii!) We hiked until we reached a little waterfall, a pool, and then further on a HUUUUGE water fall (which we were at the top of.) You can't see much of it in this first picture, since we were at the top, but later we saw it from an overlook across the way and you could see the whole length of it.

We also stopped and took some pictures at a few drive-up overlooks. Once we were done with those, we decided to start the long-ish drive *all* the way around to the other side of the island (no roads go across the island, only around the outside), where our vacation rental was and where we'd start our backpacking adventure the next day. We reeeeally needed to rest up from that, so we bought some groceries, had a simple dinner, and lazed around until turning in for an early bedtime. (We watched a little Cosby Show on the giant flat screen TV first, though!)

A word about our vacation rentals. I am very proud of the nice places we were able to stay and the work I put into finding them. I may have mentioned this before, but I have learned to really love planning vacations--I love finding awesome places and getting good deals. So I have to talk about these rentals because I spent hours picking the perfect ones. We scored really good prices by using vrbo.com, which I highly recommend. This first place was supposed to be just a studio apartment, but the owner ended up upgrading us to the larger one for free. So we paid just $105 a night (including taxes) for this amazing place with a full kitchen, jetted tub, super comfy bed, loft, outdoor roof patio/sun bed thing--the works! And, the best part was that the owner essentially gave us 3 nights for the price of 2, since we left for our overnight backpacking trip--we stayed there before and after the hike and she didn't charge us for the night in between. Sweet!

Our Hawaiian Holiday--It starts...

All right, dear friends! I'm starting my story of our now 2 months old trip to Hawaii-yay! For my blog, I will probably bore you with all the details--we may later make a "prettier" blog with pictures and minimal description, so if you want to wait for that one, I can't blame you. But if you want all the nitty-gritty details, read on! I am just going to post a day at a time, so this could time me a while to get the whole thing done. Of course, feel free to skip the words and look at the pictures. :)

We left for Hawaii VERY early in the morning on a Tuesday (after staying up VERY late to finish packing!). It happened to be just a few days after my birthday, and also just a few days after numerous stressful work and church-related special events. I guess my immune system was rather worn down, because on Monday night, I found my

self coming down with a cough, AND I found my gums getting infected. (Ever since I had my wisdom teeth out after they were horribly infected, my gums get infected every now and then if they get scratched or something. It’s not like gingivitis--I PROMISE I brush and floss!) In the past when this happened, it kept growing worse until the dentist prescribed antibiotics. So on Tuesday morning, I’m feeling fairly crappy from the cough thing and getting worried about my teeth—not that they were very bad, but I was afraid they’d get worse and worse and end up with a problem in the middle of our backpacking trip or something.

Kevin and I both flew out of Peoria, IL, which is about 1.5 hours away from our house. However, since our tickets were both frequent flier, we had to go with 2 different airlines, so we left on 2 different planes. I went through Chicago, and Kevin went through Dallas. I had a 3 hour layover in Chicago, and to my relief and happiness, I discovered there is a doctor's clinic *inside* O'Hare airport, and they saw my mouth and prescribed penicillin (and then gave it to me)! So that was quite a relief. I still felt rather yucky on the looooong ride from Chicago to Honolulu, but I was less worried.

I arrived a couple of hours before Kevin, and our plan was that I would go check into our hotel and Kevin would come on a later shuttle and meet me there. I had originally intended to walk down to Waikiki beach immediately after checking in, but the shuttle took longer than expected to get to the hotel, plus it was drizzly outside and I still felt sickish, and I was soooo tired from the traveling...so I just stayed in the room and read my book. At least we had a (TINY) balcony--couldn't see the beach from it, though. Only the crazy expensive hotels on Waikiki have ocean views. Our hotel room was about $100 for the night, which for Honolulu is very inexpensive. It was fine, but very small with uncomfortable beds. Luckily, we were just there one night, though.

When I first walked up to the hotel, I was astounded to find that the lobby was totally open-air and had no walls or doors at all. There was a roof, but one whole wall was open to the air. I marveled over this, but I had yet to learn that half the buildings in Hawaii are like that--including parts of the airports, actually!

