Aloha #3

Monday was a busier day.  First we went to the "trailer" and bought tickets to go to the Polynesian Cultural Center, which is what we planned for Tuesday.  And then we drove our way north towards the Dole Plantation.  But on the way there, something caught Chuck's eye:

...so we had to stop and check it out.  

I've never been to a coffee garden before, so thought this might be interesting.

We got to walk around and see how they grow their coffee beans.  I've never really seen a "coffee" tree before, so that was kinda cool.  They grind the beans and sell their own coffee of course, so naturally Chuck had to buy some.  Since it was kind of a "cool" cloudy day I asked for their chai tea latte, which was very very very good (better than Starbucks).

At last we make it here:

First we rode the Express train and took the 20-minute tour through their plantation.  

We saw pineapple fields...

banana trees....

macadamia nut trees...

koa trees (whatever that is)...

...just to name a few.  There were others that I didn't get pictures of, like sugar cane.

Anyhoo, after the train ride, PW finally got to do what she mainly wanted to do there:

This turned out to be different than what I was expecting, but not in a disappointing way.  I thought the maze would be too easy cuz I imagined that the maze was made with short pineapple plants that we would be able to see over.  I don't know what kind of trees these were, but they were not pineapple plants.  They were tall enough to actually create "walls".

When you buy your ticket they give you this paper and you're supposed to find all 8 stations, and stencil them in the designated squares on the paper.  And I guess if you get it done in a certain amount of time you get a "prize".  From past experience in something similar to this, I was guessing that the "prize" was probably something like a 10% discount on anything in the store, or something like that designed to encourage us to spend more money.  That was my GUESS, but we never found out cuz we didn't find all the stations.  After about an hour or so of endless walking through the maze that never seemed to change scenery, PW decided it was okay with her if we stopped.  

So after emerging out of the leafy walls, we wanted to try their special treat, the Dole Whip:

It was pineapple flavored ice cream with fresh pineapple chunks.  Yum.

Before we left, we walked around on the premises a little more and took some more pictures of interest, like this conspicuous pineapple:

...and this lizard who was chasing a bug.

There's those roosters again.  They were everywhere!

Now we are off to a place called Waimea Valley, which is a huge huge botanical garden kind of place with unique trees from different tropical islands.  It was very pretty, and the hike ended up at a swimming hole.

Here are just a few things that we saw (this post is getting too long):

really weird lily pads...

...some kind of weird fruit tree...

...some flowers that Chuck was fascinated by...

...a big viney tree that looked like a woolly mammoth...

...bright pink fuzzy pom-poms...

... and lots and lots more.  But I don't wanna sit here all day, so let's fast forward.

Here is the end of the trail where we find the waterfall and swimming hole:

It looked very inviting (and reminded me of "Lost"), but alas, we didn't bring any swimming clothes, plus it started to rain.  Rain doesn't seem to bother people there; they just kept swimming, and we stood there getting drenched while we watched.  If you're swimming, I guess it doesn't matter that you get wet in the rain, right?  So maybe we should've just jumped in.

So we hiked back in the rain, which really wasn't that bad cuz it was a warm rain.  My only complaint is what it does my HAIR!

When we got back to the cabin, the weather was still too cool (for me) to play in the ocean, so I promised PW that we would go swimming in the morning.

So we grilled some burgers and brats, and played card games.  

End of Monday.