River's Biggest Fears

Until now we thought River's only fears were drains and cattle guards. Well boy were we wrong. Turns out an even bigger fear of hers, so it would appear, are these huge, banana shaped pods that fall off of a tree here that we haven't yet learned the name of (seen in image number 2). We noticed that she was unsure of them when we were walking to the beach one morning. When she noticed a pod on the sidewalk, she quickly moved to the complete opposite side of the concrete to avoid it. Carl and I, being the awful parents that we are, felt the urge to torment her a little. So we picked one up and set it next to her. She completely freaked out and jumped, and I do mean jumped, onto the grass. Little did she know, she landed right in a huge patch of them. I've never seen her leap so high as the moment she realized where she was standing. She panicked. We felt kinda bad for her, but it was REALLY funny.



Other than that she loves it here. The guys that share our property (from here on out known as Matt and Ryan) have 2 cats. For the last week River's been high-tailing it after them when she sees them. A couple of nights ago I was cooking dinner and I heard Carl whisper, "Stace, look at this." I turned around to see River sleeping on the tile and MashTun, one of the cats, was behind her sniffing her rear. We couldn't believe how brave the cat was. River bounced up when she heard my reaction to the sight, and the cat was out the door. We thought they'd never become friends, but today they semi- played together.

At lot of times during the day River comes back up stairs from playing outside and looks like this...

If I Were A Gecko...

If I were a gecko Carl would:

Worship the ground I walked on

Cherish my every move

Think I was adorable, even when croaking so loud
I keep him awake at night

Take pictures of me 35 times a day

Grab me and stare into my eyes

Pau Hana

Here in Hawaii, the word "pau" (pow) means done or over and "hana" means work. So, together they mean "after work." Stacey and I have been spending our pau hana time sitting on the old couch on our lanai, checkin out the view. Stacey has found a great website called Pandora that allows you to pick your favorite artist, and it automatically creates a station with alike artists. So we put on some good tunes and watch the sunset. The vog has created some strange, although beautiful sunsets. However, tonight was the first night that we actually watched the sun set into the water instead of a cloudy bank above the horizon. It was SPECTACULAR. I realize that a picture cannot do it justice, but here you go.

In these next two pictures you can see the lights at the north end of town. The bright white lights to the far right are on a soccer field. I know its kinda hard to see in the picture, but all of the street lights in Kona are yellow. This helps keep down the light pollution for the observatory on Mauna Kea. My first experience driving at night was strange, because it constantly feels like you are driving into a yellow traffic light!

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Ryan lent us his car.......

Last friday our roomate Ryan headed over to Oahu to spend some time with his girlfriend. Stacey asked him if he needed a ride to the airport, and he said that would be great. He told us he thought it would be a great opportunity for us to borrow his car and explore the island a bit. He had already offered to let us use it as soon as we arrived, but we were perfectly content with the semi-short walk to the grocery store. Besides that, a very nice local woman had given us a ride back home after seeing us carrying a ton of groceries, as well as having another person offer to give us a ride on a different trip (the attitude in Kona is very friendly). But with Ryan heading to another island, no one would be using the car. So we agreed to take him to the airport.

Well, we took the car up the hill a ways to participate in a "Hash House Harriers" run, which Stacey will soon tell you more about. On the way up the hill, we noticed a strange smell coming from the car, which worried me. When we stopped, there was a noticable amount of smoke coming from under the hood. We checked it out, and we couldn't tell where it was coming from. We drove it home later that evening and parked it in the driveway. The next morning we looked out to see a nice puddle forming under the car! After closer inspection, it seemed to be transmission fluid. Not good. We threw some kitty litter over the puddle to soak it up, and that is as far as we have gotten. Ryan's birthday was yesterday, so he decided we should wait til today (wednesday) to work on it. He was incredibly understanding and does not blame us at all. After all, he says he only paid $500 dollars for the car!

On a lighter note, here is a picture of the sunset we experienced last night. The "vog" coming from the volcano can sometimes block the sunset, but at other times it actually enhances it.

