jumpingfish

As soon as we put our faces in the water at Po‘ipu Beach, we were surrounded by fish. One moment we were mere tourists in the water and the next we were among swarms.

There were Yellow Tang. There were Orangestripe and Whitespotted Surgeonfish. There were various kinds of Butterflyfish. There were orange Elegant Coris and ones with black and white stripes. There was a Flowery Flounder fluttering on the bottom. There were Triggerfish. There were long skinny Cornets. There were Parrotfish crunching their beaks on the rocks. And there were Moorish Idols with long dorsal fins streaming behind them. 

Some swam in schools, sometimes posing for swimmers with cameras. Some swam alone, coming right up to your face to stare you down.

It made us feel as if we were in some sort of Jaques Cousteau documentary. And it made us glad we rented snorkel gear for a week.

Trudy had heard of this breakfast place in Kapaa called Eggbert’s. So after the sun was up, we went looking for the place with a trusty Google map in hand.

As it turned out, Google was wrong. So we drove around a bit until we finally asked a construction worker if he knew where Eggbert’s was. He pointed down the street.

“On the other side of that building in a strip mall,” he said.

We thanked him and drove off. And as it turns out, that strip mall was Coconut Market Place, which is next door to where we were staying, literally walking distance.

I had the #3: two eggs, bacon, toast, hashbrowns and coffee. Trudy has the #2: two eggs, bacon, toast and coffee to which she added a papaya pancake with coconut syrup.

Oh my gosh.

We did go to a different place for breakfast on one of our mornings there, but let me tell you we didn’t make that mistake twice.

On our first day in Kauai I took a fancy to a small piece of driftwood washed up on the beach. I picked it up and proclaimed, “I’m taking this.” Trudy scowled. 

The next day, I woke up sick. I had a headache. I had a neck ache. I was nauseous and didn’t want to get out of bed. I’m just saying … that’s what happened the next morning.

That evening we went to The Smith Family Garden Luau where a man sitting across from us told a story. It seems he had a friend who had come to Hawaii once and taken a small piece of lava as a souvenir. Knowing nothing of my driftwood, this man explained how his friend’s luck turned bad when he got home.

“He lost his job,” the man said, “and his family left him, and he’s in jail.”

For the next four days, Trudy grumbled regularly about my driftwood and said I needed to put it back which I pointedly did not do.

So on the morning of our last day on Kauai, as I was taking a shower, the fair and industrious Trudy announced that she was taking my driftwood back to the beach.

And as far as I know, my first day at my new job is still on for tomorrow.

Having arrived in Lihue, we waited at baggage claim A for our bags.

“Why are our bags always last?” Trudy asked, adding in her characteristically optimistic fashion, “They must have been the first ones on!”

So we waited. And we waited. And then the carousel stopped. There was no sign of our big yellow duffle or small blue suitcase.

“Did you fly in on Delta?” the woman at the baggage desk asked.

“Um, no, we flew out of Houston on United and transfered…”

She patiently told us to go to baggage claim B and pointed at the other end of the terminal.

So we walked. And we walked. We walked until we thought we had gone too far.

“Excuse me, where is baggage claim B?” I asked a woman who looked official, interrupting a conversation she was having.

She and her friend were silent for a moment, and then she pointed to a sign that said, “B”.

So we walked a little further, and when we got there we saw two lonely bags sitting against the far wall: a big yellow duffle and a small blue suitcase.

What a relief.

1. Austin to Houston

What is there to say about this leg?

There’s barely enough time for flight attendants to rush up and down the aisles offering beverages. We were crammed into a United AIrlines Canadair CRJ-700. If the flight attendants went up and down the aisles, I don’t remember it.

It was too early in the morning, and frankly our minds were focused on the destination.

2. Houston non-stop to Honolulu

This was the long leg.

The view of the arid mountains of northwest Mexico and the blue Gulf of California and skinny Baja under the wing of our Boeing 767 was nice. But after that there were many hours of … well … nothing but sky and clouds and ocean.

Fast forward eight hours.

On the ground in Honolulu, the skies were blue, white clouds rolled by, palm trees swayed in the breeze. We scrambled to pull off our sweaters.

And we wandered in amaze down the halls of the airport whispering to ourselves about how there were no walls. The hallway and chairs and carpet and counters at the gates were all open to the outside.

“No walls!? How can this be?” we asked ourselves. “Does it not rain, here?”

We guessed that Hawaiian rains must just gently fall straight down from the sky. Except when it doesn’t. Then what?

3. Honolulu to Lihue

Our last leg was a quick 30 minute hop to Lihue, Kauai.

We sat on the left side of the Hawaiian Airlines Boeing 717. So flying west from Honolulu, we had a wonderful, unobstructed view of … ocean. Whitecaps all the way to Tahiti.

“Ladies and gentlement,” the pilot said over the intercom soon after takeoff, “for those of you sitting on the right of the aircraft, we are passing by Pearl Harbor…” For those of us on the left, there were the whitecaps.

And when we arrived, we again wandered in amaze down the halls of the airport whispering to ourselves about how there were no outside walls.

“How can this be!?”

Whatever. After 13 hours of traveling, we were finally here, and it wasn’t even dark, yet!