Glenda’s birthday was Tuesday – she’s 35 (as I will be in October) – and to celebrate she wanted to go to “East Side Show Room” Tuesday night.  We loved it.  Kaua’i is unbelievably gorgeous but Austin is unbelievably cool, eclectic, and artistic.  Its great to be home.

I just left an address to the Board of Big Brothers Big Sisters – I was asked to relay my experience as a former Little Brother.  What a tremendous organization BBBS is – I hope someday to volunteer as a big brother myself.

Lunch today was with Tricia Forbes, she directs the SIMS Foundation.  SIMS provides free and reduced-cost mental health care for Austin musicians, and I serve on their music advisory panel.   It was a terrific lunch and we plotted ways I might be of service in the coming year.

I had a great call with the owner of Trilogy Guitar (John Silva) in LA shortly after lunch – Trilogy will be supporting ACGS this year with a large advertisement and a sponsorship of our spring ensemble festival.  Yay.  Thank you John and Trilogy.

I had a delightful meeting this morning with a development whiz who might be helping us out at ACGS with some big events coming up.  More on that soon.

So what’s happening?  I guess I’m hitting highlights working backward?  Yesterday I had a great meeting with Suzanne Warmack over at KMFA.  I just love KMFA!  We talked about the new season – and I also got turned onto the great blog entry KMFA’s Dianne Donovan did on our June festival.  Thank you Dianne!  Speaking of Dianne – I got in the mail the CDs of the live broadcast she and Tony Morris hosted of Pepe Romero’s concert opening our fest.  They’re masterful!

And coffee yesterday morning was with PR whiz Molly Browning – who did PR for Austin Lyric Opera for 17 years.  She is a amazing person – and she’s gonna help out ACGS!

Tuesday (Glenda’s Birthday) was fun because we went to the Bauer House (the home of the UT System Chancellor) to meet Rod Caspers who runs system events.  We were there to plan our October party the Chancellor is hosting.  So exciting, its an amazing place and we are incredibly lucky.

Monday I met with Ed Fuentes, who is the director of the KLRU documentary on our June fest – we’re putting the last pieces in place – and I had a really stimulating talk with the President of Texas American String Teachers Association.  We’ll see where that leads (more news, perhaps, to come!).

Man, that is just a few highlights from this week – to say nothing of last!  A few unusual items from last week, lessee… We got word from our friends at the Alamo Drafthouse that we’re definitely on for a private viewing of the premiere of our documentary on September 30th.  I talked for an hour Friday with Alfred Foss – owner of Fingerstyle Magazine.  Had lunch with the Development Committee of Texas Choral Consort (where I serve) and came up with a near term development strategy.  Lunched with John Henry McDonald (super power for ACGS board) and Jim Rainbolt (JH’s friend, and development genius in Austin).  And sat down with Jacqui Schraad at the Heritage Society to talk about a new partnership we’re looking at launching in the spring with a series of salon concerts in historic homes.

Why list these meet ups?  Partly for my own records – it feels good to set it all down, and take a moment to remember it all.  But there’s a bigger and better reason.  It has to do with the spirit of Austin.  There is something incredibly special about returning home and being treated to a veritable flurry of contacts with so many people – all of whom are excited about doing great things for the community. All of whom are open to new ideas and willing to think creatively and generously.

Tomorrow Bill Ash, director of the St. Louis Guitar Society, flies in to Austin and we’ll spend the bulk of the day together talking about running a big guitar festival.  He thinks he may host the festival in St. Louis that we hosted here earlier this year – so hopefully I can help steer him a bit.

I’m teaching like a mad man.  The studio is totally full with around 35 contact hours.  So I’m on until 9PM Mon-Thur and I have 9-1 Saturday and 2-5 Sunday!  I enjoy it tremendously. Whenever I can squeeze in a spare hour, I’m writing feverishly on the online training program document for ACGS education.  This is our next strategic step, and we need to finish it out.

More soon.

Today was a whirlwind return to normal life – which is considerably quicker-paced than life on Kaua’i.

And even though we were mostly interested in Puka Dogs and snorkeling while there, several “businessy” things happened while we were away that are worth mentioning.

KLRU asked if we could meet today (that is, they asked 10 days ago if we could meet this morning) to do some final taping in our offices.  They are editing the documentary they made of our giant international festival – 32 hours of footage to be narrowed down into a 54 minute piece – and they had found the need for me to “frame” a few things to help with context and introductions.  So Ed Fuentes, the documentary’s director, came by the office today to film some segments, he also borrowed a guitar to take back to the studio with him for “credits” shots.  So if you ever see the documentary, you’ll know where the guitar came from!

Also while we were away, we asked if the Alamo Drafthouse would host our world-premiere viewing of said documentary on September 30th.  They will!  So I’ll be busily planning that event in the coming month – in addition to ACGS’ annual benefit concert to be held at Jeff and Gail Kodosky’s on September 18th.  That concert, incidentally, features my mentor from Oberlin – Stephen Aron (see a short performance and a neat interview with Steve here)!

Another fun email I received on the road was from my friend Bill Ash who runs the great St. Louis Guitar Society.  Bill asked if he could come down from St. Louis for lunch and visit about running festivals.  It will be really fun to brainstorm with Bill, he’s a neat guy with deep dedication to classical guitar.  He’ll fly in on Thursday the 26th and we’ll spend much of the 27th together.

