Mokaoku

Today we had every intention of using the local bus system...but that never happened. Hilo had a shuttle service that would run to the Farmer's Market, but it was no longer in service. The nice lady at the information booth gave us all the information we needed to catch the bus. And we had every intention: waiting at the bus stop with our exact change (something that seems to be standard across Hawaii). But a young couple walked by and inspired us. We figured it was our last port day before five days at sea; we could use some walking. So we walked the two miles to town. The first part wasn't pleasant, being through a very industrial area. The second part, however, was through a nice park set away from the main road.

Once to Hilo, we first visited the Mokupapapa Discovery Center, which was the one main thing on our list of things to see in town. It did not disappoint. It was free admission, but I enjoyed it so much that almost wished they asked for donations. Many people probably don't spend much time there, but we just enjoyed several of the videos and their 3,500 gallon salt water tank of fish local to Hawaii. I will have to note that in the tank they had one fish that they had just recently discovered/identified, a type of butterfly fish. We also watched some great video on the recent volcanic eruptions. I had not been keeping up with the volcanic activity, but, while still active, no lava has been reaching the surface for some time now.

After the Discovery Center, we walked around town for a while. We had a Walking Tour brochure, but except for a park (that had a sundial that was correct!), we weren't interested in most of the stops. We were going to catch the bus to return to the ship for lunch, but upon checking the schedule, we realized that if we walked the route back to the ship, we would arrive before the bus. So, off we went walking.

After lunch we headed the other direction from the ship towards Carlsmith Beach Park, a popular spot with the locals (have I mentioned that this whole week is a holiday in Hawaii?). Again, we thought about catching the bus, but decided to make it a walking day (with the option to take the bus to return to the ship if we needed it). The park was another 2 miles away. Carlsmith park is known for its green sea turtles. It is a popular snorkel and swimming spot, where locals respect the turtles and the turtles don't seem to mind the people! It is illegal to touch a sea turtle; they are protected by law. Once again we were not disappointed. We saw six different turtles. They really didn't seem to mind the people AT ALL. In fact, one was swimming right toward two girls (one on a float). I tried to catch their attention because we foresaw how it would play out. Sure enough I caught the girl's eye just in time to point out the turtle at her feet. She didn't seem to mind it, but the girl on the float freaked out, flipping the float, screaming in fright, and chaotically trying to swim away. The poor turtle didn't mind a bit, just continuing on his way. The other, non-startled girl even followed him along for a while.

We have seen quite a lot of wildlife, but for pictures, I will include that in a separate post. I will include mostly pictures of the turtles in this post. In total, before dinner, we have walked just short of 29,000 steps and 13.5 miles. I will consider this another Camino training day!Read more