Updates from Chris & Ronja's Roadtrip in 2016

March 14, 2016

Aloha all,

we’re not even a week into this road trip and besides that Sandra is not with us, I enjoy it as much as I could ever enjoy a road trip. And if you know me, you know that I am really good at enjoying road trips, extraordinarily good. Enjoying road trips might be one of my best skills I have.

In case you are not aware yet why I would ever take a road trip without Sandra, let me explain: On my very first trip to the US, I traveled mostly by train. Occasionally, we rented a car, but renting a car when you’re under 25 was not easy in America. Under 21 it’s almost impossible. That seemed annoying then, but came in really handy now: My niece Ronja is 20 and she has heard enough about Maui and about road trips from her Uncle Chris and Aunt Sandra that she used her time off before college to first visit us on Maui with her very nice friend Sarah and then she wanted to go on a road trip on the US mainland. But since road tripping without a car is pretty hard, Uncle Chris was practically forced to take her on a trip. My arm is so twisted, it still hurts.

Luckily, our hanai parents Bunt & Ann still have Homer, which is perfect for a 3 week trip in cold country for 2 people. Obviously, we had to do this trip in winter, because the Ultimate Frisbee tournaments in Hawaii are in winter and if Ronja flies half way around the world, there better be some ultimate involved. Plus, if Sandra and I ever want to fulfill our dream of doing a really long road trip, there will be winter months involved, too. So we better get some practice in.

Homer spent the winter in a barn in Evergreen, Colorado at over 7,000 feet. We were concerned that we might spend the first week either snow plowing or waiting for warmer weather, but not only did we get lucky with the weather, Trevor even picked us up from the airport and within the first few hours after we landed, we got to play disc golf, go bowling, play ping pong and shoot pool…not a bad start and it went all uphill from there…sometimes even literally uphill, like when we did a short hike to St. Mary's Glacier at over 10,000 feet.

For some weird reason, I never went skiing, even though I am usually not opposed to fun. For the past 20 years, I have a pretty good excuse. The skiing opportunities on Maui are pretty limited. But I grew up close to the Black Forest and I went to college at the foot of the Alps…no idea why it took me 45 years to go downhill skiing for the very first time in my life, but in a way, I am glad I did wait so long. Since I am fairly old to start skiing and since I am a remarkably bad surfer and balance is usually not my strong suit, I expected to do very poorly. But I was willing to entertain Ronja and Trevor by attempting to ski anyway. At least Ronja seemed disappointed at first: I did not do anything real funny, except the one time when I ended up in a fence. I started skiing right away. Breaking, turning or slowing down took me a little longer. Later in the day, Ronja’s disappointment turned to being proud of her uncle and enjoying that we could actually ski together.

Before that day, I would have been happy to make it down the bunny hill with only minor injuries. To my surprise I barely fell down at all and quickly advanced to longer and even steeper slopes. Even though “steep” seems to be a very relative term for skiing. I feel like I am racing down an incredible steep mountain, while Ronja skis that same slope with about the ease I walk on a sidewalk…and Trevor skis on one ski or backwards to make it interesting for him. They just laugh when I call any part of a green run steep. But regardless of how flat or steep the hill was: I enjoyed it so much that I doubt any “real” skier on any black run can have any more fun. I have a hard time thinking of days when I had more fun than on my first day of skiing. What a rush!

So I did not get injured skiing at all, but since my one arm was still hurting from being twisted to go on a road trip with Ronja, Trevor had to twist my other arm to stay another day so we can play at an indoor Ultimate Frisbee hat draw tournament. We got even luckier: The tournament was supposed to be from 11pm-3am, but they got the arena earlier, so we were “already” done at 1:35am. Yes a.m. that is. Definitely the most fun I ever had playing ultimate after midnight, even though my team lost every game.

On Saturday, we started our actual road trip. Our first stop was Georgetown, just like it was last year with Sandra. I thought I could show Ronja our favorite Czech restaurant in town, but it was closed. But luckily we just happened to park across from a quaint looking tea room. Ronja says “I love tea rooms” and next thing we know, we sip tea in outrageous hats and have a fun conversation with everybody else in the tea room. It was really the cutest little place, it felt like being in a doll house, just with better food.

The next day, my experience from our last trip worked out better. We got to do the Hanging Lake hike again. Less water falling over the waterfalls, but more people falling on the snowy trail. And still one of the prettiest little hikes I know.

Today, we went skiing again. I guess I am hooked now. After one day of skiing I already have a hard time just driving by a ski area. Our first choice was eliminated by the weather, but “Powderhorn” was a great substitute, even though it was not powder snow. I still can’t believe that I skied downhill for over 8,000 vertical feet without falling down once. Maybe it’s good we are heading southwest away from most ski areas, before I get hurt. For now only my face hurts because I can’t stop smiling. 

Two more weeks, it will be way too short, but even though we are heading into familiar places for me on the way to California, I am looking forward to every mile of it.

Aloha and Mahalo for reading,

Chris & Ronja

March 21, 2016

Aloha all,

the main lesson we learnt from our previous road trips has been that it almost doesn’t matter where you go: There is something interesting to see in every corner of this great country. But when Ronja said that she wanted to go on a road trip, it was pretty clear, that we should go to the national parks in the Southwest. 

Even though I’ve been to most of them before, it still amazes me that in such a relatively small area there are all these unreal natural wonders. In the past week alone we have been to the Colorado National Monument, Arches National Park, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon, Zion and we are now at the Grand Canyon. I find these parks truly amazing and I am glad to see them again. So no wonder it seems impossible to get a pictures of us standing still.

As Ronja and Sandra can attest, I love talking to all kinds of people on road trips. It’s always interesting and sometimes you get the best ideas that way. Like the suggestion of a park ranger to take the scenic route 128 when driving from Colorado to Arches NP in Utah. What made this drive even better is the fact that we forgot to bring any CDs with us on this trip. Let me explain: The number of radio stations in that neck of the desert ist pretty limited. But at one point Ronja said that the instrumental music reminded her of Hawaii. The next song was by Hapa, then Kealii Reichel…we had caught the Hawaiian Hour of the local radio station and by the time we reached the prettiest part of the drive, Brother Iz delivered his best rendition of “It’s a wonderful World”. Wonderful indeed.

I have heard the explanation why there are so many arches in Arches National Park a dozen times and I do believe in science, but I still find unbelievable (and impossible to remember). Delicate Arch (1st picture below) might be our favorite arch, but the one that made me realize how lucky I am the most is Landscape Arch (2nd picture). Last time I was there was about 25 years ago.That particular arch seemed so fragile then that it could have collapsed any moment. What I did not know until now, 25 years later, is that only a couple of weeks after I stood under that arch, a few tons of rock did come crashing down. Lucky me. One park visitor got even luckier and actually got a picture with the huge boulders in midair; without getting killed either.

I had been to Canyonlands NP before, too. But the views are always worth another look and we also made it to the ‘Upheaval Dome’ in the “Island in the Sky’ section of this park this time. What I liked about this place, besides the name, was the scientific explanation about the formation of this dome: In short: They don’t know. I am always impressed that geologists can tell with some certainty what happened in a particular place a few million years ago. But in this place, the consensus seems to be: We don’t know. Maybe a meteorite, but then again, there is no trace of a meteorite to be found…they just don’t know: how refreshing!