Someone that I cannot wait to meet emailed me while we were on the road as well.  Louis Black – (not the comedian) founder of the Austin Chronicle and South by Southwest among other things!  Today was our big chance to meet since he’s traveling tomorrow like crazy (Boston, London, to name a few) until September 3rd.  Needless to say, we were not able to connect, but we will soon.  Not yet allowed to reveal what’s on his mind, but I look forward to sharing as soon as I can!

ACGS is deep into the newest phase of our curriculum development.  If you don’t know, we developed a curriculum product from 2005-2008 that has become a somewhat influential middle and high school classroom curriculum product around the US.  People are using it all over the place, but here in Austin it powers our affiliated programs reaching about 700 kids a day.  The next phase?  An online training component.  We’ll do it in three phases: write the text, film the video and make the schematics, and then build the product online.  We would like to finish “phase 1″ really, really soon, but there is a lot of work to do.  A moment ago I finished two hours of solid writing on it, and on the plane home Saturday I wrote for three hours straight.  Its a fun and engaging, if not daunting project.  But we’ll knock it out!

So the pace appears to have picked right back up – much more on the plate for tomorrow.

Last night, as if we hadn’t eaten enough already, we decided to break into this incredible Dragon Fruit that we had bought earlier in the week.  It’s like a kiwi, except way better!

Isn't that cool lookin'?

...and inside its like a giant tasty kiwi! Juicy, sweet, little seeds, yum. I asked Glenda why we don't eat these all the time and she said something about "rare" and "special". Well they're delicious!

Kaua’i is beautiful this morning – and every morning:

A shot from our Lanai early today...

We managed to get breakfast in before packing and cleaning up…

Matty's "Kitchen Sink" Potatoes. This is what results when, in the fridge, you have half a tomato, a potato, a quarter onion, veggie oil, salt, pepper, cheddar cheese, and hot pepper flakes - all in need of being used up! Oh, and lotsa love!

Did I mention packing?

Here's the start of the pack-a-thon!

...and just like that... magic!

…and we’re off.  Here’s a shot, from about two minutes ago on the Lanai.  You can even barely see Glenda’s lovely flower lei.

Aloha everybody!

The sun is just coming up here over calm seas - Kaua'i was preparing a glorious day!

With a bit of pancake fixin's left we felt, well, obligated to finish 'em off this morning before our departure tomorrow.

So our fist order of business was to head back to Po’ipu.  After much discussion we decided we really wanted to get another good snorkel or two in today, and the best snorkeling we’d found on the island was in Po’ipu.  It’s about an hour drive south.

Here's Matt with top down - ready to rumble.

Hellooo Glenda! Here sporting the local island beach-frequenters' style... Sarong hugs swim suit with panache. Confidence yet sophistication radiate from this stylish twist-tie of color and texture! (Sarong courtesy of Linda Light - thanks Linda!)

We didn’t take the camera to the beach today.  But I have to tell you, it was: The Best. Snorkel. Ever. Again today!  I know what you’re thinking – “How could they have the best snorkel ever three times in one vacation?”  But it’s possible, and it happened.  We started at Po’ipu Beach, the one with the cool dividing peninsula out to the sandy rocky sand bar?  And there was a large brown monk seal tanning himself on the sand bar!  It was so cool.  He did absolutely nothing for like the entire time we were at the beach.  Could’ve been dead, flopped there like that.  It was awesome!

Then we snorkeled on both sides of the divider.  The right side, where we went yesterday, brought lots of great fish like we saw before.  Then we went over to “Urchin Alley” on the other side which was rougher, and rockier and full of urchins!  We didn’t do that very long before returning to the right side where we ventured out pretty far into deeper waters and saw a huge school of stripy yellow fish.  I feel the need, at this time, to list some of the fish we’ve seen: Lagoon Triggerfish, Achilles Tang, Ornate Butterfly Fish, Raccoon Butterfly Fish (loads of these), Orangeband Surgeonfish (lots of these too), Longnose Butterflyfish, Blue- and Orangespine Unicornfishes, Needlefish, Saddle Wrasse, Moorish Idol (super cool fish), Spotted Boxfish, Yellowfin Surgeonfish, Bullethead Parrotfish, and even a White Mouth Moray Eel!  There are more – but those come to mind.

Glenda had also been interested in checking out a nearby beach called Lawa’i near “flubbering horn”, oh, I mean, “Spouting Horn”.  I, as is my usual MO, was more interested in: a) sticking with things we already knew, and, b) going to Puka Dogs ASAP.  However, not only was she insistent, but we also ended up at the beach showers next to a guy who was talking all about how he had seen turtles at Lawa’i Beach.  Turtles, along with monk seals, have been high on our list.  So, off we went to Lawa’i.

The water was rougher there, but we got in anyway and poked around.  Some very cool reef formations there, great fish, and we saw a simply enormous red Parrotfish.  It was a great snorkel.  Even so, there were no turtles.  So eventually we decided to get out.  Glenda had just reached the shore and got her head out, and I was close behind, when I saw him – a big sea turtle right in front of me at the waters edge being washed up and down the shore!  I watched him for a few seconds before calling to Glenda.  She was able to hop back in and get buffeted around by the waves with the turtle, like, they almost touched!  So cool.

