Smith Family Luau

Once off the trail and back into our red Mustang it was time to find our vacation rental condo and crash for a bit.  We found the rental company location easily enough and I sent Drew in to get the keys and any last minute check in things.  He was filthy and disgusting, and came back out with at least four bottles of water.  The woman at the front desk had taken pity and handed over everything she had in her little cooler.

We made our way to the condo, which was just a few miles down the street from the Aston Islander on the Beach that we'd stayed at our first night.  After a shower and a quick look around we ordered pizza takeout.  I ordered Hawaiian - how often do you think they hear that one?  I asked for green olives, too, and she paused to consider a moment - then said, "We have them up at the bar, I'll go grab a few and cut them up."  At least she was sweet enough, and the olives were for martinis so they were HUGE.  We combined pizza and Cokes on the lanai (balcony) and had our first real meal in days.  It was amazing.  I'm not sure we did much except relax and listen to the waves from our lanai for the rest of the evening.

The next morning we woke up, ate the complimentary macademia nut cookies and downed entire bottles of water, then headed out to the grocery store to stock our little vacation condo.  We bought things we needed, and things we didn't need.  Impulse buys and novelty buys.  We came home and made fresh fish burgers (trying to imitate the ones we'd had the first night in town) and grabbed our suits.  It was still beautiful weather and we intended to enjoy it.

Since there was road construction going on around the corner from our condo we didn't have the normal beach access.  I asked the front desk person and he told us to head the other way down the side road for a hundred yards or so and we'd come to a semi-private beach access.  And so we did - and it was better than the beach we would have had otherwise!  We found our own little nook and watched sea turtles float by, read, and relaxed.  We had nowhere to be.

That night I did some laundry and we got ready to head out for the Smith Family Luau (so named because tourists can't pronounce a Hawaiian name and Smith made for better marketing).  We were given a show by the peacocks, took a tram around acres and acres of beautiful grounds, and enjoyed a ceremonial unveiling of the pit roasted pig.  The ceremony has a name and I likely could have told you what it was a few weeks ago, but damn it if things aren't already fading away...

 

After the unveiling we headed to the pavilion for dinner.  We ended up sitting next to a late 20's couple who were on vacation with their parents.  We made small talk until the woman blurted out, "I know you.  You look so familiar!  Were you on House Hunters, the Denver edition?"  I said all I could think of which was, "Ummm, nope."  Haha.  We continued to make small talk until it was discovered that they had been part of the slow trudge up the last two miles to the trailhead the day before!  We'd actually exchanged a few words on the trail about how far, how long, and my goodness why is it so uphill.  As if to make me feel better for some reason she said at one point, "Well you clean up really pretty."  Aww, shucks.  Thanks.  :)  We wrapped up the evening with a great show and headed "home" to our condo.