October 15, 2024 Kona

The overnight voyage from the most northern major island, Kauai, to the biggest Hawaiian island, the Big Island or Island of Hawai’i, in the southern part of the archipelago was 232 nautical miles on fairly calm seas. We were about two or three nautical miles from the ship’s anchorage in Kealakekua Bay at 6:30 a.m. The sky had fewer clouds than other Hawaiian mornings. The temperature was 21°C at 6 a.m. as the sun was about to rise.

We had an earlier tour this morning, needing to be at the meeting point, the World Stage, by 7:45 a.m. for the four hour Kona Coffee, Gold Coast & Cloud Forest Adventure, which had an activity rating of Strenuous. We walked on the Sports Deck 11 for a mile (five times around the deck) after our Lido Market (on Deck 9) breakfast for the fifth day in a row. Koningsdam was anchored by 7:30 a.m. and an announcement was made that people could start to collect their tender tickets at 8 a.m., although almost 100 people had already been in line when we went to the World Stage.

We were in line to get our tour sticker at 7:40 a.m. After a 15 minute wait, our sticker number was called. There were 21 in the group. The group trooped down to Deck A, had our keycards scanned and stepped into the tender boat which holds about 130 people for the short nine minute ride to the Kailua-Kona dock. We were met by the two mini-bus drivers assigned to the group. Ray took the first group of 12. We saw swimmers on the other side of the pier. Ray explained that the world Ironman competition is being held here on October 26th. Ironman competitors from all over the world are already here practising. We also saw some Ironman cyclists in groups on the roads of Kona during the day. The staging area will be right where the tender boats were docking.

The Kailua-Kona side of the Big Island is known as the Kohala district. The Big Island is so diverse that it has 11 of the world’s 13 climate zones. The Kona side is a lot drier than the Hilo side which we will visit tomorrow. The city is located at the base of the Hualalai volcano. It has not erupted in over 200 years. In Ancient times, this was the home of many island kings. The first Hawaiian king, Kamehameha, spent his last years here. Captain James Cook landed here in 1778. It is the place where he was killed in a skirmish with Native Hawaiians.

Our first destination was the Cloud Forest hike. The land where the Cloud Forest Sanctuary is located was burned between 1790 and 1810 to clear the area of vegetation up to 3,000 feet above sea level for a sugarcane plantation. In the early 1900s it was a cattle ranch until the early 1980s when Norm Bazona purchased 15 acres.

The Cloud Forest Sanctuary has grown to 70 acres and is about 3,000 feet above sea level. Dr. Bazona was a professor of Botany at the University of Hawai’i in Hilo. He wanted to establish a cloud forest and began to plant native, endemic and non-native palm trees, ferns and other tropical plants. After only 40 years, some palm trees are well over ten meters tall. There is only seven to twelve centimetres of top soil, which has formed from the decay of plants, on top of the lava rock. Some of the decaying logs host orchids while others host mushrooms. Although the winding trail was only 800 meters long there were large changes in elevation. We stopped to look at the many different plants and watched our step since most tree roots were exposed on the trail as there is very little soil for them to go down into. The hike took about 45 minutes. There are more than 200 kinds of palm trees and 150 varieties of ferns, some over four meters high. The Blue Marble tree, a member of the fig family, bears a fruit that looks like a giant blueberry. It is native to India. There are bamboo groves, orchids and other flowering plants. The hapuu fern species has fronds stretching up to eight meters. Another ferm has a downy material near the base of a frond which was used for its healing property due to iodine content and for making pillows due to its softness. The rainbow tree has adapted to dry conditions as it stores water and is cool to the touch. When it gets wet from rain its truck shows many colours. Ray took pictures of group members by a rainbow tree. Ray also pointed out a partly uprooted bamboo plant that shows how shallow the top soil is. Nearby was a Banyon tree. We saw the carnivorous pitcher plant with bulbous “flowers”, a five meter tall wild coffee tree and several rainbow eucalyptus trees. The Pambona palm has the largest leaves. Palms are not trees but I don’t remember the category to which they belong. Back in the van as we started on the road to the coffee farm a short light rain started which is a normal, almost daily, occurrence at that altitude.

The next stop was at Ueshima Coffee Company (UCC) for coffee tasting and a short tour of the nearby coffee bushes. There are 40 acres of coffee plants under cultivation. One coffee bush’s cherries yield about 900 grams of finished coffee. The coffee plants are annually cropped to about two meters for easier harvesting by people. There is no machine harvesting of the Kona area coffee plants. When first picked the coffee cherry skin is removed to usually reveal two beans which contain 60% water. If the cherry contains only one bean it is usually rounder and the beans are kept separate and sold as Peaberry coffee beans.They are dried on screens for five to ten days to a water content of 10%. Next the beans are roasted to different roast types - Light, Cinnamon, Medium, Dark etc. They are marketed as Estate if they are exclusive to a particular farm or Island if they are a blend of beans from different coffee farms. We bought some coffee beans to take home.

Our final stop was at Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historic Park which is the site of a replica Hawaiian village, with a thatched roof boat house and a fish pond. The fish pond was built with lava rocks to make an enclosure to catch fish. The fish could swim in, but not out. At the east side of Kealakekua Bay was the village temple which was just low stone walls lava rock on the beach. It is still considered a sacred area known as the Malies Point Resource Area.

The drive back to the pier was less than five minutes. Nearby was Kings Coffee where we used their complimentary Wi-FI while we enjoyed cool frappés. Then we waked along the main street to the Hulihe’e Palace State Monument which was built in 1838 of Coral, Lava rock and Native woods. Across the street was Moku’aikaua church built in 1820. We returned to the pier for the tender boat ride back to the ship. There was a quick look at our keycard and photo ID as we entered the security area before boarding the tender. When we arrived at the ship after departing the tender boat our backpacks and shopping bags went through the ship’s security X-ray machines like airport security and people walked through scanners. We were back in our stateroom before 3 p.m.

The captain’s 4:30 p.m. announcement advised that Koningsdam would be travelling 160 nautical miles overnight going to Hilo. He mentioned that the pilot would be boarding at 5:15 a.m. and entry into Hilo Harbor could encounter large swells. Sunrise will be 6:15 a.m. Later we checked the ship’s route. She was going north up Hawaii’s west coast then turning east then south along the northeast coast to Hilo.

At dinner Graham and Suzanne said they spent the morning in Kona while Mike and Jo stayed on board. Tonight’s entertainer was comedian, Kermit Apio, who is Hawaiian and lives in Seattle. He was much better than last week’s comedian.

Steps today 13,804