And so there you have it.  Our best snorkel ever because it was a great snorkel, plus we got to see a Monk Seal and a Turtle.  Yippee!

I’d be lying, though, if I didn’t say that all of that was a preamble to my not-so-secret main mission of the day.  Our return to Puka Dogs!

Look at all of these people who have clearly been reading my blog! Puka Dogs was packed today!

I'm pleased to be able to bring you rare footage of the inner workings of Puka Dogs. Yesterday I mentioned the heated spikes they put the buns on... now you can actually see them. In this pic, there are two visible black spikes, all around them are overturned hot dog buns, themselves inside of white paper bags. This is a snapshot insight into the magic behind the Puka!

What could possibly be better than a Puka Dog?  I wracked my brain today to no avail. Until inspiration struck!  What could be better than a Puka Dog?

2 Puka Dogs! (one of these is for Glenda). I went with spicy lemon garlic sauce on both of mine today, with coconut relish and ketchup on one, and mango relish with yellow mustard on the other. Glenda had a veggie dog today too, and did mild lemon/garlic sauce with Pineapple relish and Lilikoi (Guava) Dijon Mustard. These things are incredible! In retrospect, I may had had one Puka Dog too many...

We followed Puka dogs with some delicious gelato - caramel mac nut and Belgian Chocolate in a chocolaty mac-nutty waffle cone. Yum!

Post-Puka we decided to head up to Kapa’a where there was a waterfall Glenda had read about.  On the way we passed:

I had an odd sense of deja vu passing this road. Like I've been down it before - perhaps even many times, and often...

Eventually, however, we made it to Ho’opi’i falls west of Kapa’a.  Say THAT 5 times fast!

Glenda is walkin' the trail...

Wow, a river, dense trees, the wilderness. I was straining to hear banjos, but thankfully all I heard was the roaring of the falls...

Oooo. The falls were very impressive!

So everywhere you drive in Kaua’i you see signs advertising “Ice Cold Coconut”.  We thought this was very strange.  ”Ice Cold” is not the first thing I would think of if I were to make a sign advertising a coconut stand.  I might write “fresh” or “local” or “delicious” or something.  But I would be the odd coconut-man out, because everyone selling coconuts on the island has a sign advertising “Ice Cold Coconuts”.  We were intrigued and we pulled over to a place that, in addition to the obligatory “Ice Cold Coconut” sign, also advertised “The Coconut Experience”.

Here we are, having the "coconut experience". The fresh coconut has just had a hole drilled in the top of it and a straw stuck in it. We were instructed to drink the milk inside.

After we drained the coconut, the lady, a young woman with a one-and-a-half year old son, held the coconut in one hand and hacked at it with a machete until it split in two, she then scored and extracted the meat for us to munch on. Yummy! And ice, ice cold, baby!

After extensive snorkeling, double doggin’ it at Puka’s, a good vertical hike, and the coconut experience, we went back to the condo, showered and got cleaned up for our last night on the town.  The town?  Hanalei!

Glenda's lovely outfit for the evening. We took this picture in front of a Hibiscus bush in front of the condo.

We walked back down to Hanalei Beach Park - here we are entering the park as the sun is nearing sunset.

We walked along the beach to the point we could see the sun going down around the hills... Lots of boats in the harbor tonight.

Here's Glenda on the beach with the sunset-lit sky behind her.

After the sunset, we walked into town and decided to stop off at:

Kalypso! We had wanted to go since we saw it nearly two weeks ago. I had a taro-garden burger and a Mai Tai. Glenda was saving her tummy for sushi...

Here's the Hanalei Dolphin, bar, restaurant, and sushi bar! We hadn't been, and this was Glenda's special request.

What to get, what to get?

Glenda got Ono Sashimi. That's a local white fish served raw and with nothin' - no rice, no roll. Just a bed of greens and fish! Glenda is a purist who really appreciates high quality and very fresh fish. She was delighted. Not to be outdone - and because the pancake breakfast, double Puka Dog with chips, Gelato, and Garden Burger with all the fixin's, fries and onion rings left me feeling a little peckish - I ordered a veggie roll and a local brown ale. Just perfect!

Whew!  What a whirlwind.  It was a great day with lots of activities and lots of fun.  Tomorrow we will get busy in the morning with final pre-travel prep and board a plane around 2 PM.  We love Kaua’i, we look forward to coming back, but we both love our life in Austin and feel just peachy about returning there tomorrow.

We especially can’t wait to see all the great people we love so much back home.  Won’t be long now.

Here was a quick shot I took from the "Garden View" side of our condo as we were rushing off this morning!

Our first goal of the day was to head south on 56, along the east side of the island, toward Po’ipu.  We haven’t really been to Po’ipu, though we’ve been near, and we’ve been by, and we wanted to check it out.  If there’s a “resort central” of Kaua’i its Po’ipu.  The Hyatt Resort is there, as is a particularly swanky restaurant called Josselyn’s.  We wanted to see what all the hubbub was about!

Oooo. So if you look carefully you can see that in the middle of this beach there is a peninsula that juts out to a sand and lava sand bar - with water on each side. This gives the unusual character to the Po'ipu beach. We set up camp off to the right...

So we're now in "our camp" looking back left at the peninsula and sand bar.