GECKO INVASION

So, one thing I was excited about when thinking of coming to Hawaii was all of the different plant-life and creatures that inhabit the island. I remember visiting my grandparents when I was a kid, and spending hours exploring. I was obsessed with catching all kinds of critters, including birds, mongoose, centipedes, etc.. I can also clearly remember an abundance of geckos crawling around at night eating bugs. The geckos I remember resembled the geckos we have in Texas. Small, almost transparent little creatures that could release part of their tail as a defense mechanism when threatened. But, almost immediately after arriving on the Big Island, I began to notice larger, green geckos with fat tails and red markings on their body. I knew that I had never seen a gecko like this before, for it would surely be something to remember. And strangely, these green geckos stayed out during the day. Last night I photographed this specimen as it was looking in our kitchen window.

As it came inside the window, I got a close-up photograph of it. If you ask me, these creatures are absolutely beautiful.

Apparently these critters are called "Gold Dust Day Geckos," and they come from Madagascar. The species is not native to Hawaii, and was supposedly introduced by a student at the University of Hawaii in 1974, when the student released eight of them that were originally kept as pets. The species is considered an "invasive" species, and could potentially upset the fragile ecosystem on the Hawaiian Islands. They consume bugs, pollen, nectar, and other geckos (which might explain why I have not seen any other types of gecko). They are everywhere in Kona, and they have been spotted on the East side of the Big Island, as well as on Oahu and Kauai.

These critters are everywhere, both outside and inside our apartment. We constantly have all the windows and doors open, so they come and go as they please. Which is really o.k. with us, seeing as how they eat all bugs at an alarming rate. Hawaiians consider these guys to be lucky, and so do we.

Every now and then you will hear them making a noise, called "barking," that sounds like a "kissing" sound. I guess that is how they communicate. Apparently males are extremely territorial.

Just to give you an idea how many there are, I was able to count at least 5 geckos from one position on the back porch in the span of about 30 seconds. Funny thing is, we have two cats roaming around, and according to the roomates, they have had an impact on the gecko population around our house. I can't imagine what it must have been like before the cats arrived.

For those of you planning on coming to stay with us sometime in the future, I guess you can consider yourselves warned. You will be forced to coexist with the "Gold Dust Day Gecko."

Kona Town

This view is looking back up Hualalai Rd from Ali'i Drive. Further up this road is where my grandparants used to live.

This is looking north down Ali'i Drive. This road runs through Kailua-Kona along the waters edge, and is something like 6 or 7 miles long.

There are a ton of little shops and places to eat along this road. And the view is great from every one of them.

Towards the north end of Ali'i Drive the water comes all the way up to the road. The view is incredible, and you can see all different kinds of tropical fish swimming in the crystal clear water.

Through my polorized sunglasses you can see through some of the glare on the surface. There are a ton of little yellow fish, called "Yellow Tang" that are swimming around. We can't wait till our snorkeling stuff shows up.

Our vehicles will be here the first of next month, along with all of the things we shipped. Then we will be able to explore some of the more remote spots on the Big Island.

hammock troubles

Well I thought I would make a quick post regarding a little hammock mishap that Stacey experienced just moments ago. As I am finishing a previous post on the blog, Stacey quietly made her way out to the lanai to sit in the hammock.

For some background info, the hammock hangs on two hooks that where installed by a previous tenant. But, when we are not using the hammock, it is more convenient to un-hook one side. I usually take the un-hooked side and hang it on a small nail near the other end of the hammock (marked by orange arrow). The blue arrow marks the hook that is identical to the other.

Shortly after Stacey headed outside, I heard a loud "thud" on the porch, and Stacey laughing. I come out to find Stacey laying on the ground. As I look up, I notice that she has taken the hammock off of the hook marked in blue, and connecting it to the opposite hook. Now the hammock is secure on one end, and hanging on a very old, rusty nail on the other. Obviously the nail was unable to hold poor Stacey.

Stacey was un-injured, luckily, because the hammock only sits about 1 foot off the ground. Here she is laying peacefully after we corrected the problem. And yes, I have her permission to post this!

Day at the beach

Stacey and I decided to spend some time on the beach today because the sun was shining, and it was a beautiful day. This particular beach is located next to the marina right in Kona. It is where several tourists spend time snorkeling and renting paddle boards and outrigger canoes.



This beach is about a 15 minute walk from our house. If you look in the background, the mountain you see is the volcano "Hualalai" and is the volcano on which we live. This year marks the 208th year since it's last eruption.

