Playing tourist

When I was little, we had a tradition that whenever we had family visiting, we'd take them sightseeing around the island. I can remember lots of times where my siblings and I would pile up in the family car and join the sometimes long caravan of cars as we showed off our beautiful tropical island. There were stops on the way, of course, little restaurants and stores to eat at and stock up on junk food, as well as the sights to see.

This tradition continued when I went away for my first year of college at BYU-Hawaii. During our Thanksgiving break, many of my friends were unable to fly back to the mainland, so I invited them to Kona; one of the things we did was our "around the island" tradition. My friends enjoyed it, and I was glad to continue the tradition.

This trip back home was no exception. My brother and his girlfriend were kind enough to take the day off from work yesterday and guide us around. See, the problem with growing up in Hawaii, for me, anyway, was that I never bothered to learn exactly where everything was. Obviously, I knew it existed and was somewhere around here and there, but ask me how to get there? Uh, nope. Sorry.

So we ended up following my brother around, and except for two incidents of motion sickness that delayed us a bit (Jeff & Ethan, not me this time!), it was a day well-spent.

Our first stop was Punaluu, or Black Sand Beach. This beach is made up entirely of black sand, due to lava flowing down to the ocean. This is also a popular spot for turtles to lay eggs. When we went, there were two of them resting on the sand, which excited the kids. However, the turtles are protected and touching is a no-no, so the kids settled for taking about a million pictures.

The view from the parking lot

TURTLES!!

Trying not to get soaked while exploring the beach but failing

Our next stop was the Volcanoes National Park. The kids really got a kick out of this place, even though it was crowded and started to rain. There were so many interactive displays to learn from, which meant the kids were talking non-stop in the car about what they learned.

When you first arrive at the Visitor Center

Looking over the large model of the Big Island and locating
all of the volcanoes

warming up at the steam vents

More steam vents

"What?!" LOL

Ethan: "Should I be worried?"

"OMG! A volcano!"

Ethan: "Are you sure we have nothing to worry about?"

Gotcha! He didn't think I'd get a picture of him, ha!

Taking a picture of Kilauea Iki

I really loved how green it was

Another sneak attack by Mom; these boys never
want to smile for the camera anymore!

After the volcanoes, we headed to Hilo for some dinner. There was a Zippy's there at the mall, which excited me (my kids thought I was crazy), because in all the time I grew up in Hawaii, the only Zippy's restaurants you could find were on Oahu. And, the food is good, so I was excited. And, it didn't disappoint. But, I was too busy enjoying my food to take a picture, but no one wants to see pictures of food, right?

One of our last sights to visit was Rainbow Falls. The water wasn't clear, due to the storms and rain from the previous weeks, so it wasn't exactly pretty. But, it was still fun to show the kids.

Checking out the top of the waterfall

More lovely waterfall water :-)

Enjoying the outside while actually being outside, ha!

Exploring some of the banyan trees near
the top of the waterfall

Gotcha again, Ryan! ;-)

It was getting dark by the time we left the falls, but we still stopped at Tex's Drive-In, home to the famous malasadas....which they were out of by the time we arrived. Dang it! And, I was so looking forward to a good malasada! Oh, well, it's not like we won't be here for awhile and can't come back. Hee-hee.

We were all exhausted by the time we got back to the house, but it was a day well spent. Right before we went to bed, the kids were all thanking me for such an exciting day, and I couldn't help but smile before falling asleep. You're definitely welcome, my Crack Monkeys!