The Hawaiian Hiatus: Part 3 – The Big Island

By Ryan LuckieUncategorized
This is Part 3 of our series documenting our 2017 Summer vacation to Hawaii.  For additional entries, click the links below.

Ryan & Amanda’s Hawaiian Hiatus – Part 1
Ryan & Amanda’s Hawaiian Hiatus – Part 2 – Haleakala National Park

The Big Island

Hilo

After spending two days on Maui we landed at Hilo on the Big Island.  We had an afternoon helicopter tour on our agenda but decided to get off the boat and explore some of the local beach parks a bit.  We got a cheap Uber to take us about 3 miles from the port to a string of black sand beaches along one of their main local roads.

Hilo and The Big Island, in general, were very relaxed and pretty.  The water was clear blue, the land was green, the rocks were black.   It lacked the magnificence and awe striking landscapes of Maui and Kauai (not yet covered in the blog), but it had its own charm.

Hilo is generally very overcast and wet, but we had a beautiful sunny day.

We found this turtle hanging out in the first park we stopped at.

 In the next park we found 3 more turtles.

We made our way back to the ship, grabbed lunch, and then in mid afternoon headed out for our helicopter tour.  After a fair amount of waiting around and safety videos we were ready to get going.

On our way to Kilauea, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, we got a preview of what it has been up to the past few years.  We got images of where it had burned and leveled neighborhoods and forests.  While much of the trip was like looking at a gigantic parking lot below, patches like this showed the before and after of the landscape.

After just a few minutes we reached the summit.

It was actually bubbling up quite good and was easy to see, although the photographs weren’t nearly as impressive.

After a few passes of the summit we headed out to the coast, where the lava is pouring into the ocean, creating an additional 20 acres of land each year.

Our shadow in some clouds below us.  The rainbow effect is not a camera / lens effect but is visible to the naked eye.

After leaving the coast we headed into the Hilo rainforest to check out some waterfalls.

Since we had an all cruise ship group and the port was just a mile from the airport our pilot did a fly by of our ship.

Back on land.

 That evening the ship sailed by the spot where the lava enters the ocean.

Kona

Kona is typically quite sunny, but we actually got a pleasant amount of comfortable shade, without getting rained on.   We started the day at Kona Joe coffee plantation.

They have some baby pineapples growing in their garden.

Coffee beans.  They are picked once they turn red. 

We next went to Original Hawaiian Chocolate, the first all Hawaiian Cacao Bean chocolate company.  (they do use imported Cacao butter from California)

We’ve had the pleasure of going on chocolate tours in St Lucia, Vermont, Asheville, and now Hawaii.  The owner of the business, on the far left, led the tour and was incredibly knowledgeable on the details of the biological processes taking place throughout the life cycle of cacao to chocolate.  We’ve learned a lot on every chocolate tour we’ve done, but this one in particular provided a lot of in depth scientific insight.

Baby cacao pods.

Mature cacao pods.

 After the Coffee & Chocolate tour was over we were dropped off in downtown Kona and we proceeded to the Kona Brewing Company for lunch. We grabbed a pizza and a few beers there before heading back to the ship.

Next up, our favorite island, Kauai.

One thought on “The Hawaiian Hiatus: Part 3 – The Big Island”

  1. Great fun for the two of you! We visited Oahu and Hawaii for our 35th anniversary and did some of the same things you enjoyed. I would like to spend more time on the international study of chocolate. 🙂 Blessings!

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