Category: Uncategorized

When Susan and I travel, there’s one consistent thread. Once we decide to find a place, no matter how hard it is to find, or whether it actually exists, we never give up.

Once, in Sicily, we were in search of a particular market described in our travel guide.   But we simply couldn’t find it.  After hours of walking I still insisted on looking at maps, Susan on asking for directions. At one point, we began to argue but agreed that we would only argue in our broken Italian. Voglio guardare la mappa!!!  No, voglio quella direzione!!!  Before long we were doubled up in laughter. We later discovered that the place no longer actually existed, but we did  instead happen upon the Palermo Palazzo of Prince Giuseppe di Lampedusa, now a museum.

We aren’t easily thwarted and there’s usually a payoff, even if an unexpected one.

So, early one evening we head down to Big Sur from Berkeley for three nights.

We had reservations at the Big Sur Lodge. More rustic, but certainly less expensive than the sky-high rates of some of the premier Big Sur inns.

We left our granddaughter’s 5th birthday party in Berkeley at 6:30, summoned Siri and were told that we could make it in 2 ½ hours. We’d be in by 9:00. Susan drove. There were no surprises on roads we had driven many times. We chatted amiably until, approaching Monterey, off to the southeast, I noticed a big billowy cloud above the encroaching evening marine layer. I wanted it to be an errant thunderhead, though I knew it wasn’t. It wasn’t fluffy white and I tried to convince myself that was just the sunset’s glow, though I knew it wasn’t.

The closer we got, the harder it was to deny that this was a forest fire, more or less in the direction we were heading. We had Big Sur in our sights. We didn’t pause and there was no discussion of turning back. A Google search turned up a small fire, but nothing alarming.

We dashed through Monterey,

passed the Carmel Valley road

and Point Lobos State Park,

and began down the winding two lane road to Big Sur. Now we were in smoke. Any reasonable person would at least start talking of the possibility that we might consider turning back. Susan kept driving. Signs warned of firefighting equipment ahead but no road closure. It was now 8:30, right on schedule to hit Big Sur at 9:00.

In the growing darkness and smoke, a continuous line of cars was coming the other way. On our side of the road heading into the fire, there was only us and one other guy. We started passing fire engines parked along the road and lots of activity. As we rounded one corner we could see the flames on the hillside above us.

At that point we both began to question the sanity of what we were doing. Later Susan said that, in her mind she always has an immigrant compulsion. It looks bad ahead but it can’t be as bad as where we’re coming from. We finally stopped to ask if this was crazy. A firefighter sitting in a large pumper told us the fire was a little way ahead, but to the east, and not threatening the road. We ought to be fine to Big Sur. And we were.

Well, fine is a matter of opinion. The smoke got heavier. I was hoping we would round the point north of the Little Sur River Beach 

and, as if by magic, emerge on the upwind side of the fire into clear air and the view of the Big Sur Lighthouse.

As we rounded that point, the smoke only got worse. We weren’t to know but this was just the second day of the Soberanes Fire, before it even had a name, which burned for over a month, scorching over 90,000 acres of wildland, costing over 60 homes and a life. With only a few miles to go, we pressed on.

We passed the The River Inn filled with cars and running on generator power, soon arriving at Julia Pheiffer State Park and Lodge. It seemed darker than expected, actually there were no lights at all. We drove through the park, lost. Just a few walkers with flashlights emerged and were swallowed in the smoke. We finally arrived at a dark building. A person appeared through the smoke and confirmed that this was indeed the lodge.

We parked at the curb, the only car, and went into registration where we encountered three staff in the ghostly light of a gas camp lamp. It was just 9:00. Yes, we could stay. No, there was no power. No, they couldn’t say when it would be back on. Yes, they put a flashlight in each room.

We had persevered and reached our goal, Susan’s immigrant urge sated. But just because we had made it didn’t mean we could  stay.  The smoke made every breath a challenge. After a short discussion, we decided to head back to Monterey, passing through the troublingly beautiful nighttime view of the fire.

We wouldn’t be able to hike in Big Sur,

we would miss our dinner at the Big Sur Bakery, 

our visit to the Big Sur River Inn sitting in big chairs in the middle of the river enjoying a snack and a glass of wine

and our lunch on the terrace of Ventana Inn overlooking the Pacific.

We’ll save those delights for another time.

 

Index of Links:
Big Sur
Big Sur Lodge
Monterey
Carmel Valley
Point Lobos State Park
Little Sur River Beach
Big Sur Lighthouse
Soberanes Fire
Julie Pheiffer State Park
Hiking in Big Sur
Big Sur River Inn
Big Sur Bakery
Ventana Inn

 

 

 

 

I parked my car at the Tuolumne Meadows Lodge parking lot and checked in.

I guess I should say that I’m not guilty, but that’s not exactly correct.  Let’s just say that what I did shouldn’t be a crime.  My childhood friend Gina was dying.  She had an advanced inoperable brain tumor.  She’d been publicly outspoken about her right to end her life on her own terms.  She wanted to make the point to help others in her predicament come out of the shadows and be able to end their lives gracefully.  As a doctor, I  helped her with the research, the methods and getting the drugs.  I had to avoid crossing the line of ethics and legality.  As her disease grew worse and she was on the verge of losing control of the situation, she left gracefully, surrounded by family.

She offered a taped interview as evidence of the rightness of her actions.  She had made her point and even though I think I stayed on the right side of the law, the district attorney in Alpine County was set on making his reputation by charging friends and family with everything from conspiracy to fraud, saving the harshest charge, second degree murder, for me.  Maybe it would all blow over, maybe not, but I was terrified.  There would be no one-armed man to save my bacon, so, for now, I ran.

 

Detective Singer, who had been assigned to find me seemed to have a special vendetta, intent on tracking me down.

I contacted an old friend Mark who immetiately offered to help without reservation, for which I am eternally grateful.  He let me use his credit card and internet access to avoid being traced by the authorities.  I knew they would be looking for my car but Gina’s brother said I could take her car. It wasn’t likely that they’d be looking for that and they could retrieve it after I was in the clear.

I headed up to Yosemite, shaving off my beard and got a short haircut along the way.  Mark drove my car down to LA using my credit card for gas and lunch, leaving a trail all the way to long term parking at LAX.    I wanted them to track down my car at LAX.  Hopefully they would focus on looking for a bearded guy with long hair who had fled to LA, where he may or may not have caught a flight from LAX to somewhere. Now, if I can manage to avoid a traffic stop, and the authorities don’t manage to connect me with Mark, I’m in the clear.  I know that this isn’t perfect but, at the very least, I’ve bought some time.

So, here I was at Yosemite trying to stay out of sight, so I decided that the best policy was to act like any other tourist.

I thought about driving the 20 minutes back through Tuolumne Meadows to Tenaya Lake to the west and the fabulous Olmstead Overlook for a hike to clear my head.

 

 

 

 

 

 

But I  decided that I should stay away from the car and I took a long hike through Tuolumne Meadows.   Though it was late summer, the river meandered through the green grass.

I looked up at Lambert Dome to the east rising 1,000 feet above the meadow.  I always try to visit at least once a year and often make that climb, but there wasn’t enough time today.

You can scramble up the granite, which is harder than it looks.  Or there’s a relatively easy 2.5 mile trail past Dog Lake and around the back.  When I first crest the edge of the dome there’s a view that I never want to leave.

On one ascent, when we made the top of the dome, we saw ranks of thunder heads heading up from the south that were just about to break over us.  This wasn’t good at all.

Our hair was standing on end from the static charge.  Still it was hard to pull ourselves away.  One rarely sees such a scene and lives to tell the tale.  We were lighting rods, standing alone on bare granite.  We headed down, drenched to the bone by the time we got back to the lodge.

I had been prepared to backpack into the YosemitE high country when I left Tuolumne Meadows, but while still in the Bay Area, I had managed to get a last-minute spot at the High Sierra Camp.  Normally you enter a lottery each November to try to secure a slot, but for years I had never been successful.  For last minute cancelations you log into the High Sierra Camp Waitlist.  Sometimes, if you’re flexible and a small party you might snag a slot.  I got the last two days of the season at Vogelsang Camp.

The next morning I headed out in full pack.  When I checked out, I chatted with the two young women at the desk, asked a lot of questions, cracked jokes and tried to be as charming as a man in his sixties can be with girls in their twenties, without being creepy.  I asked a lot about going backpacking to Young Lakes, a beautiful group of lakes 6 miles to the north and the jumping off point to the ascent of 13,000 ft. Mount Conness and the connection to the Pacific Crest Trail, which continued for miles beyond that.

I wanted them to remember me and, if Singer ever arrived, to say that I had probably headed to Young Lakes.  I circled around and started my hike up to Vogelsang in the opposite direction.

I  passed almost nobody as I headed out and felt that I’d made good on my false trail. If they ever tracked me this far, they could stake out that car forever, I was never coming back and now I was really off the gird and hard to trace.