The next highlight: We played a round of disc golf like no other before. We found a golf course that actually offers golf carts to play disc golf. Ronja loves disc golf, but she definitely enjoyed riding the golf cart way more than the part throwing the frisbees. Adding to her enjoyment was the fact that I put one of my discs right smack in the middle of a lake right after announcing that I shouldn’t do that. I also lost another disc under mysterious circumstances, but two lost discs and the price of admission was a small price to pay for the fun we had. And even after 2 weeks of traveling together, I had no idea how lazy Ronja can be: She even putted while sitting in the golf cart…

Capitol Reef was a new National Park for me. It’s pretty remote and therefore not busy even during spring break. A surprising feature besides the rock formations and steep canyon was an apricot orchard, which was in full bloom. It smelled and looked amazing. Another highlight of the day came at the primitive “Hole in the Wall” Campground: Ronja (for the first time in her life!) went out into nature when "nature called". For my European friends who might not be familiar with this expression, I can give you two hints: It did not smell as good as the apricot orchard and the campground could also be called “Hole in the Ground” now….

Bryce Canyon was one of the first National Parks I ever went to and it’s still one of my favorites. We did our longest hike here and ran into fun people and fun formations. Hiking through the canyons full of weird shapes made out of the most colorful sandstone, I kept thinking “The Gods must be crazy”…. or drunk. Who comes up with that? No geological explanation seems more plausible to me than a god who got a little tipsy before creating that part of the land. 

Zion National Park is great, too. But it was pretty busy. There were a lot of people even in areas where you had to drive by car first, then take a shuttle, then hike a little and then walk through ice cold water in a narrow canyon. Of course we were two of those people. We did not go as far as others, but only because they actually prepared for it and brought the right gear for walking through the icy water. We just brought the enthusiasm to do it…until we could not feel our feet anymore. But as bad as it felt while walking in the cold water, it felt great afterwards. The German Dr. Kneipp was on to something!

Today, we made it to the Grand Canyon and I have to say, it is very appropriately named. Grand indeed. And even though I had seen and hiked it before, it still has some surprises for me: Like a beautiful sunset. After a pretty cloudy afternoon and not much color right around sunset, all of the sudden, the sky lit up in pink all over the canyon rim.

Now the only 'first world' luxury problem we have is deciding whether we want to see Disneyland and Highway #1 along the California Coast or a few more National Parks on the way to San Francisco. The good thing about this question: There is no wrong answer: We will have one more week of fun before we have to go back to our harsh realities: Me living on Maui with Sandra and Ronja going on a Eurail trip and playing frisbee tournaments, including Worlds in London. Road trips are always too short, but it doesn’t get much better than this. Life is good!

Aloha from a very grand canyon,

Chris & Ronja

April 2, 2016

Aloha all,

Life on the road is so much fuller. A week at home can slip by without much notice. Looking back at the one week since the last update, it feels like we had two months worth of experiences. So let’s take off where we we were last: At the great Grand Canyon.

Ronja and I did a half day hike into the canyon; barely enough to change the perspective of this oversized landscape. At the end of the hike it mostly changed my perspective of how small we humans are. On our way from the Grand Canyon to Las Vegas, we drove a part of the historic Route 66. Since a lot of the old charm and the old fashioned attractions are gone, we pulled over to play two different disc golf courses instead. We also took a guided tour through the ‘Grand Canyon Caverns’, the largest dry caves in the United States, which also double as an emergency shelter for up to 2,000 people or as a hotel for 2-6 people. For a mere $800, you can rent the whole cave for a night.

Las Vegas is the opposite of the Grand Canyon Caverns and the Grand Canyon: While one of the attractions of the cave is the total darkness and quietness you could experience there, the lights and sounds of Vegas never stop. And while the Grand Canyon has been carved over millions of years and looks pretty much the same as 1,000 years ago, Vegas has been transformed by humans within geological seconds: How weird what this desert plain has become, mostly because people keep playing the odds even though they are stacked slightly against them. After a week in the National Parks, the contrast was astounding: After parking Homer in the RV Park that just happened to be behind the California Hotel in Downtown, where all the Hawaiians stay, we walk the few steps to Fremont Street and everything was different:

Instead of a clear starry night overhead, there now was that crazy roof over us that is actually a huge video screen that plays a different light and video show every half hour. Instead of a few birds chirping, there were a few bands competing who is louder and more outrageous. And instead of people going on a hike, they are zipping overhead. And instead of a ranger or interpretive sign explaining the natural features of a national park, there were now a million signs explaining why you should drink more alcohol, gamble more, eat all you can eat and maybe watch a strip show. It felt like we were crashing a big party, but I guess it was just another night in Vegas.

We spent the whole next day exploring the strip, from the famed “Welcome to Las Vegas” sign (which seems pretty modest by today’s standards) to the various themed hotels, shops and restaurants. How crazy that in the middle of the desert you can now stroll along a Venetian canal, watch a 3D movie about M&Ms, eat Indian food, ride a monorail and a futuristic ferris wheel, just to name some of the lamer activities you can do in Vegas. We also watched four of the water fountain shows at the Bellagio and saw a Cirque du Soleil show called ‘Zarkana’. It was as spectacular as Cirque Du Soleil shows usually are. It was such an acrobatic show that I am surprised I caught a moment on camera below with no people flying through the air. Wow, what a show!

After a long day out, around 1am or so we got tired and returned home to Homer. Lucky for Ronja, I knew a short cut. Too bad that is was blocked by a tall fence around the RV park. Jokingly, I told Ronja that “this fence wasn’t here this morning”. Obviously, I knew that I just didn’t remember right or was a little disoriented. I was a little surprised since I seemed to remember the huge long opening with no wall or fence, but reality proved me wrong…until the next morning. On the way back from the showers, I noticed some construction workers by that fence. I just had to ask them when the fence was built. Sure enough, it was built the day before. There was no sign of it in th morning and it looked like it had always been there when we returned 15 hours later. Nice to find out that I am not totally loosing my mind yet.

As mentioned in the last update, we now had to make the decision whether to go to Disneyland or whether to see some more national parks on the way to San Francisco. Going to Disneyland would have meant a lot more driving and getting to the park on Easter weekend during spring break, one of the busiest days of the year at Disney. So I have no doubt that visiting some more national Parks was the better choice, but we were both a little disappointed that we were so reasonable and responsible.

Death Valley was alive this winter. We got there a little too late, but still saw some nice wildflowers. Our favorite part were the sand dunes, which seems ironic: If all we wanted was to play in the sand, there was really no need to fly 6,000 miles and drive for 2 weeks, we could have stayed on Maui and walk across the street to the beach. Death Valley was both a low point and a high point of our trip: 282 feet below sea level, but with 94 degrees also a record high. Hard to believe that just a few miles further north, several passes were still closed, blocking all short routes to Yosemite. 

Our next stop was Sequoia National Park. Redwoods sure look like trees, they are just the wrong size. I remembered the huge trees from my last visit, I did not remember how scenic the park is overall. Maybe it was just the time of the year with the spring in full bloom in lower elevations and still pretty good snow cover higher up. The General Sherman Tree is considered the largest tree in the world by volume. With 275 feet not the tallest, with 100 feet (!) circumference not the biggest around, with about 2,700 years not the oldest, but the one out of which you could make the most chopsticks.