And here's a look to the right from the same place. The whole beach has this round, curvy sort of feel.

So the main thing we did at Po’ipu was snorkel.  We’d heard stories of both seals and turtles!  Unfortunately for us we saw zero turtles and seals today.  Plus, this snorkel spot has very little in the way of reef and coral activity – it was like swimming around in a fish bowl!  But even with all of that this was our:

Best. Snorkel. Ever.

Why, you ask?  It was comfy, gentle water and filled with lots of super-duper fish.  We saw types of fish we’ve seen elsewhere, but the specimens here were much bigger.  And then there was the “fish-nado” incident…  At one point Glenda and I were snorkeling and a particularly large fish, with an attitude, swam by lookin’ at me.  So I thought at him “I’ll show you, fish” and I decided to look back!  Look I did.  As he swam by I slowly turned around, making my body vertical to do so.  So as I turned around, he actually began swimming around me in a circle – like we were in a stare-off (which, of course, we were).  So I thought “I’ll out-stare you, fish” and I kept turning around, and he kept swimming around me… for a long time.  The even crazier part is, that after several revolutions, all these other fish, like tons of other fish, started revolving around me too.  It was nuts.  And for a long time – like a minute – I had tons and tons of all kinds of fish swimming around me in a giant fish-nado.

Don’t believe me?  Glenda was right there witnessing the whole thing.

After fish-nado, we were hungry, and we decided – thanks to Glenda’s amazing research abilities – that we needed to visit Puka Dogs.

Here is the Puka Dogs surf board menu. You choose "Polish Sausage" or "Veggie" then mild, medium, or hot garlic sauce, then one of 6 sweet fruity relishes and/or traditional condiments.

Glenda about to order a Puka Dog... So once you order they take a giant hoagie-sized bun, and stick it - vertically - on an inside-out bun toasting hot metal poker. This creates a hot, toasted hole, lengthwise in your bun which they fill with goodness.

Wow, nice Puka Dogs! I had a veggie, medium spice, pineapple relish and yellow mustard. Glenda had a Polish Sausage, mild garlic sauce, Mango Relish, and Lilikoi-dijon mustard. Oh my gosh, these are so good, I think I absolutely have to go back for another tomorrow, I don't care if it's an hour away!

OK, so with Puka Dogs sadly fading into memory behind us, we decided to check out “Shipwreck” beach in front of the Hyatt.  It was hot, hot, hot – like must’ve been upper 80s!

Here's a big lava outcropping at "Shipwreck" Beach. The crazy local kids jump off of that thing into the water!

We decided to leave Po’ipu, head back north to the condo and regroup.  It didn’t take us long!  Soon we headed back south – just a few miles – to a new place for us called “Secret Beach”.  A left off the highway, first right on a dirt road, park and look for the steep trail down!

Glenda in her lovely wrap from Anthropologie with some wily, crazy surf slamming the rocks behind her at "Secret Beach".

Secret Beach is actually wide and sandy, but there are some rocky outcroppings which are great for spotting one of my favorite ocean critters... Crabs! On the black lava rocks we usually just see the black "Bat man" crabs, so this little guy was a surprise.

Here he is from behind, I got really close for this shot!

Here's a shot with Glenda doing her "Captain Cook" pose. Behind you can see the lighthouse at Kilauea, and out to the left a good shot of the little island which is a bird sanctuary.

Our steps in the sand! Can you tell whose are whose?

We returned from “Secret Beach”.  It had actually been raining a bit there, and the weather was dubious, but we wanted to go to the St. Regis Resort nearby where we heard the bar has a fabtastic view of the sunset…

Here's Matt, all prepped to go to the St. Regis. I even put on a shirt and did my hair!

We've arrived at the St. Regis. It's gorgeous. Definitely cloudy and rainy but still a great view - especially when Glenda is part of it! For context, we're actually looking out here onto Hanalei Bay. That's where our adventures began here in Kaua'i, where we watched our first sunset...

Glenda with our drinks. I ordered a "Green Flash" which is rum and pineapple juice, and Blue Curacao and a handful of other things including a lightbulb-ice-cube! Glenda ordered a delish Lychee Bellini.

Here's the Green Flash with recipe/description card. A "Green flash", by the way, is the phenomenon seen at sunset here, just at the last instant before the sun sinks below the horizon. As it disappears this amazing green flash occurs that is totally awesome. At least it would be totally awesome, I'm sure, if I could see the darn thing. This is another one of those times when Matt looks avidly for a natural phenomenon, only to hear everyone else "ooo" and "ahhh" about it while he scratches his head wondering how he could have missed such a spectacular and special natural occurrence... anyway, the drink was tasty.

Our food arrived! Yum. I got tempura and Glenda got Shumai with crab and other goodies. The sauces were "totally solid", as they say here. Mine was a green lime and basil, hers was a rich balsamic and brown butter.

And in spite of the clouds and rain, we got a breathtaking view out west as the sunset from the bar. Truly a remarkable place.

And that was Thursday!  Tomorrow is our last full day here, so we’re making our lists of the thing we’d like to do before leaving.  So far my list has only one thing on it: Puka Dogs.  As long we get to go there again, I’m good.

Here's what our morning looked like from the deck today.