The hike to Vogelsang was not too challenging, seven miles with an almost 2,000-foot climb. I could almost forget my situation and enjoy the hike and the views.

From the Tuolumne Lodge the trail crosses two parts of the Tuolumne river which cut through huge granite boulders.  At the second crossing there are pools and little beaches where you can wade in the ice cold water or take a quick plunge.  That plunge is a lot more inviting at the end of a long hot hike than the beginning.  Or maybe just soak hot tired feet.

There’s a family story that when I was just three, I was here with my family and fell in, floating face down in the stream.  My father waded in and scooped me up.  I came up sputtering and apparently said. “Did you see me swimming?” So here I am agaIn at the same spot, almost 60 years later.  This place hasn’t changed and I am still trying to stay above water

After the crossing, it’s an easy walk across meadows and forest up Lyell Canyon.  You can continue that hike for three hours or more along the river stopping for a picnic and swim, or just a nap.

For the more hearty and adventurous the trail continues 12 miles up to Donohue pass at just over 11,000 feet, where you pass by the Lyell and Maclure glaciers.  

Just over a mile after the crossing, the trail to Vogelsang splits and rises steeply though the forest, climbing up to the tree line at about 9,200 feet.  From there the trail winds through high sierra meadow.

I didn’t see a single person until I passed a train of mules, three groups of 5, each led by a cowboy. Everything that goes in or out of the High Sierra Camps does so by mule.  As they approached, I moved aside and said, “You go ahead, you’re working, I’m on vacation.” An almost stunning young woman in a big wide brimmed had with a big feather in the brim said, “This doesn’t feel much like working.” Since I was a kid I’ve always jealously imagined working at Yosemite.

I continued along the path, stopping religiously each hour for a brief rest and hydration.  At each stop I was astounded at the beauty of where I found myself, all alone.  I have always loved the sound of the wind here. The whistle of the wind through the pine trees is different of the hiss of the wind over the bare granite.

After about 4 hours, I arrived at the High Sierra Camp. Despite being tired, I felt the  exhilaration of arrival, slipping off my pack and savored the accomplishment.  The High Sierra Camps provide a tent cabin with linens, toilets, showers and a dining hall.  All you really have to carry up is your clothes and water, not a forty-pound pack, which makes the trip much more accessible.  Yosemite even has a Mule trip to the High Sierra Camps, so even after you’re too old to make the hike, you can continue to go as long as you can sit upright.  If you’re a small party, you might have to share a cabin as they try to fill every bunk.  The camps are all 7 to 10 miles from each other and some people make the grand loop through them all.

There are five Yosemite High Sierra camps. Vogelsang is one of the most beautiful. It’s a collection of tent cabins along a stream with a couple of stone buildings that served as the kitchen, toilets and showers and a larger tent for the dining room.

A short hike away is Vogelsang Lake, a strikingly blue and cold Alpine lake nestled among 11,000-foot peaks.

It was one of the last few nights of the season and fortunately I had a small cabin to myself.

 

 

I dropped off my gear and took a hike to the Lake, settling on a grassy patch next to the lake, off the trail, trying to keep a low profile.  I hadn’t expected my flight from the law to include a a beach event, so I had no suit.  Stripping down, I  eased my way into the very very cold water.  Thrilling.  I climbed out and sunned myself on the grass. First one side then the other. I did this a few times. On my last plunge I noticed a group of hikers, on the far side of the lake, coming to Vogelsang camp from the south.  I ignored them and they came no closer.

Eventually I came back to camp, cleaned up and headed for dinner.

I sat at an empty table in the back hoping to eat alone, but eventually all the tables filled. The group who sat with me chatted amiably.  They told their story and I invented a story about who I was.  When they asked what I had done this afternoon, I said that I had taken a swim.  They laughed. “You’re the naked guy.” So much for low profile.  I remained the naked guy for the rest of my stay.

A ranger naturalist arrived on Friday afternoon with her brood of four women in their sixties who had hiked from Sunrise camp that day.  She was six feet tall slim with brown hair in braids, maybe 35 and wore a ranger outfit complete with the round brimmed hat.  She was crane-like and awkward and seemed a little self conscious.  She lived in Ithica NY and had been a ranger naturalist for ten years.  She loved Yosemite but in the winter worked as a guide at a Nature preserve in Upstate New York.

That evening she gave two talks to all the guests, one at twilight and one under the stars.  There‘s no place quite like the wilderness at over 10,000 feet, perfect clear air and no lights whatsoever.  In her talk all of her awkwardness disappeared as she read poems and sang an adaptation of the Star Spangled Banner about Yosemite, of course missing the high notes.  Her talk was a little goofy, a rambling rendition of all the the things she loved about Yosemite, but she managed to get twenty-five middle aged people to lie out on large granite slabs in the cold and dark, oohing and aahing at every shooting star.

Saturday was the last night of the season at Vogelsang. A crew would arrive on Sunday. By Wednesday it would all be gone, stored for the winter. Then on the Merced Lake, Sunrise, Glen Allen, May Lake, all the High Sierra Camps.  After that, on to Tuolumne Meadows.  There are over 150 tent cabins, the store, the stable, everything had to be put to bed.  In all they would be at it until mid-October. The road might be open for months when there is a late winter and hikers can come and go.  But once the first snow comes the road becomes impassable quickly and it’s closed for the winter.

The staff was what you would expect, all young all sun-kissed. The manager was an Irish girl in her twenties, very outgoing.  There were two guys, also in their twenties who did the food service, one a sandy haired guy, a typical California lad living in the wilderness.  The other, dark haired with a very full beard, like Paul Bunion.  At first he seemed like just another college boy in the woods, but I noticed that several of this front teeth were missing and began to construct an alternate story.  We hardly saw the others, except sitting together in the sun between work shifts.  There were not so many work shifts.

They all gathered together in the dining hall after the campers turned in, lit the room with candles, played ping pong and music and, I would guess, enjoyed a beer and whatever the drug of choice was in Yosemite in 2103. Who knows who was sleeping with whom.

The next morning, I shared a table with Tim a tall thin man about 40, long light brown hair, you would call it strawberry blond, but you would never call him a strawberry blond.  It was kind of stringy but in a, “ I’ve been in the wilderness for days,” not “I never wash my hair,” sort of way.” He had one of those no chin long thin faces, pleasant enough, in a Slim Pickens way, but nobody would call him good looking. He was wearing nondescript outdoor wear and a stocking cap. We were exchanging the normal pleasantries as hikers do and I noticed his jacket had Merced Lake 2000.

Clearly he was or had been on staff.  When I asked, he told me that he was the advance man on the breakdown crew. He was friendly, but slow to engage. I was a customers and customer service wasn’t his job.  When I showed interest, however, he was happy to tell me all of how the camp was broken down, how things were dismantled, what was stored up at the camp and what was taken down the mountains by the cowboys.

He told me about coming up here in the middle of winter, skiing up and digging their way through the snow into the stone kitchen building. The inner circle of the maintenance staff left provisions and kept the gas hooked up. They were party to a private mountain top winter retreat, one that took plenty of doing just to get there. They were at least 25 miles and 3,000 feet from the closest all weather road.

I took a chance and told him that I was between jobs and  asked Tim if there was a slot on the breakdown crew.  It was a long, shot but he radioed his manager who said that they were a man short.  There was some paperwork to do later but if I were willing to take the risk he would be OK to try me out for the Vogelsang breakdown.  So my backpacker self disappeared and melted into a crew of workers out in the wilderness.

A couple of weeks later, our team hiked back down to Tuolumne Meadows heading for the next camp. I wasn’t paying attention and by the time I realized where we were, we were walking through the parking lot where I had left Gina’s car.  I just had to keep going.

There was the car, covered in dust surrounded by several ranger trucks and an Apline County Sheriff’s car. They were hooking it up to a tow truck. Singer was standing there talking with a deputy.

They found this much sooner than I had hoped. Was Mark in deep weeds?  We walked right by the car carrying our big packs. I was dirty and wearing a hat, but I think that most people would have recognized me, if they looked… but nobody did.  Hopefully they were looking for a hiker up north in the Sierra and there I was, dismantling the camps, right where I started, invisible, at least for now.
Index of links
Tuolumne Meadows Lodge
Young Lakes
Mount Conness
Pacific Crest Trail
Tenaya Lake
Olmstead Overlook
Yosemite High Sierra Camps
High Sierra Camp Waitlist 
Lyell Canyon
Lyell and Maclure glaciers
Mule Trip to the High Sierra Camps

 

 

 

 

 

If you live in the Bay Area, Maui is on your doorstep.  However, you do have to endure the tedium of the Hawaiian Islands.  In the winter, the air is 78 degrees, the sea is 78 degrees, even the rain is 78 degrees. We rarely go in the summer; it’s too hot and crowded

We have been going to Maui for over 30 years. We’ve visited all the other islands, too.  Each has it’s own allure, but for us, Maui is a place to go to relax, even for just a few days. It’s not just another vacation; it’s like going home.

