Waiting…

Today felt like a lot of waiting; waiting to move along on the trail , waiting in line at the post office, waiting to be served at Kona Brewery and waiting for sunset.

We were going to hike Diamond Head today, our plan was be at the trailhead at 7 am. when they open. Oops we slept in till 6:50 a.m. New plan please…Go up to the Lanikai Pillboxes. We gobbled down breakfast washed down with kona coffee, grabbed our gear and off we went.

First though we had to stop at Pali Overlook. Our passenger, Flat Stanley needed to see the view.

We made it over the pass and into the neighborhood that the trail starts from. Hoards of people were everywhere and we were about to join them. After finding a parking place, we started the trek up to the Pillboxes. The trail was crowded, which meant waiting to go up some parts and waiting to go down in other sections. I found a nice viewing spot and told Mike to go on. I was tired of the people and looking up to see them all on the pillboxes, took away any enjoyment for me. Did I mention the trail was slippery too? This was the first trail that going down was much more difficult than going up. A hiking pole would have really helped.

Our next stop was the Byodo-In Temple, one of our favorite places. We’ve been here three times and always admire the beauty of it. The only waiting we did here was for people to get out of the picture shots.

We scooted home to grab our goodie boxes to mail to friends. We stopped at the Kahala Post Office and waited for at least 25 minutes in line to mail them out. If one lady hadn’t been arguing about a mere $1.24 it would have gone much quicker. I was tempted to run back to the car and dig up that amount to give it to her.

Kahala is close to Kona Brewery, so that became our late lunch destination. This isn’t craft beer, but we knew we could have a few brews on tap that they don’t bottle and we can’t taste back home. We sat at the bar, as there was a long wait for a table. Service was slowwwwww. We had lunch and a beer, something that would only take about 45 minutes, but this turned into a lonngggggg lunch. I know we are waiting in paradise, but still….

We finally settled our tab and returned home to await the time to walk to the sunset. You can translate that to we went home, so I could nap before sunset.

We once again walked to Diamond Head Beach, but to a different section to watch the sun melt into the ocean and clouds.