We used the morning to read and enjoy each others’ company (we always do that second part anyway!).  Glenda continued with Eat, Pray, Man, Woman, and I spent time making edits to my book and practicing the guitar.

After lunch, it cleared up and we took the opportunity to head down to our beach and do some snorkeling.  It appears as though the tides have risen, and they brought with them seaweed bits and general murkiness.  We saw tons of interesting fish today, but we’re crossing our fingers that the waters will clear up a bit by tomorrow.

This was all in preparation for our big outing of the day.  Glenda had booked us a Luau show!  On the way, though, we stopped off in Kilauea for a quick dinner:

Glenda with our soups. Hers was a corn and pepper soup, mine was a thick purple sweet potato soup. Yum!

We had pizza too, but this eclair was the icing on the cake, so to speak. A Lilikoi (Guava) cream inside a tasty eclair topped with chocolate and coconut. Sooo tasty! In this shot I've caught Glenda in mid-lick of her fingers that came in contact with the eclair's choco-topping.

OK, so then it was off to Smith’s in Wailua for our Luau surprise!

Glenda in her lovely flowery dress, in front of the main entrance!

It's cool inside! Reminds me of a "Survivor" episode with water and tiki torches galore!

We're in an outdoor theater. The ladies here are dancing across from a moat - there's water between us and them. Throughout the show they dance close to us, far away, on both sides there are tree-covered mini-stages, and there was even an erupting volcano! Lots of lighting and fire effects! The show was set up as a tour of the different cultures that make up the early Hawaiian settlers, so we saw dances considered to be from Tahiti, New Zealand, Japan, China, The Philippines, and, of course, Hawaii.

This was the Tahitian part!

The ladies up close doing a Tahitian dance.

Wait! Those aren't ladies!

One of those cool Chinese Lunar New Year dragons made an appearance! They even had fire crackers.

A Samoan Fire Dancer. This was the highlight. This guy had a giant flaming knife and he twirled it, threw it and caught it, sucked the flame into his mouth and lit the other end of the torch with the flame still burning in his mouth, he held the flaming ends of the thing on his feet while lying on his back, and then he did another dance with two instead of one! Quite remarkable!

We have two more days here in Kaua’i – then we take off on Saturday at 1PM locally.  We arrive back in Austin Sunday morning around 8:30AM!  We feel incredibly lucky to have been able to spend this time together in such an enchanting place.  And we’ve got two more days – so we’ll see what adventures await!

I was up very late finishing The Prometheus Deception, by Robert Ludlum, last night!

Here's the last thing I saw, before drifting off to sleep...

Today was a big day!  Destination Po’ipu!  Poipu is considered south Kaua’i and it is, more or the less, the only drive-able part of the island we have not at least cursorily investigated.  Today our mission was to see “Spouting Horn” and the Allerton Garden of the National Tropical Botanical Gardens (this is one of five NTBGs – 4 in Hawaii and 1 in Florida – we’ve been to the one in Florida!).

On the way, we couldn’t resist stopping for the Pineapple Frosty at Banana Joe’s we’ve been hearing so much about:

Banana Joe's!

Glenda in front of pretty flowers she liked. The pineapple smoothy was oh-so-tasty, I would've thought they blend ice cream and fresh pineapple, it's so mm mm good, but Glenda assures me there is NO ice cream which means there must be some little magic elf back there making this stuff incredibly tasty in the "au natural" way.

To get to Po’ipu, we drove south on 56 through Lihu’e, got on 50 west and then headed south on 520 toward the southern-most tip of Kaua’i.  No sooner do you turn onto 520 then you find yourself in this amazing covered drive:

The Tree Tunnel

Our first major destination was “Spouting Horn”.  It’s a blow hole – yes that’s what they call it – that is a peculiar formation in the volcanic coastline resulting in a geyser-like effect when waves crash against it.

This is not the Spouting Horn blow hole, this is, however... our "Chicken of the Day" picture! It's hard to fully appreciate with no others around, But this guy attracted our attention because he was huge - nearly twice the size of the others.

Another non-Spouting Horn shot, though we're very close, this is looking due south at the Spouting Horn site - frothy waves today!

And the moment you've waiting for, Spouting Horn! That's it, right in the middle! That little, feeble bit of H2O flubbering up through the rock there. OK so it's not that impressive, and I bet you're thinking, gee, Matt could have caught the blow hole at a slightly better moment... maybe stuck around a bit for a better shot. And my answer to you is no, Matt could not have "stuck around a bit" and gotten a better shot because that's as good as it got today. Let's just say that the blow hole, well... it blew!

Not to be dissuaded, we decided to head to the botanical garden, but that meant first having lunch.  Lunch included this cool purple sweet potato salad – mmm.

OK, so here’s the quick history: Sam Allerton made ridiculous amounts of money buying hogs during the big freeze of the 19th century for cheap out west and then selling them for a premium back east.  Loads and loads of money.  His son, Robert, was not into business, but was very into art and eventually found his calling in landscape design.  He designed and built, over 14 years, the Allerton Garden in Po’ipu Kaua’i, here we go:

A shot down at the Allerton residence, now where the curator lives.

We took a tram over, and here's a shot back down the path we've just traveled. Ferns, vines, water seeping from rocks - otherworldly.

Robert Allerton created "rooms" with his landscapes. We're about to enter the first. The pineapple statues mark the entrance...