Getting there

Getting there is part of being there. Once you hit that airline seat, you’ve arrived. The trip is out of your hands.  Resist the Mai Tai on the plane as a relaxer; they’re awful and, after all, it’s only 10 in the morning. Just try to embrace the land of slow.

We take the early-ish flight from Oakland, arriving at Maui at about 11:00 local time. One of the best moments of the trip is when you’ve just stepped off the plane. You’re wrapped in warm moist island breeze. And that breeze is best if you’re dressed for it. If you’re still bundled up from your early morning mainland climate, by the time you pick up your bags, get on the shuttle bus and secure your car, which will be your first chance to be in air conditioning, sweat will be dripping from your chin with your undies in a bunch.

You have two choices, leave your house in shorts and flops, braving the early morning chill.  Or, as I often do, wear your cool weather clothes and pack your shorts and T in your carry on.  At some point in mid-flight, change in the airplane toilet.

The now universal fold-down baby-changing table is a big help, but it’s still a bit of a wrestling match trying not to step barefoot into the unidentified moisture on the floor, which only gets soggier near the end of the flight.  First, put down the toilet seat and lower the changing table.  Now, there’s virtually no way your phone can find it’s way into the toilet.   Take off your shoes and socks one by one and stand on your flops, remove your phone, wallet, keys and put them on a dry spot on the counter, drop your pants carefully keeping them off the floor, put them on the changeing table,  step into your shorts, and reinstall your pocket contents, transfer the belt, change your shirt and slip into your flops.

You’re almost done.  Now all you have to do is exit the toilet with your mainland clothes bundled in your arms and endure the stares of the long line of people who have been waiting endlessly for you to finish.

Whenever I do this I think of the five-mile club, whose members have been reported to have had sex in an airplane toilet.  As I’m wrestling with my trousers, it seems unlikely to be a fun event, especially at my age, and one that, at the least, risks a major charlie horse.  So you emerge, looking like a local,

or like a round pink person in a Hawaiian shirt.

Baggage

Be calm when you go to get your bags.  Try to never be in a hurry for the whole trip. Actually, you really should be able to do with carry-on.  Amazingly in a pinch, they actually sell clothes in Hawaii and there’s no State Law prohibiting washing out undies in the sink, though you really shouldn’t dry them on the lanai.  There’s virtually nowhere where you can’t go in a T-shirt, shorts and flops.  If you must dress up a little, with one Aloha shirt or a little dress that you can roll into a ball, you’re good to go.  I’ve never returned from Hawaii and said, “Darn, I took too few clothes.”

So with your small bag in hand, saunter, do not sprint, to the rental car bus.  People often try to pretend they aren’t tourists but why try so hard to be cool.  If they try to put a lei around your neck, a sure brand of a tourist, let them.  When they thrust out the magazine with all the tourist advertisements, take it and thank them.  This is your first chance to use Mahalo (thank you in Hawaiian).  These magazines will actually come in handy or, at the very least, provide almost a week’s bathroom reading.  Remember, you actually are a tourist. Now pause…….., don’t run for that bus that is about to leave, you’re in no hurry.  Look up and you’ll see that beautiful mountains surround the airport, one a 10,000-foot volcanic cone draped in clouds.  OK now, get on the next bus.

Car Rental

The rental counter can be the next test. If you book the flight and car together, sometimes it works out that all 200 people on the flight had the same great idea and converge on the same rental desk at the same time. Try to avoid that by booking your car and flight separately and signing up for the rental company’s express services.  But even with the best planning you sometimes end up at the end of a long line testing your resolve to remain in the land of slow.  It’s not the end of the world if you linger here 30 minutes or even more. Remember you’ve already arrived. Lines are excellent people watching places.

I recall once watching most of the last period of an NBA final game while in the car rental line. The entire room was transfixed as Michael Jordan displayed memorable brilliance. People could hardly tear themselves away when it was their turn to step up to the counter.  More than one person stayed for the end of the game even after getting their car.  Now they’d arrived.

First Beach Stop

To mark our arrival, we stow our bags, decide who will drive, get in the car, adjust the seats, mirrors, buckle up and pass through the security gate.  Instead of turning right toward the highway as instructed, we turn left heading for a Kanaha Beach Park five minutes away.

Kanaha Beach is a famous windsurfing and kite boarding venue but that’s not until the afternoon when the trade winds build.  We take the road to the last park entrance then go to an almost empty parking lot at the far end of the beach and walk through a wooded park, regaled by tropical birds and chickens, to the beach. This is where the full impact of being on an island, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, hits us.  This is the windward side of the island, where a warm sea salt breeze that has been running uninterrupted for over 3,000 miles from the mainland fills our lungs. The sky is a tumble of billowing multi-colored clouds against brilliant blue sky; the sea is a blue and green reflection of the sky with white breakers crashing on a reef 200 yards off the beach.

We stand knee deep in perfectly clear water as it laps over the soft white white sand.  As Susan is nearly a foot shorter than I am, I stand with my back to the water. The steep beach aligns us perfectly as we exchange our first lovely kiss of the visit. It’s just noon local time. We really have arrived.

Pupus

Our tradition continues with a drive the twenty miles to Lahaina, landing on the seaside terrace at Kimo’s.

We prefer a table right on the rail overhanging the water in the shade and often manage to secure one. When we aren’t successful we have to tamp down our disappointment if, horror of horrors, we have to settle for a table in paradise, one row back.  We relax and chat, planning our stay or remembering past stays, admiring the sea and the islands of Lanai and Molokai in the distance.

We have a glass of Prosecco and a few items from the pupu menu, pokey, smoked mackerel or maybe a pulled pork slider or fish taco. We are served by one in an unending stream of twenty something waitress, women who have come to Maui for a time. They come for a season or two, but not many stay.  On our last visit, it struck me that the woman who was serving us had not been born the first time I came here, and the waitress from my first trip is now 50 something.  But Kimo’s, the view, the menu, have not changed.  It feels good to be home.

Logistics

We finally give into logistics. When I first started coming here, there were almost no mainland chain stores and food, especially mainland brands, was very expensive.  In those days there were some things that you could only get in the islands; Hawaiian papayas, Maui potato chips and Lauperts ice cream, which now seem to be everywhere on the mainland.  Now all the mainland chains are there and prices have come down dramatically.

We prefer to shop locally, but for staples we go to one of the big grocery stores. There’s a Safeway in Lahaina and a local grocery in Honokowai called Times Supermarket.  At the Safeway we can get things we are accustomed to, particularly wine at only a few dollars more per bottle than on the mainland.  The store is eerily like any Safeway on the mainland, as if we had been transported back home, except that everybody is in flops and shorts. They do, however have some local items including the CookKwee’s Maui cookies that I am fond of, particularly the white chocolate macadamia nut version.

On my first trip to Maui, I discovered the Honokowai Farmer’s Market, a traveling Farmers Market run by a young couple.  They set up in the parking lot in Honokowai on Monday and Wednesday and in Kihei on Tuesday and Thursday. The wife would commonly have her little baby slung over her shoulder as she weighed our produce.  It was always crowded and we tried to arrive on Sunday or Tuesday so we could get our fresh produce the first thing the next morning.  Some time ago they were able to lease the adjacent shop and are open every day with an expanded offering. But they still do the street market twice a week. I recently asked after her son and she pointed out a tall young man laying out Papayas out front.

They have great local prepared foods, a very good Maui onion salad dressing, the best banana nut bread and an unusual tofu mock chicken salad, which I am addicted to and Susan is not, and plenty of samples. Papaya shopping is their art form. They help us to get papayas that will just be perfect in one, two and three days. We number them. Each morning out on the lanai with our coffee, a slice of banana nut bread and a numbered papaya with a squirt of lime – we start our day.

In Maui style the Honokowai Farmer’s Market doesn’t seem to even have their own website but here is the directory of farmers markets on the Island.

There is only one place where we go for fish, The Fish Market Maui, located right across the street from where we usually stay, and just down the block from the Farmers’ Market.

The market is run by a group of young local fishermen. When they first began, the shop was smaller and didn’t open until the afternoon when they pulled up in their pick-up with big ice chests filled with fish caught that morning.  The guy who had caught the fish was serving you.  The fish wasn’t just a disjointed piece of meat on the ice; you could see them carving up huge fish in the back.

These days they have expanded.  They are open all day, have staff, a wider array of prepared fish dishes and a café/take-out menu that’s very good.  They make buckets of Ahi Pokey, lobster salad and ceviche each day.  But the fish still comes in fresh that day in the back of the pick-up.

