Moloka'i Day 1

Exploring Moloka'i...

We usually like to begin our vacations by exploring the island.

Moloka'i is a LONG island.

And it really has just one main road/highway running the length of the island and the speed limit is 35 mph!... Slow goin'!

We woke up in the morning and ate breakfast. We packed up our beach chairs, towel and ice chest and headed out from our place (at mile 13). We headed East to look for beaches. We stopped at a little place around mile 15 or 16 (Mana'e Goodz and Grindz - Mana'e means "east End, I think) and they made us tuna sandwiches (not great, we make better ones at home - haha). We also rented 2 DVD movies for the night time. (No credit card or ID required... just good faith... and we paid cash for the rentals, in advance.)

Then we drove from the shop to mile 27... the end of the road. This was a long, slow drive and we passed very few other cars on the way to this remote end of the island where you can hike and there are waterfalls, etc.

We headed down into the little cove in the photo.

We had to trudge across a stream to get to this beach. One of us (Dad :) had a little falling incident in the crossing. He forged ahead blazing the trail and it was MUCH deeper and more slippery than he expected and his balane was off because he was wearing his full backpack chair and carrying the ice chest and other stuff (think "pack mule"). He just slowly went down, kind of twisting his ankle in the process. Thankfully, I did not have to learn that lesson first hand!!! We found another crossing!

This cove LOOKS deserted, but there were a few other people there. We got to watch 6 or 7 little boys (maybe 6-11 years old) hop on their boards and zip out and surf on those waves in the distance (little "groms"!). There was also a black lab puppy frolicking on the beach who came over and hung out with us... Adorable!

I actually fell dead asleep for over an hour. D had difficulty waking me up to tell me he was going for a swim!

We left the beach midway through the afternoon to explore and see if we could find other beaches on the way back.

This island is NOT visitor friendly in that there are no real maps or signage showing the decent beaches... in fact, in some cases, entrances are hidden - more on that tomorrow!

The second beach we found was this one (forget the name, darn it! Maybe Murphy Beach?). Again, not deserted, but not crowded... There was an adorable pair of little brothers (maybe 2 & 4) long-haired and naked frolicking in the lapping waves.

D went snorkeling and got to try his underwater camera for the first time! Afterwards, he took a few photos half in and half out of the water. As you can see, I am not too happy about that angle and view!! Hahaha!

When we were done with our beach day, we came back to the condo and cooked delectable steaks with sauteed onions, baked potatoes, and salad. Then we watched one of the movies we had rented in the morning.

Ahhhhhhhhh... vacation has finally begun!