Ali's Truths, Universally Acknowledged . . .: Hawaii Day Ten

Mom and I had an early excursion today – we had to meet the bus at 7:40 am. I'm telling you, there's no rest for the vacationers. So, just the two of us went to the Aloha Cafe Breakfast Buffet. I had chocolate milk, a cinnamon roll, scrambled eggs and some fruit. Mom had a quarter of a waffle, apricots, mandarin oranges, bacon, eggs and oj. Then we hurried down to meet our bus. Today we toured Kauai. Our first stop was just a bathroom break. It reminded me of the Crystal palace in Oahu. It was some little mom and pop store that sold all sorts of touristy stuff. To me it was a waste of time and money (people buying over priced stuff).

Then we hopped back on the bus and drove up to Waimea Canyon. All I can say is wow! It's like the Grand Canyon, but lush and tropical. It was a very frightening ride up and back. I'm a nervous passenger on straight roads in a small car that I'm seat belted in. Put me in a non-seat belt bus on a curvy mountain road with cliffs on one side and I start thinking about what death is like. Besides that, it was a very cool view. I even tried to take a panorama picture. We'll see how that turned out. Then we went down to the Spouting Horn. This on a rocky beach where water flows into a lava tube and pushes it up on of the holes in the tube. It's a lot like a geyser. That was awesome. There was also a little shopping area where Mom bought herself a black pearl bracelet that will match her necklace back home. After that we went to lunch at Keoki's Paradise. They had a small buffet lined up for us. There was salad, spiced rice, pulled pork, teryaki chicken, a chopped fruit bowl and some pineapple bars. I like the pork until I got a chunk of fat in my mouth. The fruit was ok, because there were only slim pickings by the time we made it through the line. And everything else was just not my style. Between lunch and now I have eaten half a tangerine, cheerios, raspberry yogurt, an Andes mint and popcorn. I am definitely not starving.

So, after lunch we drove through a tree tunnel. It is located along an old horse and buggy trail where one of the original owners planted a lot of trees that eventually formed the tunnel. It was neat. Then we passed by some man-made pools on the beach. It's called Lydgate Beach Park. Then we drove aways up another canyon to see the Opeakaa Falls. I don't think I have ever seen that large of a waterfall with my own eyes before. It was breathtaking.

Then we went on a river boat ride to see the fern grotto. It was spectacular. Mom said that she think that's what heaven will look like. It has been raining a good portion of the day which was lucky for us, kind of, because there was a mud waterfall at the grotto. When we got back to shore we headed back to the ship. We arrived around 4:00 pm. Mom and I looked around for a free wi-fi signal, but ended up with a big zero. That was unfortunate. During this time Sue, Andy and Jeff came back from their snorkeling excursion. So we all got ready and went down for dinner at the Skyline restaurant. I had white bean minestrone, broiled salmon, lots of rolls and chocolate frozen yogurt. Everything was delicious, the salmon was a little dry though. Mom had a Caesar salad, the broiled salmon, some rolls and the chocolate frozen yogurt.

Then we went in search of popcorn only to find that the machine was broken. Grrr! So we picked up some playing cards and dice and went down to the game room. We ended up playing Zilch. It was kind of fun. We played until the evening show, which turned out to be a crew member talent show. Mom described it well when she said it was slightly better than a roadshow. I sat through most of it wishing I could be reading or taking a shower or even sleeping. It was only about 45 minutes long though, so that was a blessing. Then we went back to our rooms to get ready for bed. All of that sitting today made me really tired.