We spent our last full day trading in Homer for a tandem. After being chased by cable cars up and down the hills of San Francisco and surprisingly finding almost legal parking, we rented a tandem from what must be the most efficient bike rental company in the country. Walking in the shop just with the idea that it would be fun to ride a tandem over the Golden Gate Bridge, a few minutes later we rolled out on a tandem with a plan and ferry tickets for the way back and even a rubber band around my leg to keep my pants out of the well oiled chains. ‘Blazing Saddles” is a very efficient and very fun place.

It’s seems to me that a tandem is a little harder to ride on flat ground and a little easier uphills. Or maybe Ronja just knows when uncle needs a little more help. Either way, we made it over the Golden, or actually Red Gate Bridge for a coffee/beer break in Sausalito before taking the ferry back. Fun Day in the city without really spending much time in the actual city.

You know that time is running out when Ronja and I stay at an RV park with a disc golf course and don’t get to play. But we had another sweet ending planned: Ronja and Sarah had bought a 4 pound jar of jelly belly beans at Costco when they came to Maui. We came full circle at the end of our trip together and did a tour at the Jelly Belly factory in Fairfield, CA. A kid in a candy store is nothing compared to Ronja in a candy factory. 

After dropping Ronja off for her flight home, I got to spend 2 days with Jerry & Mary at their California home in Sonoma County. I was mostly busy getting Homer in good shape for his next adventure, which is probably going to be with Bern & Jill. But I was able to sneak away for a few hours to visit the estate of Jack London. I did not know much about him, even though he supposedly is the most translated author in the world and the most successful author of his time. At the Jack London State Historical Park, I learnt all the things we don’t know about Jack London: Who his father might or might not be, that he might have died naturally, poisoned or by suicide and that his dream home, the “Wolf House” might have burnt down by accident or due to arson,… lots of mysteries about Jack London, but one thing is clear: He lived a full and interesting life that came to an end way too early.

The same can be said about my road trip with Ronja: Certainly full and interesting and certainly way too short. But I have learnt that there is one huge advantage of traveling without Sandra. We usually have a hard time seeing the silver lining of a road trip coming to an end. But now I saw a clear 'gold lining' since I got to come home to Sandra. 

I’ve only been home for a few hours, but if Sandra came asking, I could be ready for another road trip by tonight.

Aloha,

Chris & Ronja

All Updates from Chrisandra's 3rd Road Trip - Homer's Odysee in 2015

June 17, 2015

Aloha all,

it is so good to be back on the road with Sandra in a RV. As much as we enjoy it, it’s surprising we let almost 5 years pass since our last real road trip, after which we had to sell our beloved MarRVy. Thanks to Bunt & Ann, we are now cruising from Colorado to British Columbia, Canada in “Homer”, the smaller version of MaRVy. We love both, Homer and MaRVy, but of course we can’t help comparing. Luckily, they are RVs, not children, so it is fair to ask “Which one do we love more?”. The verdict is easy: We preferred ‘living’ in MaRVy, but we prefer driving and most of all parking Homer! And either way, we are just glad to be RVing again!

You all know that we love living on Maui. But a week can go by like nothing when you are at home (wherever that might be). Most weeks are very pleasant on Maui, but a bunch of them can go by without us really noticing it. Yet in slightly more than a week on the road, it feels like we had a year’s worth of experiences and adventures. 

First we got to enjoy some time with our hanai family in Evergreen, Colorado. We got to watch some soccer, went disc golfing and played plenty of games. Evergreen is where Homer stayed for the winter, parked in a barn with a barn door about 1 inch wider and 1 inch taller than Homer. Driving Homer is much easier than MaRVy, but the first 20 feet out of the barn were quite the challenge.

Our destination in the Rocky Mountains was Georgetown, the cutest little semi-ghost town consisting mostly of 100 year old houses in varying stages of decay and remodel. We had a fabulous Czech lunch (and beer) by the river and got a private tour at the historic “Hotel De Paris”, which was the ritziest place to stay during the gold and silver rush in this area. We also took the historic steam train ride on the Georgetown loop to Silver Plume. This was a treat even for seasoned train travelers, since we got to ride in a totally open train car, smelling the fresh Colorado air, mixed with the black ashes from the historic locomotive. We also took a short walk through Vail, just because we had never been there. It’s a carefree place, mostly because the town centre is mostly car free. But it’s not a ‘real’ town, if you ask me. It was very pleasant and we had a really good German dinner (and beer). But since we don’t ski, I think the 4 hours is all I ever really need to be in Vail.

On our second day on the road, we made a huge mistake. We went on what I must assume will be the best hike on this entire trip. I know, we still have over three weeks to go, but I don’t see how it can get any better than this. Imagine a place with three waterfalls, two of them magically shooting out of the rocky cliffs high above you, then imagine you could walk behind these waterfalls (I love going behind waterfalls!) and now imagine that this was not even the highlight of this hike. The “Hanging Lake” might be the prettiest place I know. It is also very popular, especially on a glorious Colorado blue sky spring day. That is why it’s so popular that we had almost given up finding parking and were on our way out twice before we got lucky after all. And thanks to the pretty small parking area in a narrow canyon, the number of people is limited to a very reasonable number. And everybody we saw and talked to seemed to be equally enthusiastic about this place. Or maybe they were all just happy they found a parking spot.

The next two days were guaranteed to be fun since we got to spend them with Annie in Aspen. An evening stroll at the Maroon Bells, another waterfall to walk behind, an aquamarine lake to swim in, a vapor cave to relax and we did not even have to plan anything, with out local experts, Annie & Mike.

The very scenic drive to our next destinations took us through beautiful lush green canyons (hey California, I know who’s got all your water!) and over the Grand Mesa, where there were still huge piles of snow, but the roads were all clear. I guess we were pretty luck with the timing. The Colorado National Monument and the Dinosaur National Monument were both impressive enough that they might as well be National Parks, but maybe it’s better they are “only” called National Monuments, considering how awesome they both are, they were both not very busy at all. The scenery is even more impressive at the Colorado NM, but I have to say that seeing a whole wall of fossilized dinosaur bones was pretty amazing, too. 

We took the “Best Dam Tour” in all of Utah at the Flaming Gorge. They can easily claim to be the best, apparently there is only one dam in Utah that gives tours. That scenic drive was also pretty exciting since I had miscalculated the amount of gas needed and we still had about 50 mountainous miles to the next gas station after the low fuel light came on. I always said that I wanted to run out of gas at least once in my life. Well, I was wrong. I driving up a winding road in this remote area without knowing whether we make it up the hill with no shoulders to pull over if we actually ran out of gas was not as fun as I expected it. On the bright side: We did not get stuck and I am cured of that silly desire. 

We love camping, ranger programs, hiking and learning in any National Park Service site. Who says the government can’t do anything right? We bought a map of all the National Park Service units, of which there are currently 407, to mark where we have already been (not even 80 yet). On that map, we also found a few more sites along the way. 