Kevin arrived a couple of hours later, and we went to find something to eat. We didn't feel like walking very far, so we just found a close place, which happened to be TGI Friday's. Same menu as in Illinois, but about twice as expensive! (All the food is crazy expensive in Hawaii, including at the grocery store--we're talking $8 a gallon milk!) But, it filled us up and that was what mattered. We were very exhausted from our flights (and the whole non-sleeping thing the night before the flight), and went straight to bed, after ordering our taxi for 4am (!!) the following morning. Sheesh! Who planned this itinerary anyways? ;)

So all in all, the first day was not so fabulous. I did see a rainbow right after my plane landed, but that was about it for enjoying paradise so far. But it was all uphill from there, I assure you.

P.S. This picture isn't actually from this day, but I don't have any from that day, and all this boring text requires *some* visual break, so there you go.

Do you ever get so behind on something that everyday it gets to be a bigger and bigger task and you have a harder and harder time thinking about digging in and getting started because it's too daunting? Yeah, that's how I'm feeling with my blog. WAY behind. I *still* haven't written about my Hawaii trip, and now there's also Christmas and New Years and...well, you get the idea. So, I hereby give myself permission to talk about things out of order. If I don't, I may never get started because there's a lot of catching up to do. I put this token beach picture in at least, and now I will proceed to tell you some stuff that happened yesterday.

Yesterday morning I was walking in the church parking lot carrying in six grocery bags full of bagels and cream cheese for a stake young men/young women volleyball activity when suddenly I found myself biting it hard, elbow first, on the ground. In my defense, there was at least a half inch of solid ice (thank you, Illinois crazy winter full of freezing rain--how is freezing rain even possible, by the way? The temp is WAY below freezing, shouldn't it be snow? Somehow the water supercools and stays liquid--at least until it impacts and then it instantly freezes. WEIRD. Crazy stuff like that does NOT happen in New Mexico. Or Utah.) But in my, uh, non-defense, I had just watched a bunch of other people slipping around on the ice (none of them fell though) and I knew to be careful. The same bunch of people all watched my fall...and then, I felt dumb.

But, I did get a very cool bruise on my elbow from the ordeal. I tried to take a picture, but my camera is out of batteries. :(

Okay, gotta go eat dinner--you'll all have to make do with this little tidbit for a little while at least.

T-minus 2 days and counting?

Hmmm, so obviously I didn't finish this post before we left for Hawaii. Now it's T-plus a lot of days and counting! Oh well. I'm too lazy to waste all this work typing up a blog and then not use it..so I'll just finish it up and post it anyway.

I've almost made it to vacation time! Yay! The last two weeks have been seriously crazy. Last weekend our stake hosted a tri-stake activity for the youth 14 and up for 5 hours. Since I'm in our stake YW presidency, I was one of the people planning stuff, and feeding 300 people dinner! It was crazy, but it went well, and I'm glad it's over. AND, my symposium on campus yesterday was crazy too, but it also went well and is now over! I only have one big thing left before we leave for our trip: our lab is getting inspected by the university's chemical safety people tomorrow! Remember how I wrote about the chemical spill we had a while back? Well, apparently we triggered a "follow-up" check to see why we had these problems. I'm actually kind of happy that we're getting inspected, because it might just force some of my labmates to start being more responsible...

I have no pictures to post today, but don't worry--I'll be posting lots of pictures of paradisical glory soon. :) But, I did get tagged by Beth for another one of these crazy memes or whatever they're called. I'm feeling less contrary than sometimes, so I guess I'll answer it. But, I must warn you that my answers will most likely be boring. There's supposed to be Eight things about Eight things, but I reserve the right to not finish the lists if I can't think of 8.