In Oakland we are surrounded by plenty of pretentious coffee purveyors. The home of Pete’s before it was corporate, Blue Bottle, Bicycle coffee, and dozens more. I’m not immune to their charms and need to secure good quality freshly ground strong coffee for our stay.  On the way to the Farmers’ Market and the Fish Market, we pass by Java Jazz to indulge the caffeine addiction.

Their coffee is good, but that’s not really why we get our coffee here.  The owner, Fazad, an expat Iranian, has created not so much a décor as a personal art piece including walls covered with masses of photos of friends and tourists, trinkets and artwork of all sorts including a series of Barbies in various states of tropical undress and duress, all overseen by a formal portrait of the smiling, be-medaled and de-posed former Shaw of Iran.  They do more than coffee, they serve meals all day and often have music in the evenings.

Stocked up with our supplies for at least the next few days, we settle into our condo by about 3 pm.

Accommodations

We have a strong bias. We have never stayed in a hotel on Maui, always a condo, and have never stayed in one of the big tourist areas: Kanapali, Kahana, Wailea, Kapalua, always the areas in-between in smaller condo properties and always oceanfront.

For a time I owned a condo so close to the ocean that you couldn’t hear yourself on the phone. It was close enough that you could toss your empties into the ocean, though I never did that. We stay there now, as renters.  It’s still great and I don’t have to worry about fixing the dishwasher or if it’s time to replace the carpet, though it’s overdue.

For me, the place to stay is Honokowai. You won’t see much mention of this area in the tourist books. It is a few miles past the big resorts at Kaanapali. Turn off on Honoapiilini road (Ho no a pi i la ni. Seven syllables. I love that name). This was where the early development in West Maui occurred. From that turnoff there is a five-mile stretch of mostly smaller two, three and four story condominium developments with only a section of unappealing high-rise buildings at Kahana. This ends at the fancy, expensive, and elegant Napili Kai Hotel which looks very nice.  Past there is the Kapalua Resort and the too too fancy and more expensive Ritz Carleton Hotel.

If I seem to dismiss the big hotels and resorts, it’s for a reason. You get a choice of Ocean Front, Ocean View (could be just a peek) Garden View or Mountain View. Then there are the Guaranteed Dumpster View rooms.

There is a big hotel in Kanapali that we walk past on the public access path on the way to the Sheraton Black Rock beach. We pass a line of rooms with only a view of the path, no ocean, garden or mountain. Worse, they are at the end a large service yard where they do deliveries and trash collection. I can’t imagine the disappointment at coming to Hawaii, checking in at your hotel lobby, pulling your bags down a long corridor, entering the room and pulling back the drapes on that view. Maybe we are spoiled, but considering all that you spend on the trip, to end up in the middle of the Pacific without a view of the ocean doesn’t seem right. And you can get that view on a budget.

At a big resort even with Ocean Front you can be several hundred yards from the water.

You leave your room, go down a long corridor, down an elevator, through a big lobby, through a garden/pool extravaganza then find your way to the beach. And you are more or less locked into three meals a day at expensive and usually mediocre restaurants.

In the smaller places in Honokowai you’re always much closer to the ocean, can usually find Ocean Front and have a lot more food options. As I write this I am sitting in an oceanfront condo in Honokowai, less than 20’ from the water. I look out on Lanai and Molokai across a channel. This shallow protected channel is the winter home to hundreds of humpback whales, which we can often see from our lanai.

On the other hand many of the big newer hotels have extravagant pools with water slides, grottos and fountains, just what you and, more importantly, your kids may want.

If that’s the case, by all means stay at the big hotel. When my daughter was young, 10 or so, we used to walk into the hotel pool areas and sit down on a chair with an abandoned hotel towel. My daughter was the master at making friends with some of the little kids staying there, sometimes even getting them to take her to the pool desk to get a wristband to prove you were legal.  Most other times, she just brazened it out.

Visiting like this is more like living here. We settle in and live here for a short time, go to the market, meet people and watch the sunset.  We do some activity or other each time we visit, but that’s not why we come.  At home so many things take up our time; even though we are not working, each of us is often going in different directions.  Here we can just spend our days together.

If that’s what you want, this is the right place.  If you can afford oceanfront, that’s the best. And there’s a wide range of places that qualify, where you can sit on your lanai or stroll just a short distance, and have a glass of wine at sunset. I think the sound of the surf is a remembered pattern of heartbeat. If you can spend your days in its embrace you should count yourself a lucky soul.

On the other hand, if your interests and the state of your relationship aren’t suitable for quiet intimate lolly-gagging alone together or if you have suffered a lapse of good judgment and have brought along your mother-in-law, by all means grab that activity book and have at it.

Living in the land of slow like a local

Stuck in traffic on the way to Paia, we edged forward behind a new Volvo SUV with those little outlined figures on the back window, father, mother, two kids and two dogs and a license plate surround that says “Live Aloha”.  Also a sticker that said, in large type, “RELAX”, then in small type, “you ain’t on the mainland”.  Susan thought that was hostile.  And so maybe touting “the land of slow” is too, just a little.  In that same traffic jamb, an old rusted out Honda, cut out of the line, crossed on to the shoulder on the opposite side of the road and drove for over 500 yards against traffic. What was their rush?  They were heading to the beach.  For a local, that must be what Living Aloha is like.

On Going home

The time has come; you have to leave. Well you don’t actually have to leave. You could tear up your ticket and just stay. Think about it, if only for a second. More than a few people have simply stayed. The second Mrs. Hixson and I came very close to doing just that at thirty. We were visiting friends on Kauai and had offers of jobs. We were quite tempted, but in the end, like most visitors, we decide to go home.

Most often your flight is in mid-afternoon. Don’t try to do anything that day. Leave plenty of time to tank up your rental car and get to the airport. On this last trip, to make up for our tragically forgotten lunch on the outbound flight we stopped at Mama’s Ribs n Rotisserie in the Nipili Shopping Center.  We each got an order of chicken and an order of mac salad, of course.  At that point we had a mental break and added in an order of ribs to share.  We had an insulated shopping bag with some ice in plastic bags, but that simply couldn’t mask the BBQ rib smell, which followed us to the airport and on to the plane.  I felt a little self conscious, but when we opened up our spread, passengers and crew alike were impressed.

If you can, make a last stop at that beach by the airport. Then, go and check in, have some lunch at the airport.  With our BBQ delight in tow we passed this time.  Sit around the waiting room and read.  Do whatever you can to bring some piece of the Maui slow back with you.  In mid-flight, do the reverse clothing change.  It will be cold in the evening when you get home. You don’t have to flaunt your Hawaiian style, just cruise home with some slow.

In the next post “Not Exactly a Tour Guide to Maui” I include recommendations of restaurants and activities.

Index of Posts
Kanaha Beach Park
Kimo’s
CookKwee’s Maui cookies
Honokowai Farmer’s Market
The Fish Market Maui
Java Jazz
Mama’s Ribs n Rotisserie

Here you are, on the Island of Maui – the land of slow – if you can let that happen.

This post doesn’t begin to rival any of the several hundred page bookd on Maui.  Definitely get one or more of those.  But after almost 35-years of visits, these are our observations and recommendations, what we do then we’re here.  There’s a lot here, so scroll through the post and look at the index of links at the end.  If you arrived on this post without visiting the post Thirty Years of Visiting Maui circle back; getting here is part of being here.

Update April 2018

New Restaurant – Leoda’s Kitchen, Olowalu
Easy snorkling, good beach – Kapalua Bay
The Hana Highway Drive is the must-do activity.

Before we delve into activities and restaurants, there are some issues to discuss.

On Sunsets

 

Mark your day by the sunset. You don’t need to be at a great place each time, just remember to look up. Since you are in the tropics, the time of sunset doesn’t change much over the year. Just after 7:00 in June to just before 5:00 in December. There is no daylight time change. There is about a 50 compass degree difference between the direction of the setting sun in the winter and summer, about 295 degrees in summer and 245 degrees in the winter for the navigation nerds. So sometimes the sunset is over Lanai and sometimes it sets right into the sea.

Summer sunsets last longer than winter sunsets. Sunsets can be quiet. When it’s quiet, you can almost hear the hissss as the sun sinks into the water. At other times, it is an amazing light show that can last for almost an hour. Where we usually stay, most of the units aren’t oceanfront, but there is a sunset deck at the water’s edge, where locals and tourists congregate, have a drink, chat and watch the show. Even though we have an oceanfront unit, it’s fun to go out and mingle. A friend of ours known only as Bear, who sat on that deck over 300 days a year, all of them stoned, would say, “Not bad for a Tuesday.” Rest in peace Bear.