The “Golden Spike National Monument” is the place where the first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. To represent this historic occasion, they rebuilt the tracks in this area and even reconstructed locomotives from the two competing railroad companies. If you want to pinpoint the end of the West as the wilderness frontier to a single event, this would have to be it. Instead of traveling by wagon over the treacherous trails or by boat around all of South America, you could now take a train and get from Omaha, Nebraska to Sacramento, California in only 4 days. They still had to stop about every 30-50 miles to get water, coal or wood, but that’s quite the improvement from the wagon trails. I remember, when I first came to America after high school, I took Amtrak all over the country. I think the trip from Chicago to Las Vegas still took about two days, so 4 days is pretty impressive for 1869. No wonder people were excited and no wonder it had such a huge influence on the development of the West, for better or for worse.

I had not heard of Fossil Butte before, but learnt that it is one of the premier spots for fossils on the planet. They actually found whole alligators, turtles and even small horses in the rocks that used to be the bottom of a lake. Humans have chipped and hammered away on those rocks for over a hundred years, including commercial mining operations that look for fossils to sell to collectors even today. But surprisingly, the ranger I asked guessed that 98% of all the fossils are still untouched. 

Off to Idaho. First stop: Shoshone Falls and then what was supposed to be a quick scenic stop at the Perrine Bridge over the Snake River in Twin Falls. But the beauty of a road trip is that you never really know what comes next: We ended up spending 15 hours around that bridge. The view was so awesome that we picked a restaurant with a view of the bridge and the canyon for dinner. The dinner (and the beer) was so awesome that we asked whether we could park overnight if we had another round of beers. The restaurant was surprisingly affordable for such a location and really delicious food and the friendly service included a 20% discount because it’s somebody’s birthday this month. We loved that place - my favorite meal of the trip! 

And since we like the bridge so much, we went there the next morning, to have  our breakfast at the view point when we noticed several people folding parachutes on the lawn. It turns out we are not the only ones who love this bridge. Apparently, BASE jumpers love it, too. It’s the only place where they can always legally jump without a permit. Seeing people jump of a bridge 486 feet above the canyon floor is pretty impressive. I got an adrenaline rush just from watching and talking to them. 

We also stopped at Minidoka NHS, which was one of the internment camps for Japanese-Americans during WW II. Maybe the panic after Pearl Harbor explains this lack of judgement. Basically imprisoning people simply because of their race seems obviously wrong from today’s view. 

Now we are at the Craters of the Moon National Monument. Not that we were homesick already, but this feels a lot like home: Lava tubes, cinder cones, lava, which they still call A’a and Pahoehoe here,…all reminds us very much of Hawaii. Surprisingly, they have the prettier and more colorful flowers blooming all over the cinder and out of the cracks of the lava. So at least at this time of the year, they make up for the lack of an active volcano.

And that’s the News from Lake Idaho, where all the flowers seem to be in bloom, where all the beer seems to taste awesome and where all the National Park sites are more interesting than average.

Aloha,

Chris & Sandra

June 23, 2015

Aloha all,

I am seriously excited about our NEXT road trip, even before this trip is over. In fact I am almost bursting with anticipation. Not because this one is no fun, but because this one is so much fun, that I can’t wait to go on another, longer trip. There is just so much to see, do and learn! We just spent a week in Idaho, but I am sure we could easily spend two months exploring this spectacular place!

In my first update, I mentioned the wild flowers in the Craters of the Moon National Monument, below is a picture to show what I mean. Lava fields and cinder cones can be so barren, but they were in full bloom here. At a ranger talk at this park, we also learnt that the first transcontinental road trip took place in 1903. One Horatio Jackson drove an automobile (or a 'horseless carriage' as they probably called it then) from San Francisco to New York City and completed this feat in 63 days. It would take us a lot longer than that, but only because we’d want to see every historical site, National Park, state capitol, presidential home or library along the way, plus some fun towns, a few disc golf courses, swimming holes and maybe a couple of breweries. From the accounts I hear from Mr. Jackson’s trip, he was pretty much busy either driving or repairing his automobile…

Speaking of road trips that were not as fun us ours: At Three Island Crossings on the Snake River, there is an excellent Interpretive Center on the Oregon Trail. Actually, the museum itself is only good, what made it excellent was Josh, the enthusiastic curator there. This is in a State Park, but Josh was the opposite of what some people think of state employees. I am not sure whether we got special treatment since we have this weird combination of being from Hawaii with an accent from Germany or whether he was just glad to have somebody seriously interested in learning about the Oregon Trail. Not only would he answer every question (and believe me, I always have questions in those types of places). He would actually go back to his office a few times, looking stuff up and come back with a detailed answer or to read us a passage from a book.

My favorite part about the museum was the wall where they displayed information that was given to prospective pioneers thinking about going to the Oregon territory: There were enthusiastic accounts of lush valleys where everything grows in abundance and pigs roam free with the forks already stuck in them so they are ready to be eaten and guarantees that claimed “There are no hills between Missouri and Oregon that anybody would call a mountain.”  Apparently the Rocky Mountains were formed after the 1860’s… Other reports claimed that most settlers died on the trail or made it to Oregon only to find making a living there was harder than back east. You think there was some bias in the news then? And you thought you can’t trust the media today…

Our next stop was Boise. Compared to the surround countryside, this is a real metropolis, but still easily maneuvered by RV, in fact we got a parking spot right next to the state capitol. We try to tour any State Capitol we can, they are always very informative and welcoming and Idaho was no exception. So welcoming in fact that they don’t have any security checks whatsoever, you can stroll right into the senate or house of representatives without ever even being looked at. What would they look for anyway: Apparently it would be legal to walk into the capitol with an AK 47. I am sure there is much more to see in Boise, but we spent so much time in the capitol that we only had time two of our other favorite things to do: Food and beer. The beer was my favorite kind:  locally brewed and free (some sort of rally in a nice park for a good cause). Since we learnt that Boise has the largest expat community of Basques, we opted for a Basque dinner, which was delicious.

This is actually the first “working road trip” for me - meaning I still work on my little vacation rental website business almost every day, even if it’s just sending a couple of e-mails in the evening. Usually, the evenings were our time to make plans for the next day, so the planning time is now occasionally compromised. But not having a plan sometimes works out beautifully: The next day, we were heading north from Boise, knowing only which scenic route we wanted to take, but not what to do or see along the way. After driving through a scenic canyon, we pull over at what we thought is just a visitor information, without knowing it was also “Kelly’s Whitewater Park” and it was surprisingly busy. Our first clue that we had pretty good timing was when the volunteer at the parking entrance asked whether we are here to compete. Turns out they were having the “Payette River Games” that weekend. It is apparently the most competitive River Stand Up Paddling event in the world. They offer $50,000 in prize money for paddlers willing and able to go through rapids down the river on a stand up paddle board. That seems to be enough money that a large contingency of athletes from Hawaii, Maui in particular, made it to the Payette River Games. No, not us, we can barely stand on a board in calm waters. But we did enjoy watching the pros, enough that we stayed here watching them all day. Besides the SUP races, they also had a frisbee dog show, beach volleyball and...you guessed it: food and beer.