1. 8 TV shows I watch
Ha! Boring right off the bat: I hardly ever watch TV. We don't have cable, and only get one fuzzy channel with the antenna. But, I will answer which shows I *used* to watch:
1. the Price is Right--this one I rarely missed growing up. I used to dream of being called to "come on down" the aisle!
2. Bob Ross's Joy of Painting--despite the fact that Bob (may he rest in peace!) didn't show any *real* painting techniques, he sure was fun to watch and inspired me to learn how to paint!
3. Dark Wing Duck--a favorite one as kids. What a classic.
4. Thunder Cats....ho!
5. Reading Rainbow--oh man, I can't believe I almost forgot about this one!
6. Square One. This was a truly great show, and helped make me the nerd I am today!
7. NPR--okay, so this is not a TV show. But is the program I most regularly tune into these days. I usually listen to NPR on my way to and from school.
8. ER--in college I watched this fairly often with Alicia

2. 8 Favorite Restaurants
1. Duke's on Waikiki beach! my newest fav
2. Chilli Works in Los Alamos (for breakfast burritos)
3. Ruby Tuesdays--love their garden bar!
4. Red Lobster--my mom used to take me here when we went to Albuquerque together
5. Kennedy's in Urbana (a really nice restaurant that I mostly only go to when I go to dinner with invited University guests and the university pays the tab.)
6. Biaggis--a nice Italian restauraunt not too far from Kennedy's
7. Ottavios in Provo
8. that one Thai place right next to Regency Apartments. What was that called again? I liked that place.

3. 8 Things that Happened Yesterday

Hmmm, should I write about yesterday, or about the day before I first started this entry? I guess yesterday, since my memory doesn't go back that far
1. I went to the doctor because my ear was hurting
2. I deposited a check at the Credit Union (it took forever!)
3. I slept in reeeeally late--combination of still being in Hawaii in my biological clock, and being kind of sick
4. I ate a lot of yogurt
5. I watched the First Presidency's Christmas Devotional for FHE (we forgot to watch it on Sunday--woops!)
6. I ordered some stuff on barnes and noble's website, but then tried to cancel my order when the confirmation email said it was backordered, and had to call in twice and ask for a manager before they would finally help me.
7. I read some Christmas letters from family
8. I did NOT do the laundry, even though I should have (I'd doing it today, though. Luckily, things hadn't *quite* reached critical laundry mass.)

4. 8 Things I’m looking forward to
Darn, this one was going to be easy back when I first started writing this--I was going to list Hawaii things I was looking forward to. Hmmm, I think I'm still going to put that list--things I *was* looking forward to (and am now happily looking back on)
1. Seeing my family for Thanksgiving
2. Watching the ocean and eating pineapple...for thanksgiving dinner!
3. hiking along the Na Pali coastline on the "Garden Isle"
4. seeing real live lava in person
5. being warm!
6. Falling asleep to the sound of the surf
7. Watching professional surfers on the giant waves
8. learning about Polynesian culture...and FOOD

5. 8 Things on my Wish List
1. A washer and dryer
2. A dish washer
3. A garbage disposal. I should have put this one higher on the list--I'd rather have a dispoal than a dishwasher if I had to choose between the two!
4. A house! Or at least a second bedroom in our apartment
5. A Ph.D.
6. A piano
7. Beautiful scenery to look at out my window
8. Central air conditioning (well, not right now, but in general we would really like to have that!)

6. 8 Things I Love
1. Kevin
2. my other family members
3. dark chocolate
4. step aerobics--does that make me weird? When I first started out, I was a total klutz, but now that I've done it for a long time, I love exercising in this way--the choreography keeps my mind busy so I forget that I'm tired.
5. good health
6. pain killers--I'm sooooo glad someone invented these!
7. going on vacation
8. my kitchenaid food processor

7. 8 Things I Can’t Stand
1. Girls who act dumb to attract boys
2. Cloudy skies--I hate it when I see no blue for days on end!
3. Exreme humidity
4. research projects that never work
5. not knowing how to help someone you love
6. beets. Yuck.
7. how fast my giant bushy eyebrows grow back after plucking
8. waiting in airports

8. 8 People I’m Tagging
Ummm, I don't think even 8 people read my blog! I guess it will have to be 8 things about 7 things...But I guess I will informally tag people reading my blog who haven't already done this one.

