So, let's rewind to Wednesday. Wednesday morning, I was pretty tired after a night of Mai Tais, but forced myself out of bed and into the car, on a pretty hot day. I spent about 5 minutes analyzing how to get out to Rte 93, Farrington Highway, which would take me all the way north a couple miles short of Kaena Point, which is the westernmost point on O'ahu. I headed up this one road I thought would take me past a military base and on there, but I somehow got backwards and ended up heading east back to Ewa Beach... So I parked at the foodland and re-analyzed my route. Apparently part of the map was behind because the road that was on there is no longer open to the public, and one of the roads on there wasn't even built yet. So I said "screw it", and followed the sun North and West. I finally made my way onto 93, and headed west past Ko Olina where I had the luau the other day, and up toward Waianae. The book Sue sent me to prepare for this trip said that Waianae and the west coast used to be pretty rough in the 70's, but that things were blown out of proportion now, and it's totally safe for tourists to travel there. I can see how this area may get this reputation as I encountered some pretty destitute living conditions for some people living on the beach. Whether they have been forced there or live there by choice, I do not know, but I saw some "tarp cities" deep in the bush between the highway and the water. When I mentioned it to Quinn, he told me how some of the locals here have basically been priced out of their homeland due to massive inflation in the real estate market. The situation is sad, for such a beautiful place that the natives are being kind of shoved to the wayside to make way for resorts and other Capitalist Delights. It seems almost like a 21st century, passive Trail of Tears, only instead of forcing people to walk out to Oklahoma, people have come in and bought up all the land increasing the prices so much that without a way off the island, those that cant afford housing move to the west side.
Waianae is not without it's beauty despite all this, and given the choice to be homeless here or in Roanoke, by far I'd choose here, even though there is less upward mobility. Nanakuli, Maili, Waianae, and Makaha are all small towns on this stretch of highway. One interesting story I read about Makaha is that it used to be very dangerous. There is a mountain (Pu'ukea'au) on the east side of the road that pinches the pass to Keawa'ula Beach (Yokohama) From over 1000' feet up, lookouts could see groups of people coming and would yell "high tide" if the group was big and "low tide" if the group was small enough to be robbed. What struck me most about this area is that it is exceptionally beautiful, even in the summer when things are mostly brown from the arid climate. The west side gets very little rainfall and the beach and mountains basically meet together. 
As you can see, getting on the beach here is quite treacherous, as it is packed from one end of the coast to the other with locals and tourists. There are many beaches just like this one along the way, but my favorite was all the way up north at the end of the road... a place known as Yokohama Beach (Keawa'ula Beach). It's the last beach accessible by paved road before getting to Kaena Point State Park, where the waves I hear are extraordinarily large, and unsafe for swimming. The waves here at Yokohama were awesome. Some of the kids were doing backflips over the conditions here. Even the locals got in on the action. I hung out here for a while, but couldn't stay all day unfortunately, and eventually headed back to Ewa where Sue had to take off for work. The trip wouldn't be complete without scoring a shot of a friggin spectacular Hawaiian Mullet - - on a motorcycle no less.Sue took off and I babysat the three kids until Quinn came home. For the most part the kids here are exceptionally well-behaved, except they like to see how far they can get with me when mom and dad aren't home. It's difficult for me to play disciplinarian to kids when I used to get away with so much as a child. So we've started this system up when Uncle Scott babysits: As soon as they go over the line with misbehaving, I whip them with an old antenna off a 79' Chevy Impala. No, really, they generally do what I say, when I say it.
Quinn got in, and a planned early-to-bed drink turned into 3 or 4, and the next thing we knew, we were pretty drunk out on the patio having good conversation. While I *am* in paradise and have so many things assaulting my senses... beautiful sights (and women), wonderful smells and tastes.... it is the conversations and quality time I have been getting to spend with Quinn, Sue, Ben, Nate, and Naomi that I will be taking home as the longest lasting memories. This is time I truly cherish.
Thursday morning, Quinn and I had intended on getting up at 6am to head out to Shark Country for an early morning Surf. We didn't really hit the road until 7:30. The surfing at Shark Country is pretty far out, and quite corally, and since I don't surf, I pretty much stayed at the rocks and practiced taking photos with my camera. I got some videos that you can see at my YouTube Channel and a lot of stills of the surf action on my Picasa site. The surf was pretty far out, so I didn't get anything super great. Most of the stills I had to get at 20x digital zoom distance... and a few actually came out. I like this one of a guy getting eaten by the wave.We came back and I scored some breakfast and a long nap.
After my nap, I did a little grocery shopping at the Foodland and got fixings for burgers. Friends of Quinn and Sue's: Greg and Cecilia came over for a little cookout in the evening. I made some of my Roanoke-Famous Blue Cheese Burgers, and found some Aidells Chicken Sausages to cook up as well. Apparently, this was the very last meal to be cooked on the family grill, as we awoke Friday morning to find a rusted out bottom of the grill laying on the patio. The salt air plus some curious rats probably contributed to the death of this poor feast-making machine!
During dinner, I was a little shy, being the fifth wheel at this party, opting to drink my "Green Bottles" (Heineken) and enjoy the food and listen to the talk. When Greg started talking, Quinn used his secret power of being a local chameleon to start talking Hawaiian Pidgin with him. Listening to this dialect was fascinating. The more I drank, the more I understood what was being said, as I fell into some sort of crazy time warp and each word sort of became clearer. Either way, it was fascinating to listen to, and Greg and Cecilia are wonderful wonderful people. Since I am but a visitor to their lovely island, they showed me great friendliness and hospitality. I can't imagine better people to take care of my Quinn and Sue while they're so far away from me! I only hope I didn't make a complete ass of myself from all the "Green Bottles!"
Needless to say, this morning I slept pretty good. I was very confused as to what time it truly was due to my being in a time warp. It was like dark when I woke up first and I thought it was maybe 10am, then the next time I woke up it was extremely bright and I was mad at myself for sleeping until noon. It turns out it was 8:30am, and I sort of flopped around a bit until I felt good enough to head downstairs.
Quinn made me a killer Poke Omelette and left it in the fridge. After that, Sue did her morning tread/sunbathing as I got cleaned up and tried to help around the house wherever I was needed (which apparently is nowhere), but ended up playing with the kids a bit. When she came in, she taught me the ancient game of Pinochle. One thing about Sue is that I can count on her to have a good time playing cards. I love playing cards, and she probably enjoys it as much as my mom did when I was a kid. One thing's for sure... when I get home, I am going to see about organizing some card playing. Not like drinking card playing, or necessarily high stakes poker, but just a fun night to play cards, eat snacks, listen to tunes, drink some beers. Spades, Hearts, Poker, Pinochle, whatever floats the boat. Something to get people together, as the community aspect is what's so much fun about it.
Sue headed off to work, and I hung out on the couch with Nate and Ben while they played video games and we all waited for Quinn to get home. I started reading a book which grabbed my attention quickly. I'm hoping to get some time tomorrow to get farther, but it will be a full day up on the North Shore and heading around the island. Had some "Arroz con pollo" for dinner, which tricked the kids into sounding much better than "Chicken and Rice". I have to admit, it was pretty good. All in all, it was a good day.
Early to bed, Early to rise. -- One week down, one to go.
Signing off from the Island,
Scott
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