Room 1: the Thanksgiving Room. Cool gazebo, reflecting pool, neat vertical elements.

All around were not only incredible trees, but also things living on the trees, orchids and so much more.

After walking through the orchard, we arrived in the Diana Room. You might be able to make out the statue of the Greek Diana at the end of the pool.

...and here's what Diana sees, looking back up the "room" from her perspective.

My personal favorite, the "three pools" rooms.

Here's a close up of the drain at the bottom of the third of the three pools. Here's the deal. There are no pumps anywhere in the gardens. All the fountains are gravity powered. The water starts way up high, gets trapped in cisterns, then feeds down into the top-most pools, and when its done it runs into drains like this one, and flows dow to power the fountains of a lower section of the garden - genius.

Half way up "Three Pools", and to the left, is an amazing waterfall, it starts out all naturalistic and gradually progresses to more and more "man-made" in appearance.

3 pools from the top looking back.

Walking up the path with the little streamlet running along side, reminded me of the Alhambra in Spain.

We're at the apex of the gardens, this waterfall feeds that streamlet we just saw...

Walking down from the apex, we see another streamlet... and Glenda!

The Bamboo room - complete with Buddha!

The Mermaid Room. Check out that long water conduit! Its hour glass form causes the water to begin flowing smoothly at the top, but end up sloshing back and forth by the time it reaches the bottom.

Ryan, our tour guide. A super-nice guy. He's standing at the bottom of the hour-glass thing.

Lot's of Hollywood movies are filmed here. Pirates of the Caribbean 4 was just filmed across the river from the Bamboo Room, which means now I'm gonna have to see it - goodness knows I wouldn't have otherwise! This field is where Harrison Ford got chased by natives in Raiders of the Lost Ark!

These crazy trees are called Morton Bay Figs. The second one on the left is where they discovered the Raptor Eggs in Jurassic Park 1.

Glenda and Morton Bay Fig Tree - amazing!

Matt and Glenda posing as Raptor Eggs.

This pretty waterfall is where the pool from the "Diana Room" drains. From here its into a small river and out into the ocean.

One surprise after another at the Allerton Gardens, this was a real treat.

We stayed in for dinner. I raided the fridge and made stuffed mushrooms, herbed croutons on tossed salad (ala Newman) baked Asian Eggplant with spaghetti and tomato sauce served "all done up" as "Matty's mini tourettes".

What an adventure.  I’m not sure we saved the world today, like Nick Bryson, but we had a simply marvelous time – in the company of some great folks – in a beautiful place.

This book is dangerous!

OK, I admit it.  The truth is that I’m a sucker for international espionage and caper thrillers in book and movie form.  Ludlum does it for me!  I began reading Prometheus Deception yesterday, but today I became totally obsessed.

I was able to put the book down long enough for Glenda and I to take a hike down to our private beach (it’s called Sea Lodge Beach).  Its not technically private, but today it was!  For nearly the entire 3-hours we were there snorkeling (and reading Ludlum a teensy bit) we were the only ones there.  Simply a marvelous time, the seas were very calm and the snorkeling incredible.  I returned several times to the place we first spied our sea turtle, but I’ve not seen him again.  Many sea cucumbers, though, which are cool too – the way they lie there like that – totally still.

After lunch (and an afternoon stint with Ludlum), we decided to take an outing to the Thai 2 Go food trailer off of 56 about 5 miles south of here.  We heard it was fabulous, and we were not disappointed…

Glenda awaits the arrival of Thai 2 go tastiness.

The Thai 2 go environs, the trailer is behind the palm tree!

Our "Chicken of the Day" picture. Much like our dog-friend at Kilauea, this Chicken seemed to be very interested in our food. We couldn't resist, and found out that chickens love Musman curried peanuts and tofu. We decided not see if he would like the Green Curry Chicken...

Between Thai 2 Go and our condo there is Anini Beach.  We hadn’t been before, and it was approaching sunset, so we thought we’d head over there for a stroll.

Glenda looking happy and lovely on Anini Beach. There's a light house on the point behind her - Kilauea Light House, and off the point, a tiny island which is a bird sanctuary.

We strolled all the way to the west end of the beach. This shot shows the water on the right, the end of the beach, and then one of the nice homes along the waterfront on the left.

The sun was going down. We had started to walk back toward the car when Glenda pointed out how long our shadows were!

The sun is setting. Check out how calm the water is here - it's amazing!

Setting...

Set!

So we happily and somewhat hastily drove back to the condo.  At least one of us was hasty, in his desire to know what Nick Bryson would do once he arrived in Beijing.  It was just terrible that he had been deceived by that nasty Ted Waller and the Directorate, and Layla (!), what a complete shock.  It’s like you can’t trust anyone!

Kaua'i out our condo window this morning. Note the blow-i-ness and generally foreboding grey. It was raining too, I swear!

So I elected to do what I always do when the weather is lousy.  Take off my shirt and cook!

That's not technically true, I don't always do that. But in this case Glenda had read about a fabulous Sunday brunch and called for reservations last night only to be told that the place is no longer offering Sunday brunch! So I decided to try and lift her spirits with a little taste of Matty's Kountry Kitchen Home-Kookin'!

Matty's Kountry Kitchen Kakes, Omelets, and Taters!

