We’re starting to fall into a routine here in the land of breakfast-is-for-lunch. Toby loves Hawaii time. It’s his natural time. He usually rolls out of bed around lunchtime and wants breakfast so he is tickled pink that we all have to adjust to his schedule for a change. When I start fading and thinking, “Shouldn’t the sun be going down by now?” it’s only noon with plenty of time to spare. Which is kind of cool because there is always plenty of daylight to get everything done.

I didn’t really feel like I was jet-lagged because I’m not tired or feeling groggy but this waiting until eleven-something for breakfast is a little rough on the growling tummy. Toby’s been thinking that Baby Bug isn’t very well-behaved in restaurants but actually it’s because breakfast is her naptime and dinner is three hours past her bedtime. In reality she’s been quite a trooper.

One of the waitresses who works at the hotel restaurant took pity on (me) us and made Baby Bug a little origami frog. That was the best thing ever. It was just a little piece of pink paper folded in such a way that you could press your thumb down on its back and it would hop about three inches into the air. Bug loved her little pink frog. She carried it around for a good part of the day and let me take a picture of it. In the photo above the frog is “saying cheese”. Can’t you tell? Hee hee.

Then we drove over the lava fields to a fancy-schmancy outdoor mall that is almost exactly like the fancy-schmancy outdoor mall back home. The lava fields (not sure if that’s what they are called) are out of this world. You feel like you are on Mars or something. Just lots and lots of crusty porous black lava rock munched into dried piles that look a little like dung heaps. Not really in an ugly smelly way but just strange. Then there are tufts of yellow grass growing out of the nooks and crannies.

I was wondering why this yellow grass is not used more often in Hawaiian artwork/signage/marketing etc since it seems to be everywhere and it is pretty in a waving-fields-of-wheat sort of way. But Toby explained that it’s a non-native grass (which is kind of silly since nothing is really native here except the lava) and actually Hawaii, the island we are on, is the newest island. I had no idea. I thought the biggest island would be the oldest island but actually it is the newest and the others were once this big but have worn down over time. So this lava and grass is just the early stages of an island. If you think of millions of years as “early”.

This is probably not very interesting to most people but since I am a graphic artist by trade (or was for the last decade or so) I am always looking at what there is around that can be used in a design if I were suddenly forced to whip out a three-fold brochure or something. I don’t know. I guess it’s all those years that I was forced to make up full marketing plans using three very dated cd’s from photodisc because our clients were too cheap to pay for stock art. Oh, those were the days. Sorry, flashback.

Back to our vacation. We spent day three shopping for shorts for Toby. Shopping with Toby is not much fun. He tries to make it fun (with frappucinos from Starbucks and a new dress for me!) but it just takes forever. He is very particular about every stinking thing (down to the seams!) and will settle for nothing but the best. So we shopped and we shopped and Baby Bug and I got hot and bothered. I’m very thankful to say that Toby did find some new shorts though! So all is well that ends well!

And really it was nothing that a steak dinner and a pretty sunset couldn’t fix.

You might wonder why Toby is wearing working man’s clothes while we are here enjoying paradise and that would be because Toby is actually here to work. The perks of being a photographer who takes pictures of luxury homes is that you get to work in all the best places. This week he’s shooting a resort home just around the bend from where we are staying in Kona.

I can’t really blog about the house itself because it is owned by someone very very wealthy and privacy is part of the package deal. But I can say this: it’s pretty amazing. The people who are building the house let us take a sneak peek while Toby scouted out the views.

This was a nightmare for me because as everyone knows two-year-olds want to climb up on and touch everything. The whole place looked like it needed a giant “Don’t Touch” sign to me. I about died when she clambered up on the very staged and very exotic bed that was about as high as something right out of The Princess and the Pea story.

Thankfully the “stagers” (people who set up the furniture etc.) were very nice and didn’t seem to mind a bit. I’m so glad too because it was hard enough keeping her out of the wine cellar that had just been varnished and smelled like cancer. They suggested I let her play in the shallow end of the vanishing pool in the back yard.

