Since my last post we have managed to slow things down a little bit. No diving, no snorkeling, no wave runners. We have seen polynesian dancers, had great food, and circumnavigated the island.
Wednesday night the hotel had a polynesian dancing troupe give us half-hour show and it was fun. I wasn't too excited to attend because I have seen some pretty extravagant shows (from when I was a kid in Hawaii) and they were long, and after the first 30 minutes or so, boring. This was just the right length and it included some audience participation. Both Sarah and I were selected, among about a dozen, to participate. It was cute and not too embarrassing.
After the show we went to the resort restaurant and had some very nice food. Just right. Again, we were all tired from the day and hit the hay early, excited to sleep in today. Of course we were all up early, around 7a, and trying to figure out what to do for the day.
Thursday was Richard's last day with us and we wanted to see the rest of the island, so we rented a small car and took off around the island around 9:30a. We took a little road up the Opunohu Valley toward a lookout called Belvedere. From it you could look down both the Opunohu Valley and the Opunohu Bay and the Paopao Valley and Cook's Bay. Kind of cool to see both in the same view.
We saw a couple of archaeological sights dating back to the 13th century. One of the sights was an ancient archery platform from which the inhabitants had contests. The other was an ancient dwelling. Brian Davis would be loving it.
From Belvedere we headed back down to the bay and drove around the island. We made one stop to check out a large waterfall. It was about a 15 minute hike up a moderate to easy trail to the falls and it was worth it. I even stripped down to my skivvies and took a waterfall shower. It was fun.
We stopped and bought some cuban cigars, had some pizza for lunch, and then came back to the resort to relax on the patio until Richard's departure. It is about a 15 minute drive to the ferry from our resort, so at four o'clock we took Richard to the ferry and dropped him off. Once he gets home, back in Chicago, he will have 23 hours before he heads to Nevada to see his parents. He is literally going from one vacation to another.
Sarah and stopped at a small black pearl store on the way back to the resort. Muk, the owner of our resort, told us it was the only place on the island that would not rip us off, and that the owners were very nice. He was right. We spent a little over an hour there looking at pearls and talking to the gal who runs the shop and her brother who is the jeweler.
We got to learn a lot about how the Mooreans feel about the French (they don't like them much) and a little about life in paradise. They are probably a lot like most Alaskans; they don't really see the splendor in which they live. I think that talking with them reminded them to take a look around. I think it did because they really seemed to like us and they invited us back today to harvest some bread fruit in their yard and eat some with them.
I think Sarah and I are going to take the resort kayak down to the pearl place to visit with them, an then....we will will see what the day brings.
Today I will be posting some photos of local flowers, the resort cats, and the waterfall. The yellow cat we call MC (mangy cat) and the other is call VC (vacation cat). Sarah wants to take care of them, but they seem fine to me, and I don't think they need any food from us, since there are chickens literally everywhere on the island. In fact there are homeless dogs, cats, and chickens running around everywhere. It seems like the cats would keep the chicken population in check, but I think there is so much fresh fruit to eat, that none of the animals are in need.
Check out Facebook for the full spread of photos.
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