The official Idaho State map claims that Idaho has the most miles of rivers in any state. That can’t be right since I “feel” it should be Alaska. And even within the lower 48, at least according to what I found on Google, Nebraska seems to have more miles of river, which sounds even more counterintuitive. But regardless of the length of the rivers in Idaho, I feel they they have some of the prettiest, so we spent the next two days on the Salmon and on the Snake river on two very different river trips. The first one was on a small traditional wooden dory. We basically walked into the first funky looking rafting outfit we saw in Riggens. We knew we were in for a treat when they asked us what kind of boat we preferred, we could choose between a raft, a dory or kayaks since we were the only guests, actually, we were their first guests of the season! The tour also did not start at a particular time, but “whenever you come back from lunch”. Our river guide Gary was not only most knowledgeable of the river, but also knew our friend RJ from back in the day when he lived in this neck of the woods. We had actually stopped at his cabin that morning. I love these coincidences.

The river trip on the next day could not have been any more different: Instead of a wooden little row boat, we were now on a jet boat, blasting up the Snake river into “Hell’s Canyon”. This is the deepest canyon in America (Yes, deeper than the Grand Canyon!). While we were rocking and rolling down category 3 rapids the day before, we were now going up category 5 rapids like it’s nothing. Being on a jet boat felt like cheating, since it makes one of the most remote places easily accessible in a couple of hours, but it was still a lot of fun. Again, we were lucky with the timing: The company had their photographer on our tour, so we “had to” go up and down the biggest rapid 4 times. I did not get much wetter at the following swim stop.

The next day was another one without a real plan. But I don’t think any amount of planning could have improved on this day: We drove up the very pretty Lochsa Valley towards Montana. We found a nice little trail along the river where I took another quick dip. We stopped at the Historic Lochsa Ranger Cabin for a long picnic, talking to the volunteer ranger about Germany, Hawaii and almost everything in between. Even the flagman at a place where the road was one lane due to tree trimming work was an event by itself. In 7 minutes, he told us everything from his incarceration for drug possession to a couple of hot springs we could visit in the area. We decided to hike to the one recommended by a hitchhiking rafter we gave a ride to. Out of all the hot springs we have ever been to, this is our favorite. In a lush green valley, just above the cold stream was this picture perfect, hot tub sized pool of hot spring water and it did not even smell of sulphur. Slightly improved by forest workers to be deep enough to really soak in it, but otherwise all natural. What a perfect place to end my birthday! And since besides a very friendly hippie who camped close by, we had the pool to ourselves, I could wear the appropriate suit for the day. What a place, what a day, what a life!

And that’s the news from Lake Idaho, where all the people are friendly, all the rivers are good looking and every day is above average.

Aloha,

Chris & Sandra

July 4, 2015

Aloha all,

I had a blessed childhood, growing up with a loving (and game playing!) family in one of the nicest areas in Germany. I was very excited and loved moving into my first own place in Freiburg during my alternative service. I have very fond memories of our college years in Munich. I immediately found a great group of friends to explore this great city, I got to drink and study a little with them and I got to marry one of them. The semester I worked at Disney was truly magical: Living, working, learning and playing with people from all around the world. We were ecstatic when we got the GreenCard, allowing us to move to Honolulu. We feel truly blessed living on Maui. As a tropical island and part of the US, we think it’s the best of both worlds. Unfortunately it’s far away from friends and family, but we found such great new friends and even a hanai family on Maui. We can’t think of any one place we would rather live than Maui. But even compared to all of this, I am happiest when I am on a road trip with Sandra. 

Cruising around this amazingly diverse country with every day open for new adventures is such a inspiring experience. Only on our Na Pali kayak trips, backpacking through Haleakala or at some Ultimate frisbee tournaments, I feel the same way, but unfortunately those only last a few days. Our road trips are never long enough, but at least they last a little longer.

Our first stop after crossing over Lolo Pass into Montana was at a place called “Traveler’s Rest”. It was none other than our old friends Lewis & Clark who called it “Traveler’s Rest” and they stopped here twice on their epic journey. Among the around 500 places they camped on their journey, this is a very unique spot: It’s the only spot with physical evidence of them having been there. Well, technically only of them shitting there. You read that right, not ‘sitting'. Let me explain: Over 200 years have passed since the Lewis & Clark expedition came through here. The area has been used by native Americans, pioneers and farmers since. Even though Clark kept pretty detailed journals, there was no way to figure out exactly where they camped…until a few years ago. With modern technology, they were able to find some disturbed soil in a similar pattern as the camps that Lewis & Clark usually set up. So far, this was mere speculation. But then came the scientific breakthrough: They found high levels of mercury in an area that would have been set aside for the latrines of the camp. Mercury does not occur naturally in this area and the natives would not have had any mercury either. However, one of the few ‘cure all’ medicines Lewis & Clark had with them were some “purging pills” that had a lot of mercury in them. And sure enough, in Clark’s journal, it is mentioned that several men were sick that night and were sure to have used those purging pills - and the facilities quickly thereafter. This makes Traveler’s Rest the only place with scientific evidence of them camping there. Now I will be honest, as fascinated as I was on the tour of this place, there was basically nothing to see besides a small ditch. But isn’t it amazing that we know exactly when and where Lewis and Clark pooped in the woods in Montana over 200 years ago…even though Sandra and I sometimes have a hard time remembering what we did three days ago.

Off to Missoula, where we visited two interesting spots: Fort Missoula would have been just another fort, which is usually interesting by itself. But the local Historical Society decided to enhance the fort by adding other historically interesting buildings from the area: From an early train depot, to a church, a school house to a library train car and a fire lookout. We were the first visitors of the day and bumped into the grounds keeper and got to talk to him about his fight against the ground squirrels, the various buildings and his fear of crowds of people in the “city”, by which he meant Missoula. The other stop was the Smokejumpers headquarters. Now if you think regular firefighters are usually pretty fit and brave, you better save some admiration for these guys (and a few gals). They are only deployed to the most dangerous and most remote fires. They parachute to the burn sites with about a hundred pounds of equipment, fight the fire for up to 16 hours a day and then usually have to hike out. Idaho and Montana have some of the largest wilderness areas on the mainland, so the hike to the closest road can easily be 20 miles. Our tour guide through the facilities was a smokejumper’s wife who was understandably proud of her guy. 

After dining at, camping by, swimming in and driving around Flathead Lake we made it to Kalispell. We found an interesting museum there by just walking around town to kill some time, but the highlight was to visit our friends Coach & Judy who spend most of their time here when they are not on Maui. I can see why: For about the same price as their small condo on Maui, they can live in a beautiful barn with a huge yard on a river. We talked story, took a short trip in their row boat and soaked in the hot tub…not a bad place…in the summer!

The next five days we spent in Glacier National Park. What a place! We went hiking every day and did as many ranger lead hikes, lodge tours and campground evening programs as we could. They were all excellent, restoring our faith in the National Park Service after we had one very lame evening program before. My two favorite hikes were the Highline Trail and the Iceberg Lake Trail. The Highline Trail starts at Logan Pass on the “Going To the Sun Road”. From start to finish, this was one of the most scenic hikes I have ever done. Dramatic views, thousands of blooming wildflowers and waterfalls from melting snowfields everywhere. The trail is so nice that even the mountain goats like it: On a particularly narrow section cut into a steep rock wall, two mountain goats came running at us, we made room on the trail for them to pass, but they decided to run along the edge, seemingly unconcerned about the few hundred feet drop off just inches away. The comments from us and the other hikers varied from “majestic” and “wonderful” to “gorgeous” and “awesome”. We decided the one that described the day the best for us was “Glorious!”. Just for extra kicks and giggles, we also got to hike over a large snow field that day, which of course is an extra special treat after so many years in Hawaii.