Gulp. Yeah, that would be my heart in my throat. Do you see that seam between the pretty flagstone and something dark and blue? That’s the deep end. Let’s just say I was working just as hard as Toby keeping Baby Bug from learning how to swim the hard way.

After Toby put in a couple hours of “work” he took us to a nearby cove in Kukio. It is the most perfect beach ever. It was overcast and the sun was setting so the light didn’t really do it justice but the temperature was perfect. That’s the strangest thing around here. Usually when the shadows start turning purple I start looking for my sweater but around here night can come and go and you can wear no sleeves without even the slightest shiver.

There are two resorts on both sides of this little beach but right in the middle is a public walkway for the rest of us humans. Before I knew the name of this little cove I called it Turtle Beach because this is where we saw real sea turtles!

They crawl up on the sand here and take a rest from swimming. It’s very strange to be so close to them. I assume they are protected so we tried to give them a wide berth (thank you zoom lens). Of course Baby Bug wanted to go take a ride on “Crush” because she is such a fan of the movie Finding Nemo. I had to explain that these turtles were sleepy and Crush was somewhere out in the EAC. Maybe some other time Bug.

That was okay because there was plenty of sand to play in and she could do what she always does which is throw rocks in the water. Too bad I didn’t bring a “shubble” though. I don’t think this sand is very good for making sand castles with anyway. It is very coarse because it is made of volcanic rock and coral. It can be a little “ouchie” on the feet if you are not careful.

That pretty much sums up our day in Kukio. I can’t wait to go back when there isn’t so much “vog” in the air. Vog! Isn’t that a funny word? That’s what they call the smog around here because it is pollution coming from the volcano instead of cars and factories. It can be worse than breathing the air in LA, they say. Imagine that, 100% natural organic pollution. And guess what? It’s just as cancer-causing as the man-made stuff.

More photos here again!

The only place I can pick up wifi is here on our hotel balcony. What can I say? Life is rough in paradise. Ha ha. I can’t see my screen very well but the view is fantastic.

All I can see (and hear) is the dark turquoise ocean rushing up against the lava rock four floors below me. Now and then a big wave hits the rocks and white froth sprays into view. The mynah birds are thick and they click and caw out to each other from the balcony to balcony. I feel like I am on a ride at Disneyland except it smells nicer (no chlorine) and I’m not walking on black asphalt with gum stuck to the bottom of my shoe.

It’s beautiful. Waving palm trees and funky 70’s architecture poke into the view from the sides. The temperature is pretty much smack dab at perfect and it’s not even that humid. Baby Bug and Toby are napping. I don’t think I’ve ever blogged from a more perfect location. If I could see my screen a little better I think I could set up office here.

I think what I love the most so far are these palm trees. They are so different from the tall towering ones we have at home. When it’s sunset no matter where you point your camera, you feel like you’re taking a photo of something right off an old O.P. t-shirt. They really do make you feel like you’ve arrived in the tropics.

It’s actually a bit overcast here and Toby tells me that the water and views are a hundred times more impressive when it’s clear and bright but I’m not going to complain. It’s a pretty place to be stuck.

Baby Bug is eating up the hula culture. She loves pretending that she is a hula girl and I am the hula girl’s mommy. She’ll say, “Do you want a cookie Hula Girl Mommy?” waiting for me to answer, “No, that’s okay Baby Hula Girl” or anything along those lines. As long as I include the words Hula Girl in front of my name or hers she keeps smiling. I think I could probably get her to eat liver if I convinced her that that is what Hula Girls eat. She’s so funny.

She is also enjoying the attention of having two parents. It’s thrown me for a bit of a loop. I love having Toby back but getting our schedules to mesh (he the night owl and me the lover of dawn) and a three hour time difference has pretty much taken all the routines I’ve gotten used to in the last two weeks and flushed them. But I shouldn’t care. We’re in paradise! Who cares if breakfast is for lunch and dinner is at midnight… as long as we have fun right?

And with that, I’ll close and say Aloha and Mahalo like everyone else around here!

p.s. More photos here!