Aloha

Aloha makamakas!! For all of you who don't speak Hawaiian, that means "Hello friends". Normally our blog is mostly about the kids, but as the oldest of the Echols kids and at times, most immature, I wanted to tell about something that I had gotten to do recently.

Thanks to Jaime, who I like to refer as the "greatest wife ever", I just returned from a week in Hawaii. I went to visit my longtime friend, Heath, who is currently living on the island of Kaua'i. It was a full blown guys week and did I mention that it was in Hawaii. (I couldn't remember.)

It was a blast. On days that Heath had to work, I spent a lot of time sitting on the beach and balcony staring at the waves rolling into the bay and also snorkeling. A few days into the trip, we were sitting on the beach and seen a shark attack a turtle in the spot where we had been snorkeling a few days previously. Needless to say, that really ended my snorkeling trips for the rest of the time that I was there.

We toured the whole island. We seen the old sugar cane mills, sugar cane and coffee fields, several waterfalls, Menehune Lake, and most every beach that we could find. Some of my more favorite things that we done were going up to Waimea Canyon, the dinner Catamaran cruise to view the Na Pali Coast, and touring the North Shore side of the island.

Here are a couple pictures from Waimea Canyon and the Kalalau lookout.

Here are a couple from the Na Pali Coast.

Here is a good shot of a beach on the North Shore. The cool thing about the North Shore side is that the beaches run right next to the road. You pull the car off to the side of the road, open the door and you are standing on the beach. They also are not very crowded as you can tell. This picture was taken on a Saturday.

One of the other great things the food. We stayed clear of the places that we could eat here and stuck with local eating places. The best was the Smith's Tropical Paradise Luau. It was more food than anyone can eat, but I tried most all of it. Of course the kalua pork was the best, but the teriyaki beef and sweet and sour mahi-mahi was good too. I also ate a Hawaiian sweet potato, which was purple, and a few bites of poi. Poi is sort of weird and I won't waste anytime explaining it because, I don't know that I can. Another one of my favorite eats was at Puka Dog. You may ask what that is and I will say that they only serve hot dogs and fresh squeezed lemonade. Puka means hole in Hawaiian. They cook the inside of their buns on some type of post and then they put the dog in the hole. You pick your type of dog (sausage or veggie), then you pick your garlic sauce (mild, hot, or volcano), then finally you pick your type of sweet relish (mango, banana, coconut, pineapple, etc). I had a sausage Puka Dog with mild garlic sauce and coconut relish. Possibly best hotdog ever.

The last day that I was there, we attempted to ride some waves with a boogie board. As amateurs, we were in way over our heads. The surf looked good, so we headed out to find that the waves were probably 8-10 feet high. Both of us managed to catch a few waves and it was awesome, but most of the time we drank more saltwater through our nose than anyone ever should. Our boogie boarding skills did draw the attention of some locals. There were some 11-12 year old kids who were making fun of us. We knew we looked goofy, so we joined in on the fun.

I had a great time and I must give the host/tour guide/cook/photographer at the Mixon Makai 5 stars.

Aloha!!