Continued from Hawaii Day 3 Part 1.

Silly girl. She thinks of doing these all on her own.

At the end of the botanical garden is the ocean.

Again, rocky coast with strong currents.

I think someone got an ouchy.

These look like penises.

And these look like long penises.

So phallic looking.

Alright, that’s the end of the garden, time to turn back and go back the way we came.

Love this tree canopy.

Ah ma blinks.

Little KL blinks.

More phallic symbols.

Silly girl.

Look at how big it is compared to my head.

I look ridiculous.

Girls helping ah gong up the incline.

Push, push.

Rest break. It’s all up hill going back up to the parking lot.

Made it back to the shop/parking lot. Ah gong wanted a popsicle, which means everyone else wanted one too.

It is a good time for a popsicle after that hike back up. Look at the full parking lot and our lucky parking spot right by the ticket office. As we were leaving, there were lots of cars trying to find a parking spot. We made a good decision to come here right after they opened for the day.

From the botanical garden, we drove a short distance back into Hilo, and here’s downtown Hilo.

We are looking for lunch.

Lunch spot found. At first, we were a little skeptical about this hole in the wall place, even though it came recommended from my PT’s Hawaii recommended list.

Ah gong is hungry, he just got one of the to go bento and started eating before everyone else…sigh.

Not long after we sat down in an empty restaurant, people starting showing up.

Falafels.

And chicken katsu. Odd to have falafels and katsu on the same menu. They also seem to be a much bigger fan of chicken katsu than pork in Hawaii.

I think this is karage.

Lamb.

And seared tuna. What an eclectic mix of food. Apparently this place is very local Hawaiian fare. I guess it’s a mix of cultures and foods.

By the time we were almost done with our lunch, there was a whole line waiting to get a seat and placing to go orders. Nice, we beat the crowd. Food was great by the way.

Now, it’s time to take a quick stroll around downtown Hilo and visit some shops.

I’ve got one goal in mind, buy a Hawaiian made ukulele. RL and I discussed buying an ukulele here in Hawaii last night, and I found a shop here in Hilo. By the time we got to the shop, I was extremely determined to buy an ukulele as a souvenir.

So many choices….

After listening to quite a few different ukuleles, this Kamaka concert ukulele is coming home with us. Not a cheap instrument, but it sounds sooo good!! Don’t know how to play, but my goal is to learn how to play it. I’m not big on souvenirs, so I was surprised that this one took on a life of its own for me to the point where I really wanted an ukulele. Reminds me a little bit about when I heard an accordion in Europe being played by a busker and that ended up with me buying and learning how to play an accordion. I guess I like musical instruments.

Even the curbs here in made out of lava rocks. Done with shopping, time to head back to the house.

Some rain on the way back. We’ve been really lucky on the weather this trip. We’ve only barely had any rain, and it’s never affected our travel plans.

Back at the airbnb, we took a photo of the ukulele that they had hanging on the wall. Originally the ukulele was supposed to be for RL, but my obsession kind of took over and hijacked the original idea. Now, we’ll buy another ukulele for RL back in America, except she want a less expensive one that she can more casually play with.

Back at the house. took a nap, and now it’s dinner time. RL and I will drive the 20 minutes out of the neighborhood to the closest shopping center to bring food back for everyone.

Dinner spot. They are to-go only right now.

A little run down, and a little worried that we are eating sushi on the night before flying home tomorrow…I’m sure it’ll be fine. It’s Hawaii, they eat nothing but raw tuna over here all the time.

The sushi was supposed to take 45minutes to be ready, I guess they had a lot of orders. So we drove around to this Mexican food restaurant in the next shopping center. It has no signage and is obviously used to be some fast food place.

Well, the parking lot was full, so let’s see what it’s like inside.

Got inside and it immediately felt like a party here. It’s not too off from a regular tex mex joint here in Texas.

I ordered a Lavaman, red ale from Kona brewing. Never had it before, and I’ve never seen it before so probably a Hawaii only beer. Gotta try it, if anything just for the name. Pretty good, very malty. This outing without the kids or grandparents ended up being a little fun and relaxing for us.

Food should be ready soon, we are now waiting outside Mighty Sushi.

Got our food, and made the drive back to the airbnb. There’s a metal gate at the airbnb that we open and close manually. Would get old really fast if we lived here full time.

Dinner! Nothing to write home about, but got the job done.

This airbnb has strict smoking rules. You can’t smoke on property, so ah gong has 3 smoking location options. The end of the long winding driveway onto the street, the side gate that exits onto another street, or all the way past the edge of the property onto the public beach. I told him not to go to the rocky public beach, but of course, he says he’s been there and he’ll be careful.

Fuck….right after dinner, he comes back into the house trying to act all innocent and prevent it was just a light scratch. He slipped and fell onto the volcanic rocks on the path by the beach and cut his head along with his arms and legs. Ugh!!!!

I went all over the house looking for a first aid kit, and that’s when I discovered that the master bathroom has a bidet. Cool.

Anyhow, back to ah gong and his injury. He’s so lucky that it was just a small hit on the head. Those rocks are very sharp and a more unfortunately hit would have led to much more devastating consequences….Sigh.

We got some bandaids, let’s put a Frozen one on him to teach him a lesson.

Wound care nurse RL goes to work. The cut isn’t too bad, but our stress level is high. It’s more of the he’s lucky that he escaped this fall with such little injury. I can’t bear to think about what would have happened if where he fell happened to sit a larger and shaper rock….Either way, he’s not allowed to smoke there by the beach anymore.

After that very stressful and perhaps lucky outcome, time for a drink. They sell liquor at the grocery stores here in Hawaii, so we had picked this up a couple night ago. Coming into good use tonight.

RL playing with our new instrument. Tomorrow, we pack up and take a long flight home back to Austin.

Here on the big island at this airbnb, the nighttime frog calls are nonstop. I mean probably even noisier than the animal calls at night in Costa Rica rainforest. Apparently it’s made by an invasive coqui frog from Puerto Rico. They are really really loud and they are tiny, like size of a penny but pack a punch. Apparently they were introduced by accident in the late 80s and now they are everywhere creating a ruckus at night. I’d be so pissed if I lived here in Hawaii prior to the frogs and could enjoy a quiet night, and now it’s just loud ass frogs all night long. Apparently they are the most widespread on the big island, and you can literally hear it. It’s crazy loud.

To be continued at Home, Sweet Home.