Eric Designs Jewelry

Saturday was a long day. First Zac’s cell phone alarm didn’t go off and we missed the sunrise. Even still it was cloudy so we couldn’t even see the sun, but we still experienced a beautiful sight.

We took a leisurely drive back to Hana. One side trip we took was down a narrow road to the coast that ended at a small state park. Cars at all the houses were parked very close to the very narrow road. We were too early to stop at the lava tube or the botanical gardens. There was no beach at the state park. There were a couple of fishermen and a couple boats in the water.

From there we started counting all of the one lane bridges. There were a total of 44, plus a couple of kiss your okole (Hawaiian for fanny) curves. This time we stopped at a few waterfalls. The first was at a small state park at about mile marker 23.

For the second waterfall, Zac and I had to hike upstream about a half mile. There we climbed over 30 feet of rocks to reach the pool at the base of the waterfalls. This was the place I slammed my toes into another rock. It looks good in this picture.

We stopped in Paia to do a little window shopping and have a later afternoon snack. We had an organic pizza backed in a brick oven. We had a bubbly little waitress from Arizona. She followed her girlfriend to Hawaiian last year and decided to stay.

There was a great surprise waiting for us when we got to the airport in Honolulu. Momi and the girls were at the gate when we arrived. It was a short lived reunion because Zac and I had to board the plane for Lihue. The seven girls missed their flight and instead of being on the flight before ours, were now on the one after ours. The airlines was able to get six of the girls on our flight, so Momi stayed behind.

When we arrived in Lihue we split into two parties. Wendy and Katie had their own place so they headed off to have a mother-daughter evening. I took Zac, Malia, Rebekah, Sarah, and Kaylee to Pizza Hut. After dinner we headed back to the airport to pick up Momi.

The drive to Hanalei took about 50 minutes. The house is huge and it would have to be to sleep our current group of 15. We stayed up to midnight sharing adventure stories and looking at pictures.