The bad news is first. I have at least 10 bites. Why oh why did I forget to reapply the mosquito repellant yesterday afternoon? The mosquito repellant I used said that it lasts for 8 hours. And I have to give it to them, I think it did last 8, but not one minute more. I applied early in the morning before we began our hike on the Kalalau Trail along the Na Pali coast. Then, they started attacking me in the afternoon as we were coming back from the Queen's Baths. Which by my calculation was about 8 hours and 1 minute later, and I assume some mosquitoes were hovering near me just waiting for the "Open for Business" sign on my veins. I forgot the Afterbite, but given that the active ingredient is ammonia, I have simply bathed my legs in the Windex under the sink in our condo. It's not quite strong enough, but it's better than nothing!
The good news is, everything else has been fun, relaxing and exciting. Yesterday was our North Shore day (although we will probably have one more of those), which is where the trail starts and also where the Queen's Bath is. The trail was a bit crowded for our tastes, but the beach at the end was fun and the surf was pretty intense. We then met Breean and Sam and crew at Tunnels Beach. It's a beautiful beach, although I didn't see any tunnels. Then off to lunch together in the small town of Hanalei. I got passion fruit juice. Yay! Queen's Bath was also cool, with extensive rock cliffs (so it's like La Jolla Cove, but with lava rock instead of regular sandstone). and the intense surf threatening to take unsuspecting tourists out.
We got rejected at a recommended shave ice place (it was closed, even though it should have been open according to its cardboard sign. Hey, it's Hawaii!), so we stopped at our new little shopping center where we knew there was a shave ice place. I thought it looked commercial and gimmicky and didn't expect much. However, this was really good, and based on the book's criteria, I feel they will rate it very highly in their next edition. It has ice cream (macadamia nut!) below the shave ice, which was very finely shaved. The best part was a "sweet cream cap" they put on top of the flavored ice. Jeff and I shared one and were loving it. Jeff declared we would have to get one every day for the rest of our trip. An hour or so later, when we were coming down off the sugar high, we weren't so sure. In fact, it was so filling that I didn't even eat dinner. Maybe next time we can get the child-size one.
Today we were pretty lazy. First of all, it's like I'm an actual lawyer already, working on vacation! My client needs lots of attention. I have been intending to write a post about my experience so far, so more on that later. But, it's nice to be sort of lazy too. We've played some board games and read and watched turtles from our deck, then went to pick up take out for lunch from a "locals" snack shop. I had the Hawaiian plate lunch and Jeff had a teri beef burger (that's teriyaki). I've not been a fan of plate lunches at like L&L back on the mainland, but a real Hawaiian plate lunch is a lot better! I'll post a pic in the album we make.
A bit later we decided to do some snorkeling off our shore. We saw some nice fish, but nothing too crazy, and the water didn't have great visibility (we did read that Kauai is less great than like Maui for snorkeling and diving, which does seem true so far). As we swam in, I ended up kinda coming in through the side through a sea of grass chunks floating around. Suddenly, there was a turtle face about 4 inches from my face. Naturally, I started screaming and pulled up out of the water. Jeff thought I got stung by something and was really confused when I then put my head in the water again. But it was a turtle and I had to try to get a better look! But it was also for some reason terrifying, and I was still screaming through my snorkel at this point. I finally managed to stop and, breathing hard from all the screaming, I kept trying to catch another glimpse of the turtle. I did catch one, but it was brief. The grasses were just really thick and gross. We finally finished swimming in and what was once a deserted beach now had a small group. Apparently, my screams were like the mating call of the wild snorkeler. They all knew that meant I had seen a turtle and were summoned from all around the south shore. Very exciting. We've seen lots and lots of turtles snorkeling and diving over the years, and they are nearly a dime a dozen in Maui. But it is a whole other thing to not see on until it is less than a foot away from your face!
Speaking of other wildlife, we saw a wild pig on our first day down the dirt road to the south shore beaches. It ran across the road in front of our car. Cute little black guy. I didn't know there were wild pigs here and they are so funny-looking and ridiculous that Jeff and I were actually speechless for a few seconds after it made its break across the road. Ha!
Pictures and more details later. We are off to the Friday night art walk to meet the crew and hopefully find out about this passion fruit cheesecake that they have been raving about!
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