Tuesday, February 17, 2009

The S.P.A.M Chronicles - Day 1

As Hawaiian Air departed to the West We resolved to take time to document the best Activities and reflections this trip might bring And since in Hawaii SPAM is considered a good thing We offer the following for you to digest... The good thing about e-mail is that you can receive "valuable" communications from friends and family with no effort on your part. The bad news about e-mail is that you can receive.... As a result over the next 18 days you will sporadically receive our version of SPAM which generically will recap the Sights, Play, Activities, and Music we encounter. Consider it a tropical/topical version of a Holiday letter... Day One began early as we were up by 5:30 to prepare for our flight. The participants in this adventure are Merlin & Mary & Mike & Dianna and we all appreciated Merry getting up early and dropping us off at the airport. We ran into our high school friend Jim Taylor who would be spending his birthday week in Hawaii so we made plans to get together on Wednesday for a burger at the Camphouse Grill in Kaleheo, a more rustic version of the Hillsdale Pub. The 5 1/2 hour plane ride was uneventful which is always a good thing. We arrived a little early and had a chance to take our hopper early but passed although Jim rushed ahead. We spent more time procuring our rental car than we did flying across from Oahu but finally got passengers and luggage stowed just after 4:00. Apparently as a last ditch bid to avoid bankruptcy, Chrysler decided to offer great deals to rental fleets on PT Cruisers as this is the 2009 choice four tourists. Our first stop was the ceremonial visit to Wal-Mart to pick up water milk and weights for Merlin and then a stop at the local newspaper office to start a 3 week subscription (Note to Rick S - newspapers are not dead!) Our first meal on the island was at a local favorite Hamura's Saimen Shop, famous for their soups and Lilikoa Pie, passion fruit chiffon. Sated with Saimen we arrived at our condo at 5:30. We're in the same complex we've been in the last 2 years but in a unit a few doors down that has a few pluses (one level, few stairs) and a few minuses (limited view from the lanai for whale watching, and near the parking lot) but still with a great address. Quiet evening as we unpacked, started the initial battles in the Pinochle marathon and retired early since we were still on Portland time.
Feel free to opt out on receiving this limited edition newsletter otherwise you'll learn more than you want to know about this year’s adventure in Hawaii... Aloha - "Manta Ray" Mike

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