Hilo, Day #1

     After getting to our place late last night and cooking a couple of deli pizzas, we watched a movie and hit bed early.  The sunsets and sunrises in Hawaii are much earlier than in Indiana, so it's thrown us all off a bit.  It's dark here well before 8:00 pm, and the sun is up completely before 6:00 am.  So, when I woke up at 4:30 am, it was already a bit lighter in the morning sky and birds were chirping (hence the fact I was up at 4:30 am!).  
     Hilo is on the east side of the Big Island, so we can see sunrises better than sunsets.  In fact, our little bungalow is called "Hale Pukana'la" or "House of the Rising Sun."  Our view with coffee was quite spectacular, and we're hoping for even better sunrises later this week.

     After a quick breakfast, we took off for Rainbow Falls, hoping to beat the crowd.  We didn't see many people at all, but the morning was still a bit cloudy, so the falls did not have their signature rainbow at the bottom.  Luckily for us, this quick stop is on the way to our other two planned adventures this week, so we're going to try again to catch the rainbow.  The falls were still lovely anyway, and we saw a bunch of cool plants along the little path too.

     After Rainbow Falls, we headed out of Hilo to check out Akaka Falls.  The little one-mile round trip hike gave us some really cool views of the 422-foot drop and even more plants.  I'm not usually a flora and fauna type of person, but the huge leaves, draping vines, and vibrant flowers are truly amazing everywhere we've been in Hawaii.

     After hiking and seeing the Akaka Falls, we headed to the Waipio Valley in search of the lookout.  Reading about the valley, we knew we'd be in for spectacular views of the very north end of the island, but we also knew we didn't want to attempt the 6.5 mile hike down to the beach at the bottom of the valley.  It has several stretches of 25% down grade (for comparison, parts of the highways through the Smoky Mountains have a 7% downgrade and runaway ramps for the semi-trucks) and four separate "Emergency Helicopter Landing Pads" because of the number of injuries that happen on the hike each year.  YIKES!  We enjoyed the view just fine from up above the valley!  After a bit of time taking it all in, we turn to find the little boys rolling down the hill up to the parking lot.  Those red-heads are going to give me a heart attack, I swear!  I guess they liked the steep slope...maybe we should have tried that hike after all.  Haha!

       We stopped in a cute little town called Honokaa for lunch on the way back.  The diner was owned by a couple with Portuguese heritage, so it wasn't necessarily an island meal, but it was really, really great food.  

     We came home to let the kids swim the afternoon away in the awesome pool at our place in Pepeekeo.  While we're up in the mountains and not near a beach at all, our bungalow and the pool overlook the ocean, so it's a great way to spend the afternoon.  Tomorrow we're off to see the volcano...wish us luck!