Don’t forget Sunrise

You may be thinking, “I’m on vacation, there’s no way I am going to be up for sunrise.”  Remember Maui is 2 or 3 hours earlier than California and 5 or 6 hours earlier than the east coast.  You are quite likely to be able to enjoy sunrise, at least early in your stay.  In West Maui, the sun is rising above the mountains behind you, so while it becomes light early, there isn’t direct sun.  The sun first lights up the tops of the mountains on Molokaii, slides down to the shore and sweeps across the water.  This is a subtle dance as a background to your morning coffee.

One morning, the light was just right and I saw bands of flying fish leaping out in the channel illumnated by the first rays of sun on the water.  Then the light changed and they were gone and I never saw that delight again.

On Hawaiian Shirts

First, never tuck a Hawaiian shirt in!  It functions to let the breeze in and drapes well from the shoulders to mask a little bit of muffin top at the belt line, but it can only hide so much.  However bright you think the shirt is in Hawaii, it will look five times as bright at home and will probably linger in the closet or simply embarrass the family there.  Do you have any other shirts with big flowers on them?  Look at what the local guys  wear and go that route if you plan to wear the shirt mainland way.

 

I wear the shirt on the left all the time on the mainland.  After ten years sitting in my closet I sold the shirt on the right to a consignment shop.  The shop owner said it would sell in two days….and then probably sit in somebody else’s closet for the next ten years.

On Language

A friend, who has family in Hawaii, on reading an earlier version of this post, reminded me that locals don’t call them Hawaiian shirts but Aloha shirts and flip-flops are called slippers and those really insubstantial rubber slippers are called rubber slippers or as he intoned rubba slippa.  You may come across a lot of other parts of the island tongue.  For a while I fancied myself a quasi local but in the end, I’m from the mainland, and I stick to Aloha and Malalo.

On Eating

On our last trip we cooked home three nights, got take-away two nights and went to a restaurant one night. The restaurant, though we had enjoyed it in the past, was by far the least unsatisfactory experience of the trip.

Cooking

Cooking for us on Maui is really super simple.  We just grill some of the great fresh fish from The Fish Market Maui, Susan composes one of her amazing salads with the sweet onion salad dressing from Honokuai Farmers’ Market, maybe a baked potato and a bottle of wine. And we might just slip in a container of mac salad if nobody’s looking.  And there’s never anybody looking. That’s it. Hardly cooking at all.

Take out

If going to a restaurant every night doesn’t sound appealing and/or affordable and for you vacation means no cooking at all, take out is a great option.  Sitting on your lanai with a view of a moonlit ocean with your take-out meal you hardly feel deprived. There are lots of options all over the island so you shouldn’t have to go too far.  As an example, in the little shopping area across the street from where we stay, there are four good places.  These photos are my first venture into food porn and I know that I have to up my game.  I’m planning a photo spread – ode to mac salad – which, along with artichokes and deviled eggs, is one of the world’s great mayonaise delivery systems.

Honokowai Okazuya and Deli is a West Maui institution and has a locals cult following.  An Okazuya in Japan is literally a side dish shop or deli. They’ve been here since our first visit. The owners had been chefs at one of the big hotels and decided that they could serve food at least that good to locals at much lower prices. The menu includes Mahi Mahi, Korean BBQ and other dishes. The sides include sautéed vegetables and, of course, the local favorite, mac salad. Excuse me if I keep bringing up mac salad, something we never eat on the mainland.

I can remember sitting around with some of our local friends on a Sunday evening, the night Okazuya is closed, lamenting.  “What we were going to do for dinner?”  We were at a loss, though they decided to troll the low cost happy hours at the hotels close by. The locals always know where those are.  On one visit, we arrived only to find that Okazuya was closed for the week. I guess everybody needs a vacation, but we found it inexcusable that the airlines don’t warn all tourists when Okazuya would be closed!  Each day, we tried the door again, amazed that such a cataclysmic event could befall us. On this issue, our Maui slow slipped away, just a little.  We plan Okazuya night when we first arrive and there is often a repeat.

The Fish Market Maui, which I described in the post 30 Trips to Maui, has very good pupus and fish dinners as well as being a great fish market.

A few doors down is Ohana Tacos Maui.  A few years ago they operated out of a truck in the parking lot.  Now they have moved into the big time and  have taken over one of the shops.

Finally there’s Pizza Connection, the new kid on the block.  They’ve taken over the spot in the parking lot.  They have a mobile wood fired pizza oven and good food.

The point is, that some of these places are great and they’re all good, all local and all within walking distance.  You shouldn’t have any problem satisfying everybody’s taste. Wherever you stay, search out your local take-out early in the trip.

Restaurants

In preparation for writing this section, I did a little Internet search of restaurants in Maui and realized I have very little to add. In the Bay Area, the choice of restaurants is dazzling with new places opening up all the time. We’ve found that we don’t really go out as much as we used to and don’t try each new place when it opens. We return to our favorites, mostly moderately priced with a few more expensive places for special occasions, so we don’t have the urge to restaurant shop in Maui. But if you aren’t lucky enough to have such a good choice of restaurants where you live, it does appear that there are a lot of new places, in all price ranges, to explore.

To give an idea of how we roll, one of our must stop lunch spots has been a little burger place in the bottom level of what is now a Round Table pizza at the turn-off the Kanapali Parkway. They served a burger that was so juicy it would drip off your elbows, fries, fried onion rings and a beer or even a milk shake. No view, no ambiance, just good. Sadly it’s closed now so it is up to you to find your own guilty pleasure.

I will however name a few places:

New addition April 2108 – Leoda’s Kitchen and Pie Shop – Leoda’s is south of Lahaina in Olowalu.  You pass by on the way to and from the airport but maybe never stop and think it’s too far from Lahaina to go for just that.  But you would be wrong.  Or stop after snorkling at Olowalu Beach nearby.  Breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Great sandwiches, hoagies, burgers, salads and did I mention pie?  Even pot pies.  See below for other restaurants.

Kimo’s –  Kimo’s is our first day stop. Upstairs they serve excellent seafood with nice ambience and views of the water.

 

Sea House – The Sea House is a waterfront restaurant at the Napili Kai Hotel.  This recommendation isn’t for dinner, but for cocktails and pupus at the bar terrace.  Get there about an hour before sunset before it fills up. Linger over a drink or two and a snack until sunset.

Star Noodle – This is a little place above the main road near the Lahaina Cannery Mall.  Go here for the food and the value, not the fancy dining room.  Update, Feruary 2017.  This place has become wildly popular, plan your meal there seeral days in advance and make a reservation.  It’s so great to see somebody make a greaat success in such an unlikely location.

MisoPhat – New listing for us February 2017.   The Steadman family are fishermen have been in the restaurant business for 20 years and provide all their own fish.  There are two locations in Kahana, West Maui and Kihei.  The Kahana loation is small, walk in and take away with no reservations.  The sushi is outstanding with many delightful and elaborate rolls.  It’s strictly BYOB but the store several doors down has a good vairety of small bottle sake.  This will definitely be a regular stop.

On Mama’s Fish House
I do, however, feel compelled to bring up Mama’s Fish House, a Maui tradition, but it hasn’t really been one of ours. We had driven by it for years, but never gone in. A few trips ago, on the way back from Hana, we were passing Mama’s at about 4 :00 p.m. and thought we ought to give it a try. How busy could it be this early?

We turned into a very crowded parking lot. As I was trying to negotiate an impossibly small parking space, a young man came over and told us that this was the valet lot. When I asked where the self-park lot was he said there wasn’t one. I apologized and started to get out and hand him the key so he could take it from there. He asked when our reservation was. When we said we didn’t have a reservation, he told us that they really didn’t do walk-ins and if we tried, the wait could be hours; so much for spontaneity. We left, resolving to do it right next time. On our next trip, we actually made a reservation before we left the mainland.

We arrived on time and dutifully used the valet parking. I wore my Hawaiian shirt, not to loud, and clean shorts, but still in flops. Susan donned her little travel dress. Even with the reservation, there was a wait, so we had a drink in the garden.

On the menu, perhaps in an attempt to justify the $50 dollar price tag, is a note, sort of a birth certificate, describing the provenance of the each fish that is being served— not describing the type of fish, but the actual exact fish. They describe the species of fish, the fisherman who caught it and precisely where it was caught. At least they stop short of naming the unfortunate picine. That day, one dish read “Onaga caught by Billy Shapiro in the deep reefs near Lahaina.” Susan, who is Jewish, commented that his grandmother would be saying, “William, what are doing out there chasing fish – in a boat?  It’s not too late to get back into Dental School.” After analyzing the menu, Susan, maybe out of loyalty, ordered Billy’s Onaga.

It was a delightful leisurely meal. The food is great, the dining room and grounds are beautiful and the bill for two, with the tip, was almost $300. Some friends of ours who happened to be in Maui during our last visit, saw this post and wanted to to go Mama’s.  The food was still good it was still $300 for two and it’s simply not worth it.  This isn’t why we come to Maui. I know that we would have been as happy with the take-out from Okazuya watching the sunset from our own lanai.

