Such a LONG flight

Leaving PHL at 10:20 am does not mean early arrival in Honolulu. We arrive in HNL at 5:20 and Lora (Patti Luis' sister in law picks us up and we head to Korean place to eat. A very quick meal of ppork and cabbage and then I board another plane heading to Kona to spend a few days with Heidi Winkler, a friend from the New Zealand trip.
Arrive in Kona airport at 8:30 with check in luggage and a driver is there to meet me with a sign to drive me up to Hiwa to Heidi's home. It is difficult to see the landscape at night so I get a description from the driver and he is quite entertaining.
Heidi's home is fabulous located on a hill with a grand breeze into my room. There are large windows and I'm sure there is a great view in the morning We stay up for hours chatting and drinking vodka, cranberry and lime! It was nice to get to know her better.

Heidi is famous!

Up at 8am and off to breakfast in the small town of Hiwa (pronounced Havii). The buildings are quaint and colorful in the form of the old wild west style, boardwalk included. I am sorry I didn't take and good photos here.
We head North to the point, but stop at a small Chinese cemetery along the way. The headstones are carved with Chinese writing and are tall, not rounded like ours. Some of the headstones are shaped like large oval eggs and all are quite old.

The closer we get to the coast, the foggier it gets in the distance and when we arrive at the Pololu Valley lookout, it is extremely foggy on the ocean and cliffs. But we take some photos anyway. This is a one way road, so standing in the middle of the road is permitted!

Next Heidi drives to a ranch that she knows and the view is fantastic over rolling hills down to the sea. There are about 50-100 head of cattle walking across the field and the grass is wet, but some good shots taken here.

On to the town of Waimea, about 30 minutes away. Lunch is at a barbecue place called the Fish and Hog Market Cafe. I had the brisket sandwich with dill coleslaw and Heidi had ribs. Both were delicious and much to much for one person to eat, we shared.

Leave Waimea for the Kona coast and first stop by the Mauna Kea observatory visitor center in town. The docent there gave a nice short tour of what is done up at the actual observatory. The weather report for evening is not good so we make other plans. Heidi takes me to the HGVC for a tour of where she works at Waikoloa Village and it is magnificent. It has several resorts within the site and a monorail along with a short boat to shuttle guests around the village. This is a beautiful location.

Sony or Nikon at 69th street beach Kona, HI

Off we go to Lava Lava Beach Club next door for some happy hour drinks and snacks. The sun is
getting low in the sky and we decide to skip over to 69th Street beach for sunset. There are palm trees and old dead trees to use in the background so we get set up and click away. I think I got some good images. After sunset it gets dark quickly and we head back to Heidi's home. After a drink or two I am tired and off to bed.

At 3:00am I am awakened by a phone call and decide to get up and take some star photos. I just hope that Heidi does not have a weapon and think I am a burglar. There are thousands of stars and it is so clear I hake photos for about an hour. I hope there are a few good ones.

Heidi has arranged a helicopter tour and we need to be at the airport by 6:45, so I just get up, shower and dressed and ready to go. The tour company is Paradise Helicopter Tours and it is complimentary!! Off we go up through the valley away from the ocean towards the volcano craters. You can tell you ar getting near because of the amount of steam rising from the black ground below.

Our pilot, York is from Belgium and keeps our copter steady and smooth. I am trying to take photos with the Nikon, Sony and iPhone and it is crazy how awesome it is in the air over the active volcano. There is no lava flowing, but lots of steam and looking into the center we can see some bubbling lava that looks like tiny specks of red/orange. It appears as if there are some researchers on the edge of the crater with scientific instruments. I'm not sure because we are not getting very close because of the temperatures.

York points out a lava lake and some other points of interest along the way to our landing at Hilo airport. While there, we rent a car and head out for breakfast at Ken's Pancake House. This is a local favorite and a great plate of cocoanut pancakes with strawberries was delicious.

Down the road from here is a small farm market and we check it out buying a few gifts and trinkets to take home. One of the vendors had his photographs printed on metal and they showed all the details in the photo. They were quite beautiful.

From here, we headed North to the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden. It is quite hilly and I

Taken with iPhone

recommend you walk down and take the golf cart ($5 for two) to the top. This is quite beautiful and full of native plants, flowers and waterfalls. We are having fun snapping photos all over the place! At the bottom of the trail we arrive at the coast and the incoming waves are crashing all over the rocks close by and more photos are taken. We opt for the golf cart ride to the top and head back to the airport for the return to Kona.

Our flight takes us along the coastline over the top of the island back to Kona. It was a fantastic experience and the cost was right. Heidi was able to snag two complimentary seats on that copter. The return to Kona airport was just in time for me to relax for about an hour before my flight over to Honolulu. It was a grand two days and I hope to return and return the favor and host Heidi someday here in PA.