Our first and only happy customer of the day!

After breakfast, the morning hours were spent doing homespun things.  I finished editing my book (this pass anyway) and Glenda read “Eat, Pray, Man, Woman, Love” which she seems to be thoroughly enjoying.

We (and by “we”, I mean “Glenda”) were itching to get out and do something by lunch time, though, and the dial landed on waterfalls.  If you head south from where we are on 56 to Kapa’a, at just about the mid-point of the east side of the island, you hit route 581 west which connects you with 580 west and delivers you out to Opaeka’a falls.

Opaeka'a Falls! I like this picture particularly because Glenda's pretty flowery top echos the flowers opposite. If you squint in the distance you'll see the falls. If you squint even more you'll see that there are two forks of the falls, the rather robust fork to the right and the diminutive little fork to the left. My understanding from a conversation I overheard today - though I don't understand how this could be possible - is that Canada actually owns the right-hand side...

Across the street from this waterfall is a great overlook treating you to a view of the Wailua River.  This river, as we’ll see later, opens up in the ocean in the town of Wailua.

From left to right: Glenda, a sign about Wailua Heritage Trail (and river), and Wailua River.

Hey! Its the second rainiest place on earth! Mount Wai'ale'ale! We saw this yesterday from the west side atop route 550, and now we can see it from the east. The Wailua River is snaking along below, of course.

We went back toward Wailua and Kapa'a, but pulled off for this view of the Wailua River approaching the ocean. In the mid-left foreground there's even a chicken!

Which brings us to today's "Chicken of the day" picture. We thought this guy was particularly pretty. He didn't like me getting too close, so this is the best we've got. I chased him around a bit, but it got embarrassing with all the international tourists watching me, the American, chasing a chicken at a lookout point. There is one more chicken in our future today, though, so stay alert.

Our waterfall adventures were not yet over, oh no.  Next on the list was Wailua Falls.  To get there we went back out to the main north-south road along the east side of the island, route 56, headed south to Lihu’e (where the airport is) and headed inland once more.

We're at Waialua Falls! But this is not the falls. I've just always gotten a kick out of signs riddled with bullet holes. Here I am making my "six-shooters" gesture - I am comforted by the honest belief that the international tourists who witnessed me posing for this were not the same ones observing the chicken incident.

Wailaua Falls! Now THAT's a waterfall. No offense, Opaeka'a. Short and wide beats tall and skinny, when it comes to waterfalls, any day.

This waterfall made Glenda hungry, and she had read about this fabulous noodle house in Lihu’e – so off we went to find it!

Saimin's Noodle House!

The Saimin's Noodle scene... lotsa locals, always a good sign.

Mmm, noodles. We ordered the "Small Regular" because we discovered they only take cash and we had only $7 with us, and the "Small Regular" was the only thing on the menu that gave us leftover for a descent tip. I understand it was delish!

Next was a walk along the beach in Wailua.  Lihu’e, Wailua, and Kapa’a are all nearby, more or less in the middle of the east coast of Kaua’i.

Lydgate Beach Park in Wailua. I like this shot. On the right you see crazy waves (!) with all manner of signs basically saying "don't get in the water or you will die". Then in the middle you see a man-made break, and on the left you see nice calm water on the other side of the break. They made what amounts to a salt water swimming pool here - great for parents and kids to swim or learn how to snorkel.

I call this portrait, in honor of Jessica Simpson, "The chicken of the sea".

We walked to the north end of Lydgate Beach Park and found that it terminates nowhere but the place the Wailua River empties into the ocean!  How cool!  I’ve always wanted to see a river emptying into the ocean…

The Wailua River meets the pacific Ocean - Lydgate Beach Park in Wailua, Kaua'i.

And that was our big trip.  We started making the trip north to return to our condo and passed Kealia Beach which is a favorite spot for surfers.  There were tons today!  I wish you could see ‘em better in this picture.  We sat and watched them for quite a while.

Lots and lots of tiny surfers!

And then it was “home gain, home again, lickety split JF” (what Harrison Ford movie is that from?).

Here's Matt with cards, Maui Potato Chips, and a Pina Colada on the condo deck. We had a great talk with Matt's Mom for a bit today and, among other things, got the rules for a new (to us) bridge game we can play with just two called "Devil's Bridge". Loads of fun, when you win, anyway, otherwise it stinks.

And finally, our beautiful sunset. What a transformation from this morning's blustery, rainy, torrent!

The whole day is not planned for tomorrow, but we seem in agreement that it begins with a snorkel.  We’ll see what happens after that!

The day began with an interesting view out the window at sunrise, however: low tide.  We hadn’t seen this before, but at low tide it appears as though reefs that are normally covered with water (and make for excellent snorkeling) emerge above the surface.

Sunrise this morning. If you look out in the water to the left of the palm, you can see the black tops of reefs. Usually these are not visible! Several people actually walked right out on the water this morning - all the way out to where the big waves were breaking. If you look closely on the grass, to the right of the palm, you can also see a wild mother hen who lives nearby - she appears like a black blob in this picture. She's actually sitting on 7 baby chicks!

But we had no time to dally today.  We were in the car and gone by 8:10!  Off to see Waimea!

