Hawaiian beaches

We only managed to get to two beaches while in Hawaii. You'd think that being on an island with loads of highly-rated beaches, we'd manage more than that, but unbelievably...only two.

We went to Anaeho'omalu Beach (shortened to A'Bay by locals/tourists) on our second day on the island. I really liked it coz it was very calm and relaxing, it's not very wide but clear, clear water. The sand is not the white, powdery kind of sand, but like salt and pepper, much coarser. That's okay though, coz it means that it doesn't stick to you as much. I've taken a REAL close-up of my foot with the sand...just for fun (it's in sepia tone, so it's not really the right colour, but anyway...that's the texture of the sand). Rod doesn't like non-white beaches - he thinks that they look mucky. We spent about two hours on A'Bay before going back to the property for the usual 'owners update tour' thing.

There's just something relaxing about being on the beach listening to the sound of waves, either crashing or lapping at the beach. We fell asleep in no time. Here's the proof. He's wearing his new Oakley sunglasses which he bought on the first night - very pleased with them.

We didn't get to another beach until another day or two, as we went to the Volcano National Park the following day. And of course, the big UEFA Cup Final was on the morning after that, so no activities were planned for that day. Speaking of which, Rod managed to listen to the game online, as we couldn't find anywhere that would be showing such a non-American game as 'soccer', and it wasn't on the four ESPN channels that they have in the unit.

So after the game, we wanted to go to another beach (a non-mucky one) and I had found another three beaches close by to the property. Close in Big Island terms would mean about a 10- to 15-minute drive, including a two-mile drive out from the property to the main road! That's how spread out everything is. Anyway, we decided on going to Mauna Kea beach - apparently one of the best beaches for snorkelling, with powdery white sand, and voted by Conde Nast as one of the World's Best Beaches twice! We knew that they controlled access to the beach by handing out only a limited number of parking passes each day. Still, we thought we might have made it when we drove in, but apparently not. We missed getting in by ONE car. Can you believe it! ONE CAR! So we then chose to go further down the road (another 5 minutes by car) to Spencer Beach, which is also supposed to be good for snorkelling.

When we get there what do we find? "Spencer Beach Park is closed for annual renovations and cleaning!" ARGH! How is this possible that you're on an island and you're locked out from TWO beaches?!?! This is unbelievable. So we went to the third choice - Hapuna Beach. This one isn't that good for snorkelling, but still got pretty good write-ups. As you can see, it's not very calm, so obviously not so good for snorkelling. It's a long and wide beach, with clean white, powdery sand - just the kind Rod likes. We thought we should have brought the beach pod just for shade, but it wasn't too sunny. There was a lot of cloud cover which is quite a relief every now and then.

The water isn't very deep, except when the waves come over. So I kept to a safe depth of about waist-high, which sometimes came up to shoulder-height if a big wave comes in. It's obviously a popular beach with families and 'newbie' surfers. We saw a group of them with their bodyboards, waiting for a 'mini-wave' to come in so that they could surf it. We walked from one end to the other - not as big a beach as Karon in Phuket, but still a nice walk.

We had another free afternoon a couple of days later after our snorkelling trip and thought we could give Mauna Kea beach another go. We drove up expectantly - after all, it was nearly 3pm in the afternoon. Surely people would have left by now...but...noooooo! The sign "Beach Parking Full" was still up. But wait...there are cars driving OUT from the gates! Which I indignantly pointed out to the guard and he laughed at me. Said that they were just 'workers'. Yeah right. So no go on Mauna Kea again. And we're leaving tomorrow, so I guess we wouldn't be able to visit Mauna Kea beach this trip. We head back to Hapuna Beach, which is really quite a nice beach. We were just disappointed that we couldn't visit another. Anyway, here's a photo of our car just before we left Hapuna Beach. It's in sepia tone again, but it's a white car so it'd still look pretty much the same in colour.

We'd have to go back to the Big Island again to give the other beaches a go!

Arriving @ Big Island

When the plane came in to land, it looked like we were going to land on a strip of volcano rock, it was strange. Everywhere around the tarmac looked like old lava flow, but it could be my imagination. After listening to Rod complain about Japan Airlines for the last 16 or more hours, I was so relieved to finally get to Kona airport. It's got to be the smallest international airport I've ever landed in, not that I've been to many. But seriously...we landed, walked across the tarmac, walked into a TENT, got stamped and walked out, collected our bags, and we're done! That's got to be a lot easier than going through LA airport for one. Anyway, we had rented a car so we get on the shuttle that takes us to the car rental office, and we get stuck behind a Japanese couple who were being spoken to very slowly and loudly, and behind an American Chinese-HK couple who were only able to make decisions when they are at the desk, have about 5 minutes discussing every question that was asked to them, with American Chinese girl hemming and hawing about whether they should rent the car for one day or two. ARGH!