Hilo valley from the helicopter ride.

Next Journey - Oahu and Hawaii in September

My friend Patti has access to a Hilton Grand Vacation Club on Waikiki Beach in September and has invited me to come along! This will be my second trip there with Patti and I'm looking forward to trying out my Sony 6000.

Last Day - Happy Mother's Day

Last night I packed my bags and repacked. On the way out of the US I packed my camera pack in a small 22" carry on and the other larger suitcase held my tripod and all of my clothing. It weighed 45 pounds.

Now I split my clothing between both suitcases and carried my camera bag on the plane. It's a good thing I did because my large bag now weighed 55 pounds! I needed to remove 5 pounds of goodies before they would let it go (Southwest). I like Southwest and they way they operate with open seating.

This is Mother's Day and I am happy to have my son, Alex and his fiancee Kayla, come and pick me up at the airport.

Overall this was one of the best journey's I have taken. From the food, to the people to the locations around NZ, all were memorable and some preserved as digital images!

Sunset on a wonderful trip at Manhattan Beach, California (iPhone photo)

Santa Barbara

Friday –

I thought I would sleep late before driving to Santa Barbara, but my clock said 10:10 when I was awakened by the traffic noise. I got on the road by 11:15 and the 405 had heavy traffic, but no bad delays. 

Every once in a while I would explore different exits off the

highway to see the little California beach towns, Ventura, Carpintiera, Montecito, and then Santa Barbara. Off the exit there was a small bird sanctuary where I stopped and took some photos of a few shore birds. Further down the road I pulled in to the tourist center and got a map. The restaurants on the Harbor pier looked interesting so I headed there for lunch. Since my phone had only 20% charge left I asked the bartender to charge it and he gladly plugged it in for me.

The sliders in the Endless Summer Bar were just OK but the view was awesome overlooking the harbor full of sailboats of every kind and color. After lunch I walked around and was the only person without a heavy coat. It was windy and about 61˚ out there.

I met up with Stephanie Hamilton-Durkin and followed to her rental home.

Stef is the daughter of my good friends Theresa and Bob. She and Brenden just moved here and have a beautiful rental overlooking Santa Barbara and the ocean and invited me to stay. What a magnificent location and view.

 

This is my first time here and we drove into town for pizza and some dessert. I purchased a bottle of wine in the Auckland airport to bring them, but left it in my hotel room. I’ll send it with T & B next weekend to enjoy. This is a classy sleepy little town that is known for many things, wine, beach volleyball, fresh foods, beach, and Oprah lives here too!

We sat on one of the decks here watch it get dark and drinking a Santa Barbara Pinot Noir – it was quite good. I wish the NZ wine was here to compare.

Sleep and need to sleep this jet lag away. I’m not sure what tomorrow brings…..

Flight Out of New Zealand

My 7^th leaving NZ from Auckland

As I previously mentioned, I tried to upgrade my ticket to Premium Economy but my travel agent said it would cost $1300. After exploring the NZAir website I found that you could “bid” a price to upgrade your seat to the next class. I bid $330 to upgrade from Economy to Premium Economy on the way over and $520 for the way back and both bids were accepted. I did my homework and knew that the flight home was on a 777 and Flight N2 plane which had the “space pod” seats and were better and worth every penny!

I had complete privacy from the gentleman next door as well as a

reclining seat with a big bean bag cushion for my feet, unlimited NZ wine and unlimited snack and drinks during the flight. I received a travel kit with a toothbrush/paste, sleep mask, lip balm, a pen and socks. I put on the socks because mine were stinky and worn a few days. The movies were all current movies and I selected Night at the Museum and got situated for dinner.

The dinner consisted of an entre (appetizer in NZ) of salmon in some sauce with couscous. I ate the couscous and the cheese and crackers. The main had several choices but I chose lamb and vegetables. It was good and the dessert was a pana cotta with pistachio cream. Not too bad.

The movie was over, so I switched my channel to music and found Bette Midler’s new album and listened to that until I fell asleep under my cover with a nice pillow in my space pod.

They wake you up slowly on overnight planes by turning up the lights gently. Breakfast was a choice of eggs or vanilla pancakes with berries. I chose the berries and pancakes.   I cleaned up my pod and put away all my belongings to get ready to disembark.

Before a left for this trip I applied for two different travel permissions. One is called “Clear”, which was free from Travelzoo.com and gets you to the front of security lines in 10 different airports, Orlando being one of them, LAX is not. So that was not helping this trip. The second was the Global Entry/TSA clearance. This is a double clearance for $100 they take your photo and fingerprints, check them for crimes and give you a special OK to go quickly through Customs and security. It can be used for entering this country. The Global Entry was a dream come true. I by passed about 100 people to a special kiosk to present my passport and get checked and cleared. This gave me a jump to the head of the line in the Customs section as well.

