South Shore

On our second morning the fucking rooster woke us up at 4:22am. At least he's consistent. Other roosters are further away and they crow one after another so the crowing slowly fades into the distance like the calls from muezzins at the break of dawn. By this morning I can tell our rooster's crow. He has a long drawn out finish with the tiniest yodel at the end. I'm beginning to hate Kauai.

After an early breakfast we head for Jen and Travis' place on the East Shore. From there, they lead us to the sunny dry end - the South Shore. Today's destination is Poipu beach - diametrically opposite the island from us. It has a child friendly beach, snorkeling, and a hotel beach bar with good drinks. Jen and Travis had scoped it out a few days ago.

We rented an umbrella because Carol is beginning to look like a lobster. The kids play. I snorkel. Travis helps Vivian and Evan boogie board. We stop for lunch at the hotel bar and Carol comments on the feral chickens that seem to crowd around us. We joke that they are upset because she has ordered chicken wings. Vivian tries to order octopus. I'm ready to grab a passing chicken by it's neck. At that point one chicken actually hops up on our table and for a second is on my plate but I let the opportunity pass.

Then Jo photographs the handstand scene. Looks easy but here's what it took to get us synchronized.

We spend the later part of the afternoon driving up the western edge of Waimea Canyon. It is amazing - about ten miles long and almost a kilometer deep at it's deepest, with the look of a Fauvist painting. It is a result of erosion caused by the Waimea river and rainfall at Kauai's second highest peak - Mount Wai'ale'ale. Lovely name and one of the wettest places on earth. The kids slept all the way up and part of the way down.

Home Beach

The house rooster woke us up at 4:23am. It felt like it was fucking crowing inside our heads. It wasn't far. The feral chickens of Kauai roost all over the island. This family roosts in a tree at about the same height as our open bedroom windows about six feet from our eardrums. After a few aborted attempts to try to get back to sleep by covering our heads with pillows, Jo and I gave up. It is past 8am in Texas anyway. Beach time. The kids soon wake up too.

At sunrise the surf was enormous at "our beach" - fifteen foot tunnels of turquoise their tops whipped into white frenzy by a fresh northern breeze. The breakers smashed into the narrow steep sandy beach and everything looked very pretty but uninviting. The kids climbed up on a ledge on this huge tree to get a better view. An old local haole lady walked by and yelled at Jo to make sure the kids didn't get down on the beach. "They will be swept away." And that was all before breakfast.

 

We returned home and Vivian and Evan took me on a "tour" of the yard, pointing out various flowers (hibiscus, ginger), and trees (ti, banana, coconut palm, towering crotons) and then we had a relaxing breakfast on the front deck while we waited for Jen and Travis to show up.

By mid-morning we were ready to tackle the beach again. The tide had gone out and a small reef was visible a few yards out. The water on this side of the reef was considerably calmer but the kids could still only get into ankle deep water and everyone had to keep an eye out for bigger waves that periodically smashed into the beach and obliterated our sand castles and made Jo and Jen squeal and grab their towels to keep them dry. This was a neighborhood beach, so we didn't expect crowds, but I was still unprepared for how empty it was. In a quarter to half mile stretch that we could see there were three other people sitting, and two couples and an aging dog walked by - during the rest of the day.

Because of the four hour time difference, it felt much later when we left the beach late in the afternoon. Dinner was fresh fish. Travis and I had to make a wine run to the nearest grocery store at Hanalei - only a five mile drive away made particularly slow and interesting due to the many one-way bridges on the historic Kuhio Highway. After dinner, Evan and Vivian provided the entertainment - Vivian made things out of palm leaves for poor Evan to model - which he still does very willingly. And then I think we were all in bed well before 8pm. Ready to kill some roosters if they wake us up before we are ready.

Vacation

Getting to Hawaii seemed to be easier. A brief stop to change airplanes in California and then you find yourself with a lei around your neck on a beach somewhere. This time the trouble started early. Jo decided to buck the trend of not planning till the very end by buying plane tickets six months early. Then, almost immediately she started getting weekly emails about how the flight had changed till the itinerary was eventually unrecognizable and it would take us far longer to get there. A week before we were due to leave, Jo realized she could get a full refund from the airlines if we decided to cancel because the itinerary had changed so much. So she booked us a second set of tickets that got us to Hawaii  faster. Then she found a third slightly better itinerary, so she booked that too. Then she cancelled the second and I called and cancelled the first, and we were set. Itinerary #3 wasn't great but still better than the others. We'd leave home at about 5:30am on Wednesday and get into our rental at 11:30pm that day - which is about 3:30am the next day in Austin - so about 22 hours larer.