In this picture you can see a guy on a paddle board heading out. Eventually we will get one of these so we can paddle around and stay in shape.



This was the most white guy on the beach, and it happened to be me!

We're Here!!!!

On Tuesday, February 17th, Carl and I landed in paradise. And the best part is: we don't have to leave!!! I can't begin to tell you how excited and overwhelmed we are. Everything about our journey so far has been unbelievably perfect. Our landlords currently live in Seattle, but they have a large group of friends that live in Kona. Most of them are between the ages of 28-35, they go to a different beach on the island to camp at least once a month, they skate, surf, play games, and all kinds of cool stuff. A week or so before we arrived Melissa asked us if we'd like for one of her friends to pick us up at the airport, and of course we said yes. So when we arrived, Mike was waiting for us. He brought us to our new home, we dropped off our stuff, and we headed to the Kona Brewing Co. The 2 guys that live in the house we share a property with are the brew masters there, so we got a free pint and felt like locals within an hour of landing in Kona. Everyone we've met so far has been super cool. Last night Ryan, one of the brew masters, invited us to a poker party. We started around 7 and didn't quit til around midnight, and believe it or not I only lost $3. I bought in for $20 and walked with $17. Yay!

This is my view as I write this blog. Its taken from our lanai (porch). Its zoomed in a little, but not much. Our house is about 1/2 mile from the ocean. We're on a hill, so we have a perfect view.
This is a picutre of us on our lanai. Yes, Carl is wearing a hoodie. Believe it or not its pretty chilly here. We're really glad we brought our winter gear. During the day you definitely should wear shorts and t-shirts, but in the mornings and evenings the temperature really drops. Actually, right now its 1 pm, and I'm wearing a hoodie. We went for a walk earlier and were sweating, but once you get under the shade and in the breeze you cool off really fast.

When we landed at the Kona airport, which is spectacular by the way, Carl bought me this beautiful lei.

There is an awesome Farmer's Market by the water that we've been walking to every day to get our lunch. Before we moved here we had 1 of 2 reactions from most everyone we told we were moving to Hawaii: (1) that's so awesome! i wish i would have done something like that too. (2) its too expensive there. Well, our experience has been quite the opposite of the second statement thus far. Our rent is $300 cheaper than in New Braunfels- its a little smaller, but still cheaper. And the food at the market is CHEAP!!! A head of butter lettuce is $1, a box of cherry tomatoes is $2, humongous butter avocados are $1, yellow and orange bell peppers are less than $1, and the list goes on. All of you who buy those sorts of vegetables at the super market can understand my astonishment when I saw the prices. And to top it off, the produce is of such an amazing quality that you don't even need to use salad dressing. This is a picture of the salads we've been having every day for lunch. We bought some chopped macadamia nuts at the market to put on top as well.

We can't wait for all of you to be here in August!!!!

San Diego

My mom, Susan, Kennedy, and Oliver met us in San Diego for an exciting, action-packed 3 days. We went to SeaWorld, the world-famous San Diego Zoo, and a really awesome Mexican restaurant in Old Town twice. We really enjoyed hanging out with them, although it seemed super short.
Here we are playing on the bed.
This is on the train ride at the zoo. The San Diego zoo is way too huge to be able to tackle all in one day, especially with a 4 year old, so we opted to take a bus tour in order to see the whole park. Its definitely the way to go if you're ever there. We were able to walk around quite a bit too, but the ride was awesome. I took this photo of a laughing hyena because it is sleeping just like Dan and Becky's dog Jackson, and I wanted them to see it.

Road Trip

Stacey and I left for San Diego, California, at about 10am on Tuesday morning. We weren't sure where we would end up at the end of the first day, and the trip was quite entertaining. We headed west on I-10, and it wasn't long before we found ourselves driving into an incredible wind storm in Fort Stockton. The wind was a constant 50mph, with gusts into the 70's. It was hard to see at times because of all the dust in the air. After sitting it out in a convenient store parking lot for awhile, we finally decided to keep driving. It wasn't long before we were out of the storm, and the weather turned for the better.




Sheryl and Susan made reservations at the Hyatt on Mission Bay for all of us, including baby Oliver and Kennedy. The view from this 17th floor hotel room was amazing! Stacey and I are so lucky to have been treated so well by them.








This is the spectacular sunset that we experienced on the first night in San Diego.