Eventually, we get served and got the usual up-selling question of "I noticed you've only booked a compact car. Would you like to upgrade this to a bigger car (even though I can see that there are only two of you and the size of the car is irrelevant but I have to ask it because it's in my customer service manual)? I can give you a really good deal on a convertible?" Being the practical person that I am, I opened my mouth to say "No thanks" but got beaten to it by Rod who said, "Yeah sure!" So girl says, "Which car would you like? I have a Ford Mustang or a Chrysler Sebring for the same price of $XX!" Rod looked at me and said, "Well, Chrysler is our Client (even though we've not done any work for them for the last year) and they were going to bring the Sebring into Singapore..." and then turned to the girl to say "We'll take the Sebring". Err...okay...nevermind what I think! We end up paying about $200 more than what I had estimated because we also rented a GPS unit.

But to be honest, when we got to the car...it is GORGEOUS...and I've never really been in a big convertible before, so I suppose it was a good decision after all. And as everyone keeps saying "The US$ is soooo cheap now!". We struggled to put our cases into the boot because most of it is 'saved' for the hood, so we ended up having the two big suitcases in the back seat. It's about a 20-minute drive from the airport to the hotel on a straight road, and it's a bright sunny morning, so down goes the hood and we're off! It's pretty cool to be in a convertible, I must say! Here's our view from the front of the car...although some days it did cloud over later in the afternoon/evening.

We got to the hotel pretty early, and as expected, room's not ready for check-in yet. Sigh. I thought we might get away with being 'elite'...which Rod thinks is the answer to all things. Anyway, we managed to get two loungers on the lawn area near the pool, so we went to sleep for about an hour. But what with being in the shade and with the wind blowing the whole time, it got just a bit too chilly to be comfortable. So we eventually got up and walked to the Hilton Hotel down the road to warm up. We were told that the hotel is on over 60 acres of land - I don't know how big that is in metric terms, but I know that 1 acre is big, and so 60+ acres must be huge. Well we got there and they have a tram AND a boat that takes you through the whole property, so there you go...huge.

We took the tram to one end of the property for some lunch and then took the boat back to the reception. It's much nicer on the boat - they have both covered and semi-covered boats. Very relaxing. There is a lagoon for swimming and snorkelling, as well as a Dolphin Quest on the property. They have about 4 pools, and numerous restaurants that are supposedly very good (based on reviews on TripAdvisor!). This is the lagoon, from the reception area just after we got off the boat. The property is so big that we never even got to explore the other half of it by the time we left! Apparently they have an Asian-Polynesian exhibit along the corridors of the entire walkway from one end to another that is worth about US$8million!!! Anyway, by the time we finished lunch and got back to the reception, we figured that our room's got to be ready by now, so we went out to wait for the free shuttle that runs from HGVC to the hotel and the shops. And waited. And waited. And waited. Eventually one of the valets asked us what we were waiting for, and then told us that we were at the wrong entrance for the shuttle! ARGH! So we walked back.

By now, our room or unit is ready for check-in, so we finally manage to get into the place, and WOW! It's really, really nice! There are two bedrooms (wasted on us), one master with ensuite and a double with a common bathroom. The kitchen was even better stocked than mine! So this is what they mean by being 'well-appointed' in their brochures. I said 'well-appointed' so many times that Rod was getting annoyed. The ensuite was huge with a tub (again, wasted on us) and a huge shower stall with double sinks. We really do need to get that if we ever get our own place! There's a huge deck big enough for two sun loungers and a round table with 4 chairs, and we can see the pool from the deck. This turned out to be a good thing because they had a couple of performances during the week that we could see and hear from the deck without having to crowd with the plebs. Haha.

We chill on the deck for another couple of hours - well, Rod chills while I unpack (okay, it doesn't take long, but still!). I had initially planned on going to the Hard Rock for dinner - stick with the tried and tested, right. But somehow we ended up going to Bubba Gump's (of Forrest Gump fame) for dinner instead, which we thoroughly enjoyed. I even managed to save room for dessert, which was a HUGE choc chip cookie that was served in a mini pan about 6" wide, a huge scoop of ice-cream, whipped cream, peanuts and drizzled with chocolate and caramel sauce. I wish I had taken a picture of it...it's got to be one of the BEST desserts I've ever had. Obviously I could only manage like half of it, it was so massive! I'll have to try to do this with my own cookies in future.

Of course I was the designated driver back. Not only do I have to worry about driving on the other side of the road, the drive back from Kona to HGVC is about half an hour on a stretch of road with no street lights. I think I've been spoiled with having lit highways back home, but it's kind of freaky with no lights in complete darkness. We did make it back safely of course.