Friday January 23rd 2009

Today Andrew discovered that an unheated pool is not warm at 8am even in this climate. Keen to swim we decided to drive along the south coast to Murphy's Beach at the 20 mile marker which we had discovered earlier in the week. As we set out we were listening to the local radio and heard a warning several times about bad weather that had caused all the local schools to be closed and suggesting we should all take cover and keep safe! This sounded like deja vu because the day we arrived in Honolulu a week ago, a weather warning had caused closure of all the schools and some government businesses. The storm had not turned out as bad as expected although I think we had met it half way through our flight when we went through about an hour of turbulence that was making the plane bounce and creak alarmingly. We decided to take a run into Maunaloa and consult some locals before going anywhere. The man in the kite shop said the weather was going to be fine and he did not know why a warning would be broadcast so we set off watching the sky as we went.

Murphy's is indeed a lovely beach, great for snorkelling and there was nobody else there but that might have been because a fresh wind and cloudy weather were making it almost as cold as the pool so still no swimming today. Instead we drove up over the end of the island to Halawa beach. Here we parked the car and walked down the trail to the beach to eat our packed lunch. There are lots of photo opportunities at this end of the island - beautiful views, winding roads and lush vegetation.

On the way home Claire and Andrew were introduced to Dave's Hawaiian Ice Cream in Kaunakakai. Andrew was looking for a special brand of coffee so we went to the Coffees of Hawaii store in Kualapuu but it was a bit disappointing. They only sold their own brand and it contained only 10% Hawaiian coffee!