I picked up my Hertz rental car and headed for Redondo Beach Hilton. Both chosen because I could get bonus points for the car rental and now 7x for my hotel in Hilton points! Actually the car was booked through a special promotion from USAir so I get points for that and Hilton for using that credit card – SCORE! This is the start of my learning how to travel hack points for future travel.

I checked in and started a load of wash at the hotel, made a few phone calls and then decided to drive to Manhattan Beach for some dinner.  I remember going here in 2012 with my mom and sister for dinner one night and I wanted to return to the same street.  I went to  Shellback Tavern, a small dive on the corner overlooking the rainy beach. Finally some American food and I got a ShockTop beer and some chicken tenders cooked in beer batter – delicious! Back to the hotel I go!

A new adventure awaits tomorrow too!

Final Day in New Zeland

My last morning and the alarm did not go off. I forgot to plug in the usb end! The city noise awakened me at 7:10 and up I to go. 

The hop on off tour bus begins at 10:00 and I have a lot to do. Pack both bags so I don't have to spend time later rearranging stuff. Find the Starbucks,  I am hungry for banana walnut bread. Confirm my shuttle to airport later:  check 6:40pm. And stop at the Fuller ticket office as I left my scarf at Kelly's and Simon brought it over this morning on his ferry commute. 

With bags packed and my camera ready I board the red loop bus  It is $45 NZ for an all day hop on-off tour. It is a nice way to see different parts of the city. Mt. Eden is the highest point and has magnificent views of Auckland and the harbor. Next stop - the zoo! 

I spent 2 hours there with the native birds and stopped to see the endangered tuatara. Jeff Corwin had

them on his show once. It is quite old and very protected little dinosaur /reptile. The kiwi exhibit was very nice but they know it is daytime even though the lights are low. Kiwi are nocturnal,  bummer. 

This is an awesome zoo with the exhibits appearing to give the animals environmentally appropriate room. They could improve on the signage however. Glad I had a map. Along my way out there was a small American alligator habitat. They were very very small. I guess the large ones are in Florida. 

Next to the alligaor exhibit was the Tazmanian Devil. I have seen this on tv a few times in some

nature shows, but it was much larger in person that I thought it would be. A guy in his 30's was reaching into the environment and the Devil was approaching him sniffing his way. I thought for sure he was going to bite the guy. I walked over with my camera and the Devil jumped up on a large rock and seemed to pose for me to take his photo! I took about 15 pics then he jumped down and crawled under a bush to his home.

The final section held the Sumatran Tigers. There was a school group there and the guide was explaining the habitat etc. Suddenly the male came over and became a bit affectionate with the female and the tour guide quickly led the small children to a new place. I was laughing, but the animals didn't really engage although it appeared like they might. Isn't nature wonderful?? 

While in the bird aviary this wood pigeon landed on my head! After shooing him off me I turned and

saw a sign that said: Beware our pigeon likes to perch here, and I was standing right in front of HIS place!

I've been to many zoos and thus would rank right up in my top ten maybe five. San Diego as #1, St. Louis #2, Philadelphia #3, Washington DC as #4, Auckland #5........

Last Dinner in Auckland

After a full day on Waiheke Island with the Bickerton clan, I looked for a nice place to have a dinner on the harbor. This harbor area is designed much like Baltimore's Inner Harbor with shops, restaurants and tourist museums all around the marina. I found a nice place called Wildfire which appeared to be in the Hilton as it was in the same building. All I was thinking here was POINTS!

The restaurant specialized the the Brazilian type of meat dinner for $45 per person. I was not that

hungry so I settled on pumpkin and walnut ravioli in a pomodoro sauce and a glass of wine. The meal was not a disappointment either. I overlooked the Maritime Museum with a large collection of sailboats in the harbor and inside the building. The family next to me had the Brazilian dinner and I watched various meat in large skewers go by every so often. it looked and smelled very good. Someday I'll have to try that.



The harbor in Auckland looks to handle many different activities from the ferries that handle commuters, casual sailboat tours, very large America's Cup type sailboats, industrial shipping and tourism. It is busy there from the early hours of the day to the late sunset diners overlooking hundreds of beautiful sailboats.

I tried some creative photos of the Ferry Terminal Building at night. The camera was able to capture the moving cars and buses moving in front of the building as ghostly figures with the restored Terminal in the back.

Maritime Museum

Since I had a bit of time this afternoon, I did some last minute Christmas shopping and found some fun things to bring home.