Hawaii and Halloween

Okay, okay--everyone keeps telling me I need to post more pictures, so I've overcome my laziness for today and actually uploaded one. This is at our church "Trunk or treat" on Friday night. As of Thursday night, I still hadn't put together a costume or even thought of an idea. So we ended up throwing together some stuff at the last minute and going as Tacky Tourists.

Which, as it turns out, is kind of relevant right now, because Kevin and I are leaving for Hawaii in two weeks! (We hope not to be too tacky there, though.)

Why are we going to Hawaii, you may be asking. Well, my sister Heidi's husband is a professor at BYU-Idaho, and he just happens to be doing a sabbatical thingy this semester and is teaching at BYU-Hawaii just for a few months. We also happened to have a bunch of frequent flyer miles, due to Kevin's numerous flights for conferences (most of which are in Europe) for his research, plus an American Express card we have that we can accrue miles with. So, as it turned out, we had enough miles to fly to Hawaii for free! (Well, almost free, we had to buy the last few miles because we didn't have quite enough...And, we have to fly on 2 different airlines, but at least the flights are almost the same times) BTW, it only takes 35,000 miles to fly to Hawaii, which is really not bad considering it takes 50,000 to fly to Europe, yet the airfare to Hawaii is usually just as expensive as to Europe.

So, we decided we couldn't pass up this opportunity and we'd better do it! We decided to go around Thanksgiving time, but since we were using miles, we were limited on our choices of dates...which means we ended up having to spend longer in Hawaii than the 1 week we were originally thinking of. (I know--darn!) So we're leaving in just a couple of weeks! It's crazy, because we planned this all months and months ago, and I've sort of had it way in the back burner for a long time, and now it's suddenly almost upon us!

The downside is that we have sooooo much to do before we leave! Kevin has two paper deadlines, I have a grant renewal deadline, plus some experiments that have to get done asap. Plus lots of church activities, etc. AND, there's an all day Symposium on campus that I am in charge of just a few days before we leave. So, by then we'll really need a vacation!

We're way excited. A year and a half ago, I went with Kevin to Germany (he had a conference there, so his way was paid by Purdue. I paid my own way and just tagged along for fun.) It was SUCH an awesome trip (you can read my blog from it here) , and I discovered that I really like to plan vacations! I'm thinking that I maybe should have been a travel agent for a living. :) I think I enjoy planning the perfect itinerary *almost* as much as actually going there.

I'm sure we'll do a similar vacation blog like we did for our Germany trip, but I won't promise that it will be done until we get back!

Tagged?

Being new to this whole blog thing, I'm not quite clear on this whole "tagging" idea. In fact, I generally decide not to do stuff like that I guess because I am too lazy to type out answers and because I am too ornery. But this time, Alicia says I will be "RECOMPENSA!" if I don't do this tag thing. Now, I don't know what "recompensa" actually means, but I'm pretty sure it's not going to be pleasant. Plus, this is Bingerang we're talking about. So I pretty much have no choice.

I guess I'm only supposed to use one word answers. Here goes!

1.Where is your cell phone? bag
2. Where is your significant other? meeting
3. Your hair color? Brown
4. Your mother? Angelic
5. Your father? Intellecutal
6. Your favorite thing? learning
7. Your dream last night? Failure
8. Your dream/goal? graduate!
9. The room you're in? living
10. Your hobby? Cooking
11. Your fear? spiders
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? mothering
13. Where were you last night? home
14. What you're not? early-bird (I hereby declare that hyphenated words only count as one)
15. One of your wish-list items? Ph.D.
16. Where you grew up? Geekville
17. The last thing you did? church
18. What are you wearing? skirt
19. Your TV? finicky
20. Your pet? nope!
21. Your computer? essential
22. Your mood? relaxed
23. Missing someone? family
24. Your car? well-used
25. Something you're not wearing? shoes
26. Favorite store? Target
27. Your summer? fast
28. Love someone? Kevin!
29. Your favorite color? Blue
30. When is the last time you laughed? today
31. When is the last time you cried? dunno
32. Listening to? silence
33. Waiting for? HAWAII!