Our Trip to Kona on the Big Island of Hawaii
September 3 - September 13, 2015

 

We again stayed at the Hale Kona Kai condominiums
right across the lagoon from the Royal Kona Resort.
This time we stayed one floor up in unit 313.



Another spectacular arrangement from
Island Orchard Florist.



What happened to 15% tips for good service?

We took a trip up the Kahala coast.  First stop was
the Hamakua Macadamia Nut Company, where we sampled
all their products!



Kathleen obviously had too much macadamia nut brittle!



Next we went to Lapakahi which has the remains of a fishing
village that is over 600 years old!







The Queen Lili'uokalani Race is held every labor day weekend. 
Our original plan was to follow the main race on Saturday from
one of the spectator boats, either the Body Glove or the Spirit of Kona.
Unfortunately, neither one were operating for the race on this trip,
so we ended up watching it from our condo.



Some final words from the coach before the start of the race.



And they begin paddling to the starting line for the race.



Son of Sam in the Royal Kona Resort lagoon.



During our first trip up the Kahala coast, we missed
Puukohola Heiau as there was work being done on road
at that turnoff.  So we returned later in the week.
Puukohola Heiau is one of the last major temples built in the Hawaiian Islands
and was constructed by King Kamehameha the Great in 1791.





After visiting one of our favorite breakfast spots,
the Coffee Shack, we continued onto
Pu`uhonua O Hōnaunau, the place of refuge.



We also had a day trip to the Kona Cloud Forest Sanctuary.
We ran into this guy along the way.
 

 



We also paid a visit to the Natural Energy Lab,
which is right next to the airport.



The first stop was the OTEC (Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion) Tower.
The facility has two long tubes out the the ocean.  One tube near the surface
draws in warm ocean water.  The other tube pulls much colder water
from several thousand feet below the ocean surface.  The water from the two tubes
is used to heat and cool anhydrous ammonia
which then powers a turbine to generate electricity.



The next stop was to Kampachi Farms, which is an
experimental salt water fish hatchery.  Most of our oceans
have been over fished resulting in an elimination of over 95%
of the stock.  They are seeking an economically viable
solution to grow Kampachi in mass quantities for human consumption.



 

They originally started with Groupers, which are nearly extinct.
However, the economics for setting up this species for commercial
operations did not pan out, so they decided for focus on preservation of the species.
But they ran into issues with Hawaii since the breeding stock did not originate in Hawaii.



 The third stop was at Big Island Abalone

Aloha!