So, recap

[jethrien]

A little more awake now. Plus, I've at least read all my work emails and listened to all my messages, so I think I'd like a quick break before I tackle the mound of stuff.

So, yeah. Hawaii = awesome. We started in Kona on the Big Island, and then went over to Hilo for a few days. Some highlights:
- Summit and Stars: We took a tour up to the observatories on Mauna Kea, watched the sun set, and then did a couple hours of stargazing. We could see the Milky Way, the Southern Cross, and the Hubble, among other things. I saw Saturn through a telescope for the first time. Rings!
- Luau: Tasty, tasty, tasty pig. And hula dancers and a fire twirler. Also, incredibly grateful for overhang when it started pouring.
- Scuba diving: Fish!
- Southernmost point of the USA: We're standing on the edge of a 40 foot cliff, looking down into the incredibly deep water, trying not to get blown off by the very, very strong winds. We notice a ladder. Peering over, we see that it goes all the way to the water. A guy walks over and asks, "Gonna jump?" "What? No!" we respond, horrified. "Oh, ok," he says. And jumps off the cliff. (Climbs back up and does it again.) Also, we saw the southernmost bar and the southernmost credit union. (As Justin said, "Yes, I understand you have good rates and excellent service. But what I want to know is, are you southernmost?")
- Lava: Oh, so cool. We hiked out, across a couple miles of lava fields, in the dark, in the rain, to where thet lava was actually flowing. We poked it with sticks. We made grilled cheese and toasted muffins on it. We watched it slowly set fire to a lei. Oh, so awesome. There just aren't words for how awesome.
- Snorkeling in tidal pools: Coral! Fish! 15 foot deep tidal pools! Also, neon coral! Mind-blowing!
- Black sand beach: Sand! That's black! Also mind-blowing! (Except the part where I skinned my toes really, really badly on a rock. They hurt. A lot. Still.)

Problem is, we broke Hawaii.

So Pu'u 'O'o is the crater of Kilauea that has been erupting continuously since 1983. It was a flow from this crater that we hiked out to (and which Brian threw a rock into). The next day, we went out to Volcano National Park to go hiking and found that they'd closed pretty much everything. Apparently, a couple hours after we'd left the night before, they had a series of earthquakes. Subsequently, they discovered the earthquakes cut off the magma from Pu'u 'O'o. It's stopped erupting for the first time in almost 25 years, and we were some of the very last people to ever see it. (It looks like nearby Mauna Ulu might blow instead.)

Also - the Big Island has two sides, the Kona side and the Hilo side. Kona is nearly always sunny. Hilo is a rainforest - the last time I was there, we bought rainsuits because we were so wet and cold. Kona was overcast almost the entire time we were there. Hilo is in the middle of a drought and was dazzlingly sunny.

Of course, the reason that we were there at all was for our friends' wedding. And a lovely wedding it was, indeed. lyriendel was lovely, looking like something between an ancient goddess and an elven princess in her flowing gown, fluttery cape, and circlet. And her husband looked quite dashing, himself. And it's hard to beat a wedding on a beach.

We failed to find a florist, so I ended up teaching people how to make boutonnieres and put together Lyriendel's bouquet myself. Got floral tape, wire, and ribbon from Walmart and flowers from the supermarket, and managed to patch together a lovely handtied wildflower-y bouquet with trailing ribbons. (Of course, it was a lot less simple than it looked, since I had to tape all the flowers together and then cover the tape with ribbon, but that's usually the case with these things.)

The cake also came out really well - marble cake with raspberry filling, white chocolate whipped ganache frosting, and peach and blue decorations in buttercream. It couldn't be out of the fridge for more than ten minutes without melting, but that's the problem with pastry in the tropics. Delicious and pretty, though. I was proud.

So yeah. Good vacation.

Comments

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you were pleased. It was a lovely wedding, and I'm glad I got to help.