My stay in Kona was all about catching some sun and snorkeling. On my first day, after a highly recovering deep sleep, I drove into town and had… well of course Eggs Benedict in a restaurant facing the waterfront. When you travel alone, one of the advantages is, that they would always find room for you in a restaurant that is famous with locals and therefore packed with people on a sunday. On the other hand those seats are most likely not the nicest ones… probably usually used by the one person updating the menues or doing the accounting. Well this time I had an awesome view onto the ocean, but was clamped between two pillars, so the waiter had to approach me awkwardly around the pillars. I was scared every time, when someone moved their head around the pillar, to ask me if I wanted a refill. The eggs came covered with white fish… delicous. I know, I know, I talk a lot about food. After breakfast I did some sightseeing and decided to visit the only non-supermaket-ish bread bakery there is in town. With a brother, who bakes for a living, and as a german in general, I am very spoilt when it comes to bread. I remember that it took me some time and some nasty tasting experiments, when I was living in New Zealand, to find a brand that I liked. Today Dunedin is full of bakeries, that sell baguettes and sourdough bread with a nice crust. Twelve years ago, I ended up with Pumpernickel as my bread of choice. I bought the last loaf of sourdough bread they had. Like a couple of other very nice little shops, the bakery was off the beaten track in a shopping area with Walmart and the post office. I guess you can’t afford the front row commercial rents by baking bread… at least not in America, where bread is not an essential part of peoples‘ everday diet.
Later, I grabbed the snorkeling gear and paddled a little in the beginners area in Kona bay. It is surprising how many cool fish you can see so close to the beach and with all the action in the water. Even the fish are very relaxed in Hawaii. There were all kinds fish, colours and sizes down there. Chad had given me a map of snorkeling places and an overview of the fish in the area. My goal was to see one of every kind. I did not. The rest of the day, I lay in the sun and read my book. A little before six, the other sunbathers and me were kindly asked to leave, because the hotel restaurant, that apparently belonged to the meadow we were lying on, was opened for dinner. Who wouldn’t want to look at a nicely sweaty burnt back, while enjoying a premium steak?
On my way back home I stopped at the supermarket and bought some Ahi Poke. The big supermarkets sell all sorts of Poke, which is a typical hawaiian food and delicacy. You can have Ahi (tuna) and salmon with sauces like the typical sesame oil sauce or lemon, wasabi, aioli and soja sauce. I never get enough of raw fish, so this is just the right kind of food… it is cheap, too (for hawaiian standards).
When I came home, I met the other Airbnb couple who stayed in the room next to mine. Laura and Steve from Spokane in Washington State. They are in their mid 50s and travel with their son and daughter-in-law to look after their grand kid, so the parents could „play“. Tessa is eight months old and smiling all the time. Very cute. We spent all evening talking about the different travels we had made. And boy, those two travelled a lot. They told me a lot about Vancouver, too and gave me some good tipps of stuff to do outside and inside the city.
I tried to make Steve taste some of my Poke, but he refused. It was not Chad’s cup of tea either. So I had all to myself and ate it with my Avocado and a slice of bread.