The flights were all on time. Though it felt like we had made no progress at all when several hours later we were still in Houston due to a long scheduled layover. But the kids got a chance to eat a real breakfast and run around. Here, they are hamming it for the camera at the Cat Cora's Kitchen in Terminal E.

Then, for the next leg, a passenger on the seat behind Carol got into it with an attendant because she refused to put her small non-roll-on luggage below by her feet and instead wanted her bit of overhead space. At LAX we ate an early dinner and then Vivian used Grandma's cane to practice Tae Kwondo. The kids read. They snacked. They asked how much longer several hundred times. Then we boarded our last leg and found a passenger sitting in Jo's seat. She eventually had to be threatened with evection from the plane by the ticketing agent before she finally gave up and went to her assigned seat so Jo could sit.

We landed in Lihue after dark, rented a Jeep and drove off towards the even darker sparsely inhabited North Shore. After one drive-by we located the rental and we carted the kids up the stairs and into their beds and I opened a bottle of wine.

Suprise!

On Saturday afternoon at about four thirty Jo told Vivian that she and I needed to go pick up pizza for dinner. Since the Marco's just up the street from us closed, we have to drive several miles to the next nearest one. Vivian didn't bat an eyelid when I picked up three large pizzas. Then I stopped at a Randall's where we have never shopped before and Vivian and I bought three Ben & Jerry ice creams and a bag of chicharrónes.  Having wasted enough time I headed back towards home. At the last minute I turned into Ramsey and drove by Grandpa's house to "check on it". Some more time wasted while I glanced down at text statuses that Jo had been sending me. Finally I turned into our street and saw that I needed a quick distraction. "Vivian - look over there and tell me if Jonathan is working on his front porch please".

"Yes - both  he and Amy are outside working"

"Thanks"

"Dad - you drove past our house!"

"Duh - silly me. I'll turn around at the end of the block"

And I drove as slowly as I could till everything looked clear in the rear view mirror and then I turned back and drove home. Vivian walked in with a pizza box on her head. The front of the house was empty. I followed her in.  "Hmmm - where did Mommy and Evan go?"

At which point Jo, a few other parents, Evan, and four girls from Vivian's school jumped out from behind the kitchen island and yelled "Surprise!" Jo managed to somehow capture the moment on the camera. 

It was a surprise sleepover for Vivian. She isn't going to be in town for her birthday and didn't expect us to do anything the week prior to her birthday so it was a full and complete surprise. How Jo managed to pull it off I don't know. How Vivian didn't smell about a dozen rats and an equal number of fish from my behavior in the prior half an hour is a testament to her trust, gullibility, and a perfectly Vivian centric world where the actions of others have little meaning.

The parents left after a glass of wine and Jo and I resigned ourselves to an evening of constant chatter. All six of them - the four guests, Vivian and Evan, spoke at the top of their voices the whole time. We took them to Ramsey hoping to tire them and their jaws out. Didn't help a tiny bit. As this group invaded the park, younger girls stared at them in wonder and thought "Wow - I'm going to be old enough to do this someday"

Pizza for dinner. Puppy chow for snack. A movie for a couple of hours. Then time to chill. They had beds for five set up upstairs. At about 10pm Jo and Evan retreated to our bedroom, threw Crazy out and shut the door. Crazy and I worked on my computer quietly till about midnight, the silence punctuated by occasional but more often frequent squeals and giggles from upstairs. I yelled a  couple of times for them to quieten down and turn off the lights.

At about 1:30am most of the girls with Vivian in the lead trooped downstairs and said:

"We can't go to sleep. We have tried for many hours. What should we do?"
"Turn off the lights, shut up, and see what happens" I said.
"What if we still don't fall asleep?"
"It isn't that hard. You do it every night."

They did fall asleep finally. And awoke slightly before 7am looking like shit. I bought two dozen tacos from the Shack and the kids parked themselves in a dazed state in front of the TV till their parents arrived to take their zombies home.

I don't know what they were watching when I came in to take this photo at about 9am. Whatever it was, it was quite disturbing by the looks.