We are currently on the Big Island which is actually on the Island of Hawaii. We landed in at the Kahuila Kona airport which is not a big airport – there are no 2nd level jet bridges but ramps down to the ground and then walking into the small terminal. R things this is probably how Maui was 30-40 years ago. We drove from the airport to our hotel in Kona and settled in for the night having had a 7 hour flight turned into a 11 hour flight. Our plane got held in Denver due to Mechanical issues, then we headed off to the tarmac, then due to a different issue an hour later headed back to the terminal for more repairs. I do feel the pilot shouldn’t have said “this plane has been sitting since the 18th and they are not great at sitting”.

Wednesday morning we woke up and after a leisurely breakfast headed off to visit a Safeway for some soda’s and then Walmart for a elbow brace for me. We followed that by visiting the local Costco. R especially enjoys walking around other costco’s because some items are regional, so its always a “look they have this”. Post costco we headed up to Wailoa and then followed an audio tour along the road, back through Kona down to the national park. We visited the park opposite the Captain Cook memorial and also an Ancient battleground.

Post a dinner in downtown Kona we headed to bed.

Thursday morning we got up and headed over to Hilo driving around the northern side of the Island using the same audio tours. On the way we visited the Akaka falls and also the Rainbow falls in Hilo itself. We stopped at a Cave on the way. The caves are basically old lava tubes. The Akaka falls were a 379 steps mile hike but seeing the nature, flowers and the falls were worth it. Moving from the dry East side of the Island to the wet north we passed through Eucalyptus forests, sugarcane lands and into more rainforest territory.

After 6 hours of driving we fell into our beds.

Friday morning and it was time to head to the Hawaii Volcano National Park. We drove from Hilo to the park and took in Mount Kilaeua, home of the Goddess Pele, then the Caldera’s, Craters, Nahuku (Thurston Lava tub and many other sites down to the Holei Sea Arch and back. Lava fields abounded. I did add the Hawaii Volcano park to my National Parks passport book.

We ended the night at a night market in Hilo. Because Hilo is far less touristy we got to have a lovely conversation with several native hawaiians who by the end were calling my Bra and said that we would be welcome on the Island as we’re respectful. They were impressed by our knowledge of Hawaii, we credited the Bishop Museum on Oahu from last year.

The only downside so far is that the self guided Audio tour has moved from “enjoying” on the first day to ”we want to drag him out and beat him on the third day”. I don’t think they envisioned that anyone would do almost all the drive trips back to back. If we here one more time about the ‘Ohi’a lehua tree one more time we might snap.