On Activities

Maui isn’t only the land of slow, it’s the land of Go, Activities and Activities and Activities. They’re endless. There are whale watching boat trips, snorkeling boat trips, sunset dinner boat trips, helicopter trips, bicycle trips down Haleakala, horseback riding, golf, surfing, luaus, the Hana Road, and on and on. When you arrive at the airport, they will be handing out a magazine with ads for lots of activities, and they are all easy to find on the Internet or at the activities desks in the tourists areas.

It’s easy to exhaust yourself and your family, going in many directions and making everybody crazy. If you have kids, you do have to accept that kids want to do stuff, not just sit around. Susan believes that without even noticing, we live our lives with the habit of tension as we go from one event to another. How often do we find that we are navigating our lives with a clenched jaw, that an angry reaction to a small annoyance lies waiting just under the surface?  My daughter, Mandy,  describes this as FOMO, Fear of Missing Out.

Letting go of all this is what we love about Maui, the land of slow. So try to resist over-scheduling; leave extra time to get to every event. If you assume that you will come back to Maui again and again, then it matters less what you do this time. You can do something else next time. And maybe you will come back again and again.

If forced to make a recommendation my top 5 are:

Snorkeling/Scuba or even Snuba

 

New addition April 2018 –Kapalua Bay – There are plenty of websites describing the best snorkling sites on Maui.  And your best resource is always the dive shop where you rent your gear, since they know the local conditions, wind and weather.  See more on snorkling and other activities below. But after all these years, and maybe as we have become less adventuress, we have come back to Kapalua Bay as the easiest reliable snorkle spot, especially for a first outing or if you are not that experienced.  It is protected bay with P\plenty of fish and a variety of coral formations. There is a good beach with a grassy swath behind.  Go in the morning by 8:00 or so before the wind comes up and you might still get a spot in the public access parking lot.

When the conditions are right, another great place, a little more challenging but worth the effort, is Honolua Bay.  It is beyond Kapalua and Fleming Beach.  Some of the boat trips stop there, but you can drive yoursleves.  It’s isolated; you park by the road and walk down the dirt track through a bit of tropical forest dodging chickens.

When you get there you’ll find a very rocky beach, but pick your way to the water.  To the left is deeper water with rocky ledges.  There are lots of fish and you’re more likely to  see turtles.  To the right paddle out and you’ll find a shallow reef with mulit-colored coral and fish.  Or if you’re a pretty strong swimmer you can go out into the middle of the bay.  It’s over 30′ deep.  You might see nothing or something special,  One time, out of nowhere, I was suddenly surrounded by a huge school of good size fish racing around me on all sides.  I was thrilled until I started to wonder, what’s chasing them?  Another time I got the answer to the age-old question.  How do dolphins mate?  I know you’ve all wondered.

You shoulda been here yesterday.  It’s true; this place used to be better and more colorful but still good.  It can be windy in the winter and undivable so check before you go.

Drive to the top of Haleakala  The whole top of the mountain is a National Park  It’s 10,000 feet, like a treeless moonscape, quite amazing.  Don’t forget to bring some warm clothes.

Drive The Hana Highway  It is an all day event, or even two.  If you can drive this road without anxiety you have mastered Maui style.

Update April 2018 – The Hana Highway – Over our lunch at Leoda’s today, Susan and I easily agreed that if you only do one adventure while visiting Maui, it has to be the Hana Highway.  Plan in advnce, avoid the weekend and eave really early.  Dawn is good.  We have pledged that next trip we are going overnight despite having to pay for an extra hotel room.

The Hana HighwayThere is a lot to explore on the way and once you’re in Hana.  There are lots of travel guides.  We’ve often continued around the island, which may or may not be strictly against the car rental rules.  But it’s more miles of narrow road, particularly just after you leave Ohe’o the National Park, more often called the Seven Sacred Pools.  About eight miles further on you reach Palapala Ho’omau where there is a beautiful seaside meadow with a little church and the gravesite of Charles Lindberg.  

 

I’m not much of a gravesite fan, or quite frankly much of a Lindberg fan for that matter, he got pretty weird in his later years, but the setting is wonderful and peaceful

Whale watching trip  There are several good options, but we like the Pacific Whale Foundation.  It’s as much a research organization as a tourist ride and worth supporting.  The speakers are really knowledgable.  There are a lot of whale watching videos on You Tube but this Epic Whale Encounter is an exception

Day trip to Lanai – Take the Lanai Ferry

The ride over can be as good as most whale watching trips though it is a little pricey at $60 round trip each.  When you land, just to the left is Hulopo’e Beach Park with very good snorkeling.    Or rent a jeep and explore the island.  Shipwreck Beach is one highpoint

There is a lot to explore on Lanai and the rental people will help you out.  I haven’t been on the island since Larry Ellison bought the whole thing.  Who knows what that will bring.

On recreational real estate

One Activity that we do enjoy is recreational real estate shopping. Real estate is a blood sport in Maui. Brokers and agents, circle the tourists like very personable sharks, trying to turn the hotel guest and condo tenant into owners. The rise of the fractional unit, timeshares masquerading as something more elegant, has just put more blood in the water.

We love looking at real estate. When I first came to Maui, I compulsively looked at condos. It’s a dream that the local agents are masters at spinning. “Why rent when you can own?” “If you buy now, you’ll lock in the property at these low prices forever.” “If you don’t buy now, some day you won’t even be able to come here.” “How can you pass up this chance to own a piece of Paradise?”

It’s so much fun going through these places and dreaming. In any event, the agents sitting open houses can be a great trove of knowledge of all sorts about the island. Trip after trip we kept looking, slowly like a trout nibbling at a piece of tasty bait. We weren’t serious, just looking. Then one trip, with a little nudge from a downturn in the market, we struck, the hook was set and we soon found ourselves the proud owner of a two-bedroom oceanfront unit.  It had taken years to succumb, but the school of circling brokers is patient. In fact, the hook was set so deep that within six months we had bought two other less expensive units and had already flipped one of them.  My broker Dave Siefker did all the transactions and even managed my rentals.  Nobody is better at all of this in a very low key way then Maui Dave.

This makes me sound like some sort of fancy real estate wheeler and dealer, but this was a long time ago, prices were relatively low, and we had a very low downpayment.  We’ve all heard stories about fantastic real estate deals.  I think that it’s human nature for people to exaggerate their successes or minimize their losses.  Nobody really wants to say, “We got hosed.”

While I never actually did the math, which is one way to avoid facing whether we did or didn’t make a shrewd deal.  I would suspect that if I compared all the rental income we made and even added all that we would have spent on those Hawaiian vacations, then deducted the total cost of owning, management, renovation and even a modest cost for all the time spent dealing with the rental, the return compared to having simply bought Apple stock wouldn’t look as rosy.  Property values in resort areas are extremely cyclical.  Over the years I have seen huge swings in values, with a much more modest rise in the average long-term values. If your life situation forces you into a sale at the wrong time, losing money is a distinct possibility.

I want to give a shout-out to Ray Chin a West Maui broker.  We wandered into an open house for a $10 million house and he treated us to the tour as if we could actually afford such a place.  He even showed us another expensive place.

On the other hand, in Hawaii, people who have money dress the same way the people who don’t.  Maybe he actually thought we could afford the place.  I read an article the other day about Hawaiina dress code.  “What do you call people in Hawaii who wear suits and ties?”  the answer is, “The accused.”  In many visits to open houses, the brokers have been nothing but gracious.  They play the long game and understand that you have to show a lot of people property and then,  in the end somebody bites.  I did, several times.

 

My first wife and I started visited Maui six of seven times a year, sometimes together sometimes separately, and were forming an idea that we would ultimately retire to Maui. As time passed, we found that the number of visits fell off; we were divorced and sold the remaining properties. While my next wife and I love our time in Maui, family, friends and our life in Oakland are far more compelling than life in Maui. There are so many other places in the world to visit, we only come to Maui about once a year.

Buying your own place is a big step, which is why timeshares look so inviting. A timeshare presentation is one of the most sophisticated and fascinating marketing processes I have ever experienced. If that interests you, go ahead and do the tour. These salesmen are artists and their story is nearly irresistible. It all seems so possible. It takes some time if you do the whole process though you can always just leave. Still, they sometimes offer some good enticements. Remember, leave your checkbook at home and beware the closer.

Some people love their timeshares especially when they can trade them for other locations around the world, but all you have to know is that the resale price of timeshares is a small fraction of what new shares go for. The profits to the developers are extraordinary which must mean that the value to the buyer is the inverse. If you’re convinced that a timeshare is what you want, at least visit the resellers before you jump in.  A typical new timeshare can cost $2,000 to $4,500 up front with monthly payments totaling $33,000 to over $70,000 over ten years plus annual fees of $800 to $1,800.   For expample a resale at Papakea, a nice mid-scale development, in mid-June week can run $3.700 with an annual fee of less than $500.

