Hawai'i with the Homers - Hilo, Mana Road (August 2024)

 Cozy morning TV watching.

We went to Hilo sans Jim and Ever, who stayed home sick. This was my worst day with the illness, as well. I felt really not good but tried to downplay it and power through.

First stop, obviously, was Tex Drive-In for malasadas (and pancakes for Wren and probably some local breakfast for Dun Dun). 

Next stop was Laupahoehoe Point. Wrenzy climbed on the first concrete tetrapod. 

Then Tiny had to take a turn. And we did a whole photoshoot. 

Some boys were backflipping off the dock, and I was impressed and jealous. It looked so fun. 

We checked out Kolekole Park. I have happy memories of coming here a lot during my childhood and swinging off of rope swings into the water on the far side of the river. They've put in all this fancy infrastructure now - parking lot, restrooms, picnic tables. Back in the day, there was nothing there.  think I'd like to swim there again, but it would have to be a really hot day because the water is so cold. I must have been braver when I was a kid.

Rainbow Falls. 

Bag Lady very much did not appreciate the Littles' banyan tree climbing because then her kids wanted to follow. But how can you stop super climbers from climbing the best climbing tree in the whole world? 

Dustin got involved to keep the Homer children safe. 

Such a glorious tree (with no children in it in this pic, as far as I can tell).

Back at Toots and Pops's house, Ever took a COVID test and confirmed our ailment. Super lame. But the amazing news is that the Cocos never got it. 

Toots is the most fun, and she got the kids painting. 

We did a short evening walk on Mana, and it was quite magical. We've always gone in the morning before. This time, we got amazing sunset colors, and then fun fog rolled in.  

Wrenzy was doing some fun fighty moves, ostensibly to fend off all the bugs. When she performed for the camera, her moves got weirder.  

Hawai'i with the Homers - Beach and Anuenue Park (end of July 2024)

 To the motherland! The ladies love airplanes because movies.

Walking to church. I love this place more than anywhere in the world. 

The Littles were very excited about going on the roof, but Tiny got really filthy. 

Tiny and/or Wrenzy borrowed my phone to take lots of pictures of the house and property. Below are a few of them. Who knew there was so much growing by the roof on the side of the house? I never go over there! The humidity is tough.

The girls were fascinated by the WWII truck. I found this by Wren. 

We hit Hapuna, and it was glorious.

Ever took some post-snorkeling selfies.

Bear's sweet, sunburned face outside the shaved ice place in Kawaihae. 

The geckos roam freely in the house. The excrement they leave everywhere - especially on top of picture frames and door trim but also sometimes just on the middle of the couch - is troubling.  

The Cocos arrived! By that time, though, Jim was sick. I hated telling that to Coco as soon as they walked into the house because she hates when visitors/guests infect her family, but what could we do besides share the house and hope the Homers didn't catch it? There were a couple days when Jim felt really awful and pretty much just stayed on the couch and watched the Olympics. Ever also came down with it, as did I, to varying degrees and for various lengths of time. Definitely there was more Olympics watching and a lot less activity on this trip than there normally would have been. 

Anyway, the Homers' first day there had to be a beach day. 

That afternoon, we played at Anuenue Playground. 

Speaking of anuenue, this really is the land of rainbows. 

When I was diving in high school, it seemed as if we saw a rainbow nearly every afternoon during practice. I love them. 

We went back to the beach the next day. 

The girls thoroughly enjoyed POG / passion orange Hawaiian Suns. Wrenzy would be really good in a commercial.