Something else we don’t get to see in Hawaii was the “Iceberg Lake”, adequately named since it is more than half filled with hundreds of icebergs. Since I am running out of words to describe the beauty of this place, let me try this another way: Just where you see the lake for the first time is an outhouse. While I was waiting there, I noticed that everybody who came around the corner of the trail there had the same reaction. At this point, everybody has hiked at least 5 miles through beautiful scenery, but everybody said the same thing when they first saw Iceberg Lake: “Wow!”. So I told the next hiker, before he made the turn: “Your next word is going to be ‘wow’.” Well, I guess he wanted to prove me wrong. He stepped around the bend, saw Iceberg Lake and exclaimed “Holy Shit!”. And yes, it was in reference to the lake, not the outhouse.

The area of Glacier National Park where we spent the last two days is called “Many Glaciers”. Unfortunately, that will not be an appropriate name for much longer. When the National Park was founded over 100 years ago, there were 150 glaciers in the park. Only 25 remain today and those are expected to be gone by 2030; in 15 short years… Glaciers receding might be a natural thing, but the rate they are disappearing is a scary indication that climate change is a real issue.

One thing this area did not have is phone service or wifi, that’s why you get this update with a little delay. Since Glacier National Park, we have made it across the border to Canada. But that will have to wait until the next (and final) update, so for now, you will just have to guess whether we love it or hate it here in Canada.

And that’s the news from Glacier Lake, where all the hikes were amazing, all the glaciers are disappearing and where the temperatures were way above average.

Aloha,

Chris & Sandra

July 14, 2015

Aloha all,

after reaching our destination in Prince Rupert in British Columbia, just south of Southeast Alaska, we flew first to Vancouver and then home to Maui. I think I was the most excited passenger on the very scenic flight from Prince Rupert to Vancouver. For two hours I watched the snow capped mountains, fjords, lakes and glaciers below. More glaciers than I thought there were in all of Canada… until I googled it and learnt that there are 17,000 glaciers just in British Colombia. We did not quite see all of them, but what a treat that flight was!  I think we were also the least excited passengers on our flight from Vancouver to Maui. 

Don’t get me wrong. We love Maui, we can still not think of any one place we’d rather live. But while everybody else seemed super excited to come to Maui, I felt a little sad that our road trip had come to an end. You probably guessed it already: We loved our ten days in Canada and want to explore more of it, even though I doubt we will ever run out of things to see in the US…

Our welcome to Canada was everything you would not expect from Canada. The customs officer at the remote border crossings between Glacier National Park and Waterton Lakes National Park (combined recognized as the first ‘International Peace Park’) was anything but nice and peaceful. Forget about all those jokes about the polite mounties: This was a serious jerk on a power trip, yelling at me and accusing us of stealing the RV we were driving. We were not sure for a while, but he did let us in after all.

Apparently Canada as a whole felt so bad about this rude welcome that they threw us a big party the very next day. It just happened to be July 1st, which as any informed traveler knows, is Canada Day. Obviously, we had no idea. It would be a little easier if Canadians followed the US example and called their national holiday “1st of July”…but once we found out, we diverted our route and headed to Calgary to join the festivities and see the fireworks there. Of course we first had to go up to Calgary Tower, since we always try to get an overview anytime we visit a new city. Afterwards, we joined the Calgarians in celebrating with a long day of music, food & fireworks. They had to wait with the fireworks until 11pm and even then it was not really dark yet. We love those long, warm summer evenings. Canada Day was a special treat for us since by being out of the country, we missed out on the 4th of July. One small difference: One of the performers at Canada Day made an announcement thanking the “First Nation” natives for sharing their beautiful country…I have never heard that on a 4th of July.

The trip from Calgary to Prince Rupert goes right through the Banff and Jasper National Parks. It’s a good thing we had been there before, because by now we were seriously behind schedule and only had time for a few shorter activities, such as the Banff Gondola, the Glacier Skywalk and the Glacier Adventure onto the Colombia Icefield. Surprisingly, I liked the Skywalk the best, even though we only went there because it basically came free in the package with the other two tours. Taking the off road bus onto the glacier was a lot of fun, too; and as you can see on the picture, still made me jump for joy… and for the picture.

On the long and scenic drive to Prince Rupert, we stopped only a few times. First at a 2,000 year old ‘Ancient Forest”, then in Smithers, where we watched the women’s world cup final. The first 15 minutes reminded me a lot of the semi final from Germany against Brazil. We also saw literally only the very last song of the 3 day Smithers Midsummer Music Festival, …which sounded like it would have been a lot of fun. Well, you can’t see it all.  But we sure try!

In Hazelton we visited the cultural heritage village of the K‘san First Nation tribe. The guided tour was most interesting and also very sobering. Turns out the nice Canadians were not one bit nicer to their native people. They tried to eradicate native cultures the same way Americans did with Native Americans and Missionaries tried with the Native Hawaiian culture. The sad proof that Canadians were very successful at that came right in the beginning of the tour. Our guide had just explained to the group that in K’san culture, the tribe is divided into clans and the clans into houses. She happened to have a new tour guide in training with her and asked her what clan and house she belonged to. Not only did she not know, she did not seem to know the difference between a clan and a house. A few generations of Canadian re-education at work.

After about 2,500 miles of road tripping, we arrived in Prince Rupert and actually met Ann & Bunt there to hand off Homer to his rightful owners. (See. Mr. Canadian Customs guy, we did not steal him!). Besides catching up and talking story, we also visited the Historic North Pacific Salmon Cannery. Hearing about the working conditions there (all the way up to the 1970’s) made me appreciate any job I ever had anywhere. Especially the one that I can do while road tripping. 

It was not easy saying good bye to Ann, Bunt & Homer, but at least we still had three days in Vancouver to look forward to. We packed them with some of our favorite things: a musical, Indian food, a brewery, water taxi rides, a lunch in the Top of Vancouver revolving restaurant, a tour through the Chinese Garden, a museum and looking for our favorite condo, which we will never buy or rent. Two activities that pretty much summed up our trip was the “Happy Show”, a fun exhibition about happiness and “Flyover Canada” a Disney style ride show casting the beautiful country of which we had just explored a tiny portion. 

The one thing we usually also like to do in a city is to catch an IMAX movie, but they did not want to sell us tickets. I think the customs agent had tipped them off. Instead, we walked past BC Place, the stadium where the US women won the world cup just a week ago. When we inquired about tours, they told us that they had currently no tours available, but we could get tickets for the Canadian Football game the next evening. Their number one selling point: "We have bigger balls than the Americans!"

The game from the BC Lions vs. the Saskatchewan turned out to be a blast. Just like Americans, about a third of the crowd had left “to beat the traffic”, when the home team was down 11 points late in the 4th quarter. They scored a surprising touchdown and made the 2 point conversion, still trailing 3 points with only 15 seconds to go and a 56 yards field goal attempt, longer than any field goal ever scored in over 60 years of BC Lions history. Just to prove those people wrong who had left early, they made the field goal and won with another touchdown in overtime. 

The last highlight of our trip was a guided walking tour of Granville Street and Gastown, where Vancouver got started. This great tour surprisingly was free. Now we have been on a lot of fun tours before. Often, I have described our tour guides as comedians. But this time, our guide actually was a stand up comedian, that is her other job. She is not famous yet, but judging by the laughs and the tips she received, she’s on the right track.

As sad as it is that our trip is over, it’s hard to feel depressed when you look out the window and see the rainbow on the picture below. Maui is still our favorite place to live, other than in an RV.

And that’s the news from Lake Canada, where all the customs agents we met were jerks, where everybody else was super nice and where seeing Bunt and Ann was even more fun than average.

Aloha and mahalo for reading,

Chris & Sandra

Chrisandra's Thailand Trip in 2013

Aloha all,

this update has more pictures than my updates usually have. But Thailand is a very colorful country and this is really just a small selection of the way too many pictures we took. And just think of the alternative: If I were to write a thousand words in lieu of every picture in this update, even the most avid readers amongst you would loose interest. 

Obviously, three weeks was not enough even just to see all the sights, let alone really experience Thailand. On Koh Phi Phi, a common question is "Are you traveling or are you just on holiday?". Traveling means you quit your job and you are traveling for at least a few months. Thailand is so cheap that most Westeners can afford to do that on a pretty small budget. We were "just on holiday", but even though everything is cheap, we still managed to spend as much as we did on our US road trips. Then again, on our road trips, we did not get a massage every day and we do not go scuba diving or elephant riding…

Here are some of our favorite things we did in Thailand:

• The scuba diving on Koh Phi Phi was just spectacular. We saw several scorpion fish on every one of our seven dives. On our night dive we saw 4 gorgeous lion fish. With the mix of hard & soft coral, the huge gorgonian fans and schools of fish everywhere, it felt like diving in an aquarium. The perfect water temperature and the top notch dive operation obviously helped, since it is hard to enjoy the beauty when you are cold or worried underwater.The island of Koh Phi Phi is a weird place. There are no roads on Phi Phi, no cars, no mopeds and no Tuk Tuks. Sound like a pretty idyllic place, doesn't it? I had no idea how busy and crowded an island without traffic could be. The one and only town is crammed on the narrow stretch between the two mountains. It is party central. So if you like to party or if you like to scuba dive, it's a wonderful place, otherwise I would not know what to do there.
• On the way in and out we had a few days in Bangkok. It would be honest to describe this city as: modern AND 3rd world, awesome AND awful, easy AND confusing. We like big cities, but this is definitely one I do not want to live in. But checking out the temples, riding the river taxis, sunset drinks in various roof top bars was all very fun for a few days.
• We spent almost half of our stay in Chiang  Mai, a quieter city inland in the north of Thailand. Lots of things to do there. Our favorite was a one-day trekking trip that included an elephant ride, a hike to a waterfall, whitewater rafting and floating on a bamboo raft. We also did a fun zipline tour and a beginner's ATV tour that turn into quite the adventure when one of the ATVs and one of the other participants gave up and we ran out of gas, in the dark with the lights not working…

Here are some things I noticed about Thailand (and believe me, it was not always easy to hold back the German in me who wanted to tell them how they could run their country more efficiently. They seem to be doing just fine without my help.)

• Overall, Thailand is a very safe place. Even in Bangkok, at night, walking through some random neighborhood seemed as safe or safer than most European or American cities. I explain that with the fact that Thailand is the most buddhist country in the world and in general buddhists are not fond of violence. If that is indeed the reason, it would put Islam and Christianity to shame. However, the buddhist culture does not stop them from letting women be exploited or trying to scam tourist. 
• Regardless which form of transportation you choose, it is always a bit chaotic. But we learned to go with the flow. You might not get to where you wanted when you wanted. But you always get somewhere sometime. Taxis are so cheap that the only problem is finding a taxi that is willing to take you at the metered rate. River taxis are fast and cheap and easy to take, but we did not always end up where we thought we'd be going. The same is true for busses. Tuk Tuks are cheap and fun, but can be a little scary if you are used to traffic that follows some kind of rules. 
• To be honest, we were a little disappointed by the food. We love Thai food, so obviously we thought we'd love it even more in Thailand. Maybe we are spoiled by Thai Chef, our favorite restaurant here on Maui. Maybe our expectations were so high that we had to be disappointed. We tried everything from street food, to hole in the wall places and fancier restaurants. The food was always good, but never spectacular. And we found out that you actually have to specifically order even curry dishes spicy otherwise they assume that Westeners can not handle any spice at all.
• Reviews on TripAdvisor, Yelp or any other such web site are always personal opinion and as such will vary from one person to the next. We found this to be even more extreme in Thailand. It's just normal that one description of a restaurant says: I have lived in Thailand for a year now, this is the most authentic food, it's spectacular, fresh & cheap and the service is top notch." while the next one, supposedly about the same restaurant, warns "Tourist trap, no local would ever eat here, overpriced canned food and terrible service." The funny thing is that we never felt we got bad food or great food, it was always in the middle...
• Massages in Thailand are actually only $6-$9 for an hour like everybody told us. But of course I didn't really believe such silliness. The only day I did not get a massage I made up for on the next day with two. I never thought there could be a point where I would mind being asked whether I wanted to get an hour of massage for $6, but it happened. We were also told that the only problem with massages was to only get a massage and not more. Of course I would have refused, but should I be insulted that I was never even offered a 'happy ending'?
• Everybody in Thailand seems to speak English. They never expect any foreigner to speak any Thai. You don't even have to ask for an English tour, it is understood. Even signs in museums are always bilingual. But what surprised me that even though everybody speaks English, hardly anybody speaks it well. Signs are often comically bad translations and even though we had very nice tour guides, most of the tours stayed with the very basic information. I was longing for some in-depth information like you usually get from an American National Park ranger. The kind where you have more questions after the talk than before because he brought up so many interesting points. And he can answer slightly more complex questions in a language I understand. Of course you could say I should learn Thai if I want to learn more about Thailand. But judging by how long it took us to learn just the two words for hello and thank you, I don't think I could ever learn enough Thai for a meaningful conversation.
• From Bangkok we did a combined boat & bus tour to Ayutthaya which was surprisingly fun & informative. Ayutthaya is the former capital of Thailand. In fact, in 1700 it already had 1 million inhabitants, making it the largest city in the world at that time! The ruins still stand, but one of the towers gives the tower in Pisa some serious competition.
• One of the most surprising things about Thailand for me was the fact that there are basically no old cars there. By some standard, Thailand is still a 'third world' country. Yet, in three weeks all over Thailand I have seen fewer old cars than I usually do on my 7 minute commute through a fancy resort area of Maui…. I guess if a Thai family can not afford a new car, they don't buy an old car, they just buy a moped. Mopeds are routinely used to transport three or even four people, including babies or more cargo than we could fit in our car.
• On a one day trip from Chiang Mai to the Golden Triangle, we got to go to the border to Myanmar and spend a few minutes in Laos. This area is or was known as the foremost places for the opium trade. As far as we can tell, they have completely transitioned to the hand bag trade now.
• The number of temples, the elaborate structures, decorations and artwork sometimes made me wonder whether this is the best way to spend money in a country that clearly is still struggling with some basic infrastructure to improve the standard of living for it's people, such as potable water. I found that to be most extreme in the Anantasamakhom Throne Hall in Dusit Park in Bangkok. Here the king displays some of his finest artwork, including wood carved altars of huge dimensions that have such delicate artwork that it took dozens of artists several years to complete. Surprisingly, these were not historic artifacts like you would expect in Europe. Most of them were created in the past 7 years! Yet, despite this kind of lavish spending, the king seems to be loved by everybody. Thailand is deeply decided politically, in fact we drove by a demonstration against the controversial amnesty bill, but they all agree how wonderful the king is. He must be doing something right. He is has been king since 1946, which makes him the longest reigning living monarch in the world.

And that's the news from Lake Thailand, where all the dives were spectacular, where all the massages were cheap and everything is a little more colorful than average.

Aloha & Sawadee krab!

Chris & Sandra

We have seen the light - The story of Kayaks & Fireballs on Kauai

Aloha all,

We have been back for a few days from our kayak trip on Kauai's NaPali Coast, but we are still on an emotional high. I usually only feel that way after Ultimate Frisbee tournaments or after a few months on a road trip. If I had to sum up our trip in one word, I'd say: EPIC! But since I can use as many words as I want (and you can read as few words as you want), let me elaborate:

We had seen the spectacular NaPali Coast of Kauai a few times before: on several hikes, boat trips and helicopter rides, but kayaking the entire 17 miles from Haena to Poihale Beach was by far the best experience. The perspective looking at these cliffs towering up to 4,000 feet above from a kayak just few inches above sea level is amazing and intimidating by itself. The fact that we had never done anything like this before just added to the sense of adventure. I think the longest I had ever kayaked before this trip was around a cruise ship anchored outside of Lahaina.

We are grateful that our friend Ute invited us along for this expedition. I bet this would be an awesome experience even as a commercial, guided tour. But going by ourselves (we were nine all together) with a few old and a few new friends was even better. And thanks to our unofficial leader Keith, we knew where we were going and what to do when we got there. Thanks to Keith, we also spent the last night before the actual trip in style, at the Westin Villas in Princeville, including a half priced 4 star dinner, that probably tasted even better because we knew we'd be eating spam and freeze dried food for the next four days.

Early Friday morning we launched our kayaks at Haena Beach. Sandra and I almost flipped over going through the shore break. We had good intentions to practice before going on such a long trip, but my tendonitis and life got in the way and our only practice paddle was less than an hour inside the reef in Lahaina. The first few strokes felt so wobbly that at first I doubted we would make it very far. But we never actually flipped over. Also Ute & Dyan quickly proved that flipping over does not affect the enjoyment of the trip in the very least.

The first day was the hardest. 7 Miles of open ocean is about all I ever want to paddle in one day. Some companies offer the whole 17 miles as a day trip. I assume they check that you are an olympic athlete before they take you on such a trip. The luxury of doing the trip in several days also allowed us to check out a few really cool sea caves along the way.

Those of you who have read my update from my sailing trip from Panama to the Galapagos might wonder how this seasick sailor did in a little kayak bouncing around the NaPali coast …surprisingly well. Sandra felt a little seasick, but for me, the old rule seemed to work: If you are driving the car yourself, you don't get carsick. I have no other explanation that I felt fine. But the paddling was hard on our untrained arms. But the longer it took, the happier were we to finally make it to Kalalau Beach, our home for the next two nights. This is a huge beach with a picture perfect waterfall behind it, which doubles as a shower and fresh water source. There was plenty of shade under the trees to set up our tents. Considering how remote this beach is, it was actually surprisingly busy. There are even some permanent residents here. As idyllic as it is, I like civilization enough that I don't want to live here year round. But there was plenty to do for two days.

We hiked along the beach, went into several caves and swam around the rocks to Honopu Beach. Swimming is the one and only way to get to that beach. Not even kayaks are allowed to land on this sacred beach. The only exception is if you are filming a Hollywood movie. If you have seen the 1976 version of King Kong or the 1998 movie "Six Days Seven Nights" or "Raiders of the Lost Ark" with Harrison Ford and remember a huge natural arch, then you have seen Honopu Beach. This is such a special place, I'd go there all the time, if it did not involve a drive to the airport a flight via Honolulu to Kauai, 7 miles of paddling or 11 miles of hiking, another long walk and a gnarly swim to get there…I guess that's part of what makes it so special.

In the afternoon, we hiked up the Kalalau Valley, when I realized, I had seen this valley before. The popular lookout point with the view that's on every postcard stand in Kauai at the end of the drive along Waimea Canyon just happens to be at the rim of Kalalau Valley, but what a different experience this time! The reward for talking the hard way here instead of the drive-by sightseeing tour: We got to refresh ourselves at a nice waterfall and swimming hole.

After two nights, we had to pack up our stuff and move on to the next camp site, 5 miles of paddling further along the sea cliffs. This is the most scenic part of the NaPali Coast, including the 'open ceiling cave'. I have not heard any description or seen any photos that do this cave any justice. We spent almost an hour exploring, jumping off cliffs, climbing on the little island in the middle and just marveling at the beauty of this place.

The last night we spent at Milolii Beach. This campground is a lot less busy since you can not hike here. Besides us there were only two other groups of kayakers. After a much needed nap, we went snorkeling and then Sandra, Stacey & I went exploring the nearby stream. A little rock hopping later we found another fresh water swimming hole, with a beautiful twin waterfall. Life does not get much better than this…or so I thought.

After dinner, we all laid down on the beach for some star gazing. Thanks to the remote location, a late moon rise and clear skies, the conditions were just as good as on Haleakala, without the cold! We even got to see a couple of shooting stars. What happened next still gives me goose bumps when I think about it. This super bright colorful streak of light rushed half way across the sky. It was so bright and lasted so long that, for a second, I was truly concerned for our planet. It just did not seem right. All of us sat up, howled and wondered what just happened. 

To call it a shooting star would be correct, but an understatement. I guess the better term is a "fireball meteor". According to the The International Astronomical Union a fireball is "a meteor brighter than any of the planets. Well, what we saw was easily 10 times brighter than venus. It actually is reported as an official event on the website of the American Meteor Society: http://www.amsmeteors.org/fireball_event/2013/1815
It's nice that we all got to see it, and it's nice to see it officially verified. It kind of proves what we felt even before: That this was a very special, magical weekend.

Four days in our normal, everyday life can pass by without much notice. It seemed like we experienced a few months worth of adventures in just a few days. Not that 'normal life' on Maui is not special, but this was the most awesome out-of this -world trip that I can imagine taking in such a short time. And compared to a road trip, which we never would want to end, this has an added bonus: As much fun as it was, it is also nice when it's over, since we do like cold beer and soft beds as well.

Aloha from Lake NaPali, where all the paddlers are strong, all the sea caves are good looking and every moment was above average.

Chris