On Public Beaches and Public Access

The Public Beaches and Public Access points are gems of Hawaii. There are great Public Beach parks all around the island with plenty of parking. On weekends, local families set up encampments and spend the entire day. There are also public access points for more obscure and isolated beaches. They are marked, but usually by only a small sign. There seems to be a tug-of-war between the adjacent landowners who want to discourage people from coming on to “their” beach and the public access advocates. There is often limited parking. If there isn’t a place to park, just wait, the turn over is pretty rapid, especially later in the day. Remember, the land of slow. Here is a map of beach public access points:

Black Rock Beach is right off the Sheraton Hotel in Kaanapali.  The public access parking is actually in a ground floor corner of their parking structure. The old building, built in 1963 was the first hotel in this now vast hotel row. They picked the best spot next to a rocky point, a very good snorkeling spot. This is a great place for first time snorklers as well as the more experienced. There are usually lots of fish and turtles are not uncommon.

 

If you are adventurous, you can clamber up the rocks and jump off twenty feet to the sea.   Or maybe just watch.

On Hiking

We really like to hike when on vacation and in other places will hike 5 to 10 miles each day. When we stay in Honokowai, there aren’t any off the road trails that we are used to in Northern California. Besides, in the middle of the day it’s too hot, beach weather, not hiking weather. If you must take more of a hike there is  the Io Valley State Monument  close to West Maui that has a good trails

Haleakala National Park that has extensive trails for all levels of enthusiasm, but remember most of the trails start downhill and you have to come up each step.  And you’re at 10,000 so be cautious and take lots of water.

One excellent hike that we had never taken before is the Waihee Ridge Trail.

There are two ways to get to the Waihee Ridge trailhead from West Maui.  The first is the easy way.  You go around the island counter-clockwise.  It takes about an hour and involves almost no winding roads.  It goes through Wailuku, the county seat and isn’t very much fun.   The other is the not-easy-way, which some might consider more fun; go around the island clockwise.  It involves miles of winding single lane road, probably more trecharous than the more famout Hana Road and takes more like an hour and a half or more.  You pass the Nakelele Blow Hole and the little almost town of Kahaluloa deep inside the single lane road zone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Susan enjoyed the delightful combination of car sickness and terror at my just a little too fast negotiation of the winding one lane road.

You arrive at the turnoff adjacnet to the Mendes Ranch and then driver up a narrow road to a parking lot.  On the day we arrived we were greeted with a herd of black cattle moving down the road.  The first one, the leader, came to a stop inches from our front bumper and stopped, seemingly unclear what to do next.  Eventually, he move past us followed by the rest.

We finally arrived at the end of the road and embarked on the trail.  It’s five miles roung trip and about 1,500 feet up with beautiful vistas on all sides.  The trail is steep in parts and, on the day we went, there was a little rain that made it quite slippery.  A very good hike that we will repeat.

We ran into two women on the trail in at least their sixties (but then so are we).  We asked if they had been on the trail before and one said, “many times”  One had moved to Maui 20 years before.  Walking near them for a long time, I couldn’t help but overhear the story about her husband who had been in jail and then worked as an investigator for a defense attorney and how the family didn’t seem to bat an eye at his past.  I wish we could have had dinner with them.

Our Daily Stroll

But these are time consuming events and we do need to get some daily exercise. So, each day, first thing before breakfast, we set off along the road toward Fleming Beach six miles away. We do 1/3 of that route each day or about an hour round trip. The next day we drive to where we stopped the day before and walk the next leg. There are other walkers but not too many cars at that time of day. This hike is part of our decompression from mainland life. One morning near the big resorts at Kahana, I brushed by a man, a little too close, and our shoulders hit. He spun around and yelled, “Fuck You.”  Wow, that doesn’t even happen in Oakland. Not everybody arrives at the land of slow successfully.

You notice so much more walking than driving like the small memorial to the surfer killed by sharks one year

and the house that has a pot belly pig in the yard.  This pig is gone but his house and the pig crossing sign is still there.

In the same area, the road is very near the water but in an area maybe thirty feet wide there is a beach camp that locals have probably had here for generations with awnings, a few sheds, picnic tables chairs and a boat or two pulled up on the beach.

There are modest houses and multi-million dollar homes and great views of the water along our route. Every year we take the same walk, stop in the same place and every year it changes, just a little.

The last leg starts at the Nipili Kai Hotel which may be one of the nicest low key hotels in West Maui

Just past the hotel is the beginning of the  Kapalua Coast Trail.  There is good parking, but on the weekends you have to park on the road.  On busy days you may have to park further down the road, and it can be a little bit of a hike.  It’s so so sad that we have to walk all that way to get to the beginning of our hike. I know, of course, that I would be less smug if I were hauling three kids and a ton and a half of beach gear. From the parking lot you go through a little tunnel to a beautiful cove.

There is a good beach with calm areas for little kids, snorkeling, beach showers, a equipment rental stand, snack bar and grass areas if sand isn’t your thing. If you follow the path past the beach you are on the Kapalua Coast Trail, which continues for about a mile along the shore, overlooking the remnants of an ancient volcanic flow with views to Molokai in the distance.

Seven years ago, Isao Nakagowa single-handedly created a protected breeding ground for the nearly extinct colony of wedge-tailed shearwaters or ‘u’au kani or moaning birds who inhabit the site.

The Path eventually joins up to the road where you can continue on the main road in the middle of the Kapalua resort area. This is unlike the rest of our walk. It is completely manicured, and controlled. There is no street parking, no trespassing, no dogs, no brown people without uniforms, nothing at all inviting.

We’ve left the land of slow and find ourselves in the land of no. On one walk, we made up new names for the streets we passed that seemed to better reflect the culture of that area:  Unearned Privilege Way, Trust Fund Street, Dumb Luck Circle and my favorite, Born on Third Base Avenue. You continue through the grounds of the Ritz Carlton Hotel on the hill and end at Fleming Beach. It’s not a great place for swimming, better for boogie surfing, but be careful.  But it’s a good for a quick dip and there’s a Beach Park with showers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On Lahaina

Lahaina was the historic whaling port on Maui and is now a tourist destination.  These days we hardly ever go there, but when the second Mrs. Hixson and I first started going to Maui, we went to Lahaina often. We had a young daughter, and we all liked wandering through the shops, museums, the Ulanela cultural show, the trained parrot guy, Lappert’s ice cream or shave ice on a hot summer evening, one restaurant or another, even Cheese Burgers in Paradise. It is also the place where the ferry to Lani or Molokai embarks and where many of the snorkel trips originate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s all tourism, but then we’re tourists. It’s busy but that doesn’t mean you can’t just saunter, in the slow. I think weaning yourself by steps from Lahaina after several visits is part of the evolution of becoming more like a local, and of course getting older and happier just watching the palm trees wave.

On Paia and Upcountry

The anti-Lahaina is the smaller town of Paia on the windward side of the island, past the airport, on the beginning of the road to Hana. Paia is in the area of the island where there is still active sugar cane industry. West Maui has turned clean and white. The cane fields are largely gone and all that’s left of the sugar refinery is the big chimney off the main road. Everything in Paia is still tinted by the red dirt churned up by the cane operations and blown everywhere by the trade winds. If you take the shortcut from West Maui, you go right past the active cane refinery and the connection to the historical roots of the old sugar economy.

The town has a hippie surfer woo woo vibe and is a mix of tourist shops and restaurants with a strong presence of quality local artists. There is more of a sense that the locals are hanging out here too, more young people who have settled here, at least for a time.  We make a point of coming here each trip either on the way to Hana or Haleakala or one of the windward beaches or just to stroll the shops and have a snack.

From Paia there are roads that lead up the mountain to towns with great names like Pukulani, Makawao and Kula where locals live. This is an area that’s interesting to drive through, but this world seems to be impenetrable to the causal tourist.

We’ve driven up on the mountain and explored some.  It is beautiful. Depending on the elevation you can be in tropical Hawaii, fog shrouded Northern California, with the happiest cows in the world, or the High Sierra above the tree line.  I’ve never stayed on the mountain though Susan has in another life though I often think we should try it out.  But on the way back from a recent trip, my seatmate on the plane was just returning from a visit to her parents who have moved to Maui for their retirement, living on the aforementioned mountain. I asked, “What does one do on the mountain?” hoping to hear stories of magical hidden glens. She said, “We basically get up early and head to the beach.” So I guess we’ll just keep staying at the beach.

Index of Links

Honokowai Okazuya and Deli
The Fish Market Maui
Ohana Tacos Maui
Pizza Connection
Kimo’s
Sea House
MisoPhat
Star Noodle
Mama’s Fishhouse
Kayak
Alaska Airlines
Hawaiian Airlines
SNUBA
Honolua Bay
Dave Siefker – Maui Beach Villas
Ray Chin Real Estate
Typical New Timeshare
Timeshare Resale
Public Beach Access
Jump off Blackrock
Io Valley State Monument
Haleakala National Park
Waihee Ridge Trail
Nakalele Blowhole
Kahakuloa Road
Kahakuola
Mendes Ranch
Napili Kai Hotel
Kapalua Coast Trail
Isao Nakagowa
Fleming Beach
Lahaina
Uanela Cultural Show
Cheeseburgers in Paradise
Paia
Makawao

 

The Streets of New York

We had just had lunch at the outdoor café in Bryant Park, behind the New York Public Library Main Branch on 5th Avenue.

How better to spend an afternoon in the Big Apple.  New York City holds about 8 million souls, but Manhattan only 1.6 million.  At 23 square miles that’s a whopping 400 sf per person.  The value of all that land was estimated in 2016 to be $1.4 trillion, or $875,000/person or almost $2,200/sf.  As  a numbers geek, I can’t help seeing things that way.

All these people, on all of these very expensive square feet of land, are all constantly in purposeful motion, as if it just isn’t right to loiter on such expensive real estate.  And they’re in motion on foot, on busses and subways, in cabs and cars.  In a day, on foot, you might pass thousands of people. (I’ll let you figure just exactly how many, but think of a crowed sidewalk where you could easily pass 200 people in a minute)  In Oakland, where we live, we may pass a lot of people, but there, we’re all usually cocooned in our cars.

We were walking along 9^th Avenue at about 59^th street, Hell’s Kitchen, next to a young woman in a hoodie. She was an average young woman, beautiful in the way that all of the young are beautiful, but you might also call her plain.  She seemed sad to me and might have even been crying.

A little later, on 5^th Avenue, there were throngs of people all around us.  Nobody particularly stood out.  Then, walking toward us, was a woman, very tall, very slim and very good looking in a fashion model sort of way.  She was dressed casually, but expensively, and walked with an easy gate with her head up.  She might have even been singing, or she just seemed to be singing.  You could tell that she was used to being looked at.

Later that afternoon, over a glass of wine, Susan and I were remembering the day.  Amazingly, out of the thousands that we saw that day, we both remembered these two women.

One way to experience a City is to look at the landmarks, buildings, parks and stores, and if you also pay attention to the people as they stream by, you can catch just a glimpse of who they are or who they want to be or who they think they are.  Most people, I think, are not aware of being watched, but every now and then there is a flash of somebody looking back. And then they’re gone.

There are the rushers, the cell phone callers, groups of men in animated conversations being carried on in all imaginable accents and languages, men in T-shirts, men in suits and men in really nice suits, women of all types, races, sizes, shapes, in running shoes and four-inch heels. You catch pieces of conversation; “…with these real estate prices….”, …and I couldn’t believe she said…”, “…Can you see if she is available…”, “…and he was holding a dildo in his hand…”, “…my bras are all stretched out…”, “…yes a colonoscopy…”, “…so he asked, where we keep the wine glasses.  My god, we’ve been married for 22 years…”, “…I’m not happy…” There are poems made of found conversations, and each day a million new poems unfold on the street.

One morning on the #1 subway from Columbus Circle, we heard beautiful classical violin music coming from the far end of the car.  It isn’t uncommon for performers to come on the train to earn tips.  Sometimes it’s fun and they’re talented, so you are glad to pitch in a dollar.  Sometimes it’s not good at all and there’s some resentment at the pressure to give.  But she was a talented musician.  As the music grew louder, a sweet looking young woman worked her way down the car.  Her playing was difficult enough, but doing it while keeping her balance in the pitching subway car showed both her musical and acrobatic dexterity.

She smiled and finished her piece.  We gave her some money and a coupon for a free milk shake at the Shake Shack, which she seemed to appreciate.  She got off the car at the next stop, Columbus Circle near Lincoln Center and the Julliard School of Music.  We have a game of inventing a back-story for people that we encounter and thought that busking on the subway was not exactly what her proud family in Indania had in mind for their little girl as they packed her off to Juliard.

Wait for the end

The next afternoon we noticed a man in the crowd.  He wasn’t tall or overly distinguished or expensively dressed.  It was as if everybody else on the street was spinning abound him and he was the calm center of all this activity.   He was in his mid-sixties, relaxed khakis, bow tie, sports coat, tweed baseball cap (Look at this hat; you have to have solid self confidence to wear a tweed baseball cap).  He and his wife were at a crowded crosswalk waiting for the light on the corner of 52^nd and 6^th Ave, mid-town, just at rush hour. They weren’t rushing and were both completely calm amidst the chaos.  They were on their way somewhere chatting amiably.  It’s clear that this man is in charge somewhere and mid-town Manhattan is his home court.

While you may pass thousands during the day, you may only transact business with a handful. Waiters and clerks, others waiting in lines … long lines, seatmates at a play. Wonderful and sometimes surprising conversations can ensue.  Or, at the least, you can indulge in extended period of voyeurism.

We were having an early dinner at Babbo Ristorante & Enoteca, an upscale restaurant just off Washington Square.  Even though we’ve mostly given up the high scale places, we almost never miss a meal at Babbo each trip.  When we settled at our table we were engrossed, as if we were watching a great tv show,  by a family tableau unfolding across the dining room and imagined their story.

They were four.  A well heeled couple in their sixties sitting on one side of the table.  Both  nicely dressed, but casual.  She was appropriately thin and attractive, not showing a single strand of gray hair.  He was carrying a little weight, in the way that middle aged men do, balding with a fringe of gray curly hair and horn rimmed glasses.  Across from her was their daughter, unmistakably, also thin, maybe a bit painfully so, and also elegantly dressed.

Mom and daughter had a lot to say to each other and leaned in,  riveted by their conversation.  Then, there was the new boyfriend.  Overweight, overdressed, in a baggy gray non-descript  suit, rumpled shirt with the collar open and his tie in his pocket.  He engaged in some fitful conversation, mostly with Dad who leaned back holding the floor with easy gestures. The new boyfriend kept looking down at his phone.  You could feel the Dad’s annoyance from across the room.

At one point, the daughter broke off the conversation with her mother and leaned over, put her arms around the boyfriend and kissed him, bubbling something positive to her parents – an enthusiastic if not somewhat desperate pitch.  We imagined the parent’s conversation later that night. “Where did Sarah get this guy?  She can’t be serious.”  “Now be calm Sheldon.  He isn’t so bad.  He has a good job and he certainly isn’t as bad as that Patrick or Miles, especially not as bad as Miles.”  “Let’s just hope that this one passes quickly.”

We had been sitting on a bench by the Delecort Theater in Central Park enjoying our street stand dinner while we waited to go into the theater for a performance of The Tempest, put on by the Public Theater Shakespeare in the Park

We had wanted to do this for years, but weren’t prepared to endure the all day line that snaked through the park.  These days there is a lottery, no long line.  Susan discovered that there are also a limited number of advance tickets available to those who make a $200 donation, certainly in the range of New York theater price and a great way to support this wonderful event. You do, however, have to get your tickets very early in the season, before the limited tickets are gone.

As we sat waiting, we heard thunder in the distance.  How clever, they are setting the mood, practicing sound effects for the Tempest?  No, the sky in the east grew very dark; it was real thunder. We hadn’t seen a drop of rain in two weeks until then. The rain started, first as a few drops.  We begin to pack up.  Then it stopped and we sat back down happy to have dodged the bullet.  Then the downpour.  Hundreds of us crushed under the overhang of the theater waiting for them to decide whether the show would go on.  This is where we literally bumped into a couple, Marty and Matt.  We talked for more than an hour and a half, sharing pieces of our life stories.

Marty was raised on the Upper East Side where his doting mother stayed at home and pampered him, making him his own special meal each night.  His dad was on Wall Street and rode the melt-down to the bottom, never recovering. Rather than follow in his father’s footsteps,  Marty is an accountant working on feature films.  He has lived in Harlem for years.  His mom was the child of parents, both blind from birth. They took on a foster child as an infant but when she was six, the birth mother claimed her and they never saw her again.  He keeps a vacation flat in, of all places, downtown Atlanta.

Matt, some years younger, had grown up in Virginia, the child of professors at Univeristy of Virginia, and had moved to New York.  He recently landed the job as event coordinator at a major museum. The donors are a very high-powered group and he was having a great time, living the life as an onlooker to New York high society.

Everyone has at least one unexpectedly compelling story and we were delighted with the two that the rain storm brought us.  The rain stopped, we all rushed in to take our seats and our new friends were gone.

We went to see Larry David in Fish in the Dark, the creator of the Seinfeld TV show and star of Curb Your Enthusiasm, though the role has since been assumed by Jason Alexandar.

Fish in the Dark is a farce about a neurotic Jewish family.  It’s funny quick-witted Jewish shtick, with more than a little misogