Kohanaiki Park, just north of Kailua Kona, is a popular park which provides a great view of the sunsets, has a good surf break, has protected pools for keiki to paddle in, and has all the facilities needed for a good barbecue.
If there’s a downside to the park, it’s that it’s just south of the airport. It’s not O’Hare, but planes come and go with some regularity. It’s also used by the military and planes, such as this big C-17 transport, practice touch-and-goes with some frequency. So it’s not the most relaxing beach on the island, that’s for sure, but with white sand, blue water, and hot sunshine, it has a lot going for it.
This week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme is ‘Simple Joys.’ See more responses here.
This is one of the beaches at Hualalai Resort on the Kona coast. While the resort is private and access is restricted, Hawaii law states stipulates that the public has a right of access along the beaches and shorelines in the state situated below the “upper reaches of the wash of the waves.”
Any developments along the shore are required to provide designated public access points. The catch here is that sometimes parking at these places is limited and if it’s full, getting to the beach involves a much longer walk.
At Hualalai, there’s a good-sized parking lot, an easy walk to the coast, and a paved trail along the waterfront. Some beaches can be quite crowded but, in my experience, it doesn’t take much of a walk to find a stretch of sand that is either sparsely populated or entirely deserted. And in my book, walking along the coast, past palm trees and sandy beaches, is definitely a simple joy.
I’ve posted plenty of anole photos on this blog, but they have all been of the green anole or Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis). Some of these photos have shown an anole that is colored brown, but that’s because the green anole can change color to brown.
It was only recently that I saw my first brown anole (Anolis sagrei), which has a quite different look and different markings to the green anole. Native to Cuba and the Bahamas, it is considered quite invasive and will outcompete green anoles for territory. This one was next to the coast path through Hualalai Resort on the Kona coast.
The scant remains of this shipwreck lie on the rocks of Kahuway Bay, just north of the Hualalai Beach Resort on the Kona coast. The keel is still clearly visible along with several keel bolts and the bottom part of the hull. I don’t know which wreck this is, but it’s been there a long time and will probably survive for many years to come.
Last week, I went down to Hualalai Resort while the 2020 Mitsubishi Electric Championship, the first event on this year’s PGA Tour Champions, was going on. I was going to spend time at the event but, on arrival, found that the PGA doesn’t allow cameras. Since I was mostly going to take photos I wasn’t sure how much time I wanted to spend watching golf without it.
Instead, I went for walk along the waterfront, which is public access. This path also happens to go by the 17th hole of the golf course, so I took some photos and returned later when the players reached that point.
The top photo shows the 17th green with Hualalai volcano in the background. The tee for this par 3 hole is on the slightly elevated area to the right of the photo. This was taken in the morning, before the tournament started. In the middle photo, staff rake the 17th hole bunker before the event. Below, Ken Tanigawa puts on the 17th green. He missed, though got close enough to make par. Technically, I wasn’t supposed to take this photo, so if this blog suddenly stops it’s probably because the PGA’s lawyers have bludgeoned me with five irons (the preferred club for that kind of activity) and buried me in a bunker on the 13th hole.
This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Yin-Yang.’ (See more offerings here.) I had no idea what I’d post for this, but ended up with a couple of posts.
The first is a simple take on light and dark, or light and shadow. On a recent walk along the shoreline, the shadow of a palm tree imposed on a sunny beach, deserted except for empty chairs.
Kohanaiki Beach Park, north of Kailua Kona, is a favorite spot for surfers. But at the south end of the park, the focus switches to history.
There’s a hālau, Ka Hale Waʽa, which is used for teaching Hawaiian crafts and culture. There’s a garden which grows the same kind of plants brought over by the first Polynesian settlers. And there’s a Hawaiian star compass, a 17-foot diameter recreation showing how the Polynesians used to navigate the vast open spaces of the Pacific Ocean.
The top photo show shows the compass. The middle photo shows a plaque, which explains the basics of how it works, using the points of the compass, the sun, nighttime celestial bodies and the ocean swells. I won’t go into detail here, but more information can be found here, here, and here. Below, the setting of the compass, with a Pacific golden plover walking on it. I like this shot because the plover is said to be the reason Polynesians discovered Hawaii. Each year, plovers summer in Alaska and then fly south as far as New Zealand. It is said that the Polynesians noted this small bird’s annual journey back and forth and figured there must be land somewhere to the north, so they set out in their canoes to find it.
Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Round.’ See more offerings here.
This is the molted shell of an a’ama crab, seen on the North Kohala shore. A’ama crabs are numerous around the Big Island and they scuttle away when disturbed. But while these crabs are black, their molted shells turn red in the sun, as this one has.
Graham's Island 