Here's a close-up of Matt in the convertible today. Kaua'i, as I've mentioned, has very unpredictable weather. The top came up and down a bunch today as we drove in and out of rainy patches.

So south we went… and then west along the south side of the island on route 50.  We went almost as far as you can go before stopping in Waimea (the town) for the “best coffee on the island” served up by a very enthusiastic lady.  We took the occasion to enthusiastically use the rest room before heading up the mountain!

We've begun our ascent along a ridge that will take us to the top of Waimea canyon and beyond. Think of the road up Rocky Mountain National Park if you've ever had the "pleasure" of driving that one. We stopped here to take a shot south, back down the hill, and over the town of Waimea and the enthusiastic coffee lady. Out in the water you may be able to see Nihau - the privately-owned Hawaiian island.

A touch further up the road, we saw this water fall, running down through a patch of the famous Kaua'i "red dirt". The red dirt is popular here - it stains! In fact, they even have a popular T-shirt company where the shirts are all colored using Kaua'i red dirt (ends up looking curiously like UT burnt orange - Hook 'em!)

So some explanation is now required.  In the above picture we’re part-way up route 550, which starts on the south-west corner of Kaua’i (roughly) and heads north rising above Waimea Canyon on the inland (east) side.  550 ends, 20 miles later, towering high above not only the northern-most  part of the canyon to the east, but also something called the Na Pali coast to the west.  The Na Pali coast is 22 miles of Kaua’i coastline along the northwest part of the island that is entirely inaccessible by car.  So inaccessible, in fact, that if you’re in North Kaua’i and you want to drive to west Kaua’i you have to do what we did today and drive to the east coast, south to the south coast, west to the west coast, and THEN head north to get to wherever you want to go.  The Na Pali coast, then, is most often viewed by boat or helicopter or, from above, from the northern-most tip of route 550.  That’s where we are here:

Ooooo. Na Pali Coast. Gorgeous, peaceful, cool, quiet - apart from the chatter of the tourists. We saw tourists from India, Germany, Japan, and the US.

Glenda with Na Pali backdrop.

OK, time for more explanation.  First, you’re right, we have not yet actually seen Waimea Canyon – which was the stated reason for the trip.  We’re getting to it!  We drove along it on the way up, but we decided to get to the tippy top first, see Na Pali, and then work our way back down.  Second, at the top of 550 you’ve got Na Pali to the west and you’ve got Waimea Canyon to the east – actually to the south east.  To the due east, from the top of 550, you’ve got Mount Wai’ale’ale which is the second wettest place on earth.  That’s right, it rains on Mount Wai’ale’ale virtually all the time.  Check it out!

See that dark cloud obscuring that mountain top? That's crazy rain falling on Mount Wai'ale'ale - the second wettest place on earth!

Matt and Glenda hiked around the top-o-550 zone a bit, and a nice couple took our picture together!

Matt with Na Pali in background.

Glenda with Na Pali in background!

Pretty orange day lilies grabbed Glenda's attention as we left the summit.

…and leave we did.  We headed back down the ridge-top road known as 550 and eventually pulled over to get a good look at:

Waimea Canyon! It was really impressive, and very peaceful.

Perhaps it was the majesty of Waimea, or the ethereal splendor of Na Pali, but this next moment on the road south struck us with an unusual poignant existential force.  Witnessing this scene stirred in me a question that I’m still trying to define.  Is it Why?  What?  Where?  Something is scratching at the surface, perhaps once we sleep on it, all will be revealed:

???

Whew, what a brain teaser!

Anyway, we made it back to Waimea and sought out what we’d heard was the best shave ice place in southern Kaua’i (its been well-established, I hope, that Wishing Well is the Holy Grail of shave ice in the north).

Jo Jo's! Hole in the wall ambience, surly je ne sais quois from the wait staff, what more could you hope for?

We ordered a "Tropical Rainbow", that's a trio of Lilikoi (Guava), Orange, and Mango ice over Mac-nut ice cream. Totally perf! (Or "solid!" as they say here when they mean "totally perf".)

We had a touch more juice in us after Waimea and Jo Jo’s, and we decided to stop in Hanapepe on our way home.  Hanapepe is just west of dead center on the south side of the island which, I should say, is a good bit warmer and drier than up north where we’ve spent most of our time.  Hanapepe is an old town and they are just now revitalizing.  We toured some art galleries and then headed for the “swinging bridge”.

This is not the swinging bridge - but these flowers were gorgeous, and they are invisible out from under the tree! How unusual! We were heading to the swinging bridge (next photo) and we were totally surprised by these pretty flowers hiding under the canopy of this tree.

The Swinging Bridge! This was fun. Basically it swings a bit while you walk on it! Worth going up and back...once!

And that’s it!  We were bushed.  It was early afternoon, and our trip to see Waimea canyon and Na Pali from the top of 550 was a raging success!  We made it home in the mid-afternoon after a round trip that probably took a bit over 6 hours.  We’ll do at least one more big trip south, to see Po’ipu while we’re “on island”.  On the whole, though, we’re really glad to be staying on the north side.  Here’s Matt back in the condo this afternoon:

Still editing that book! I made it through chapter 9 today...

No plans for tomorrow have been proposed and agreed upon by the council here.  So we’ll take a “wait and see” approach.  I imagine some snorkeling, or possibly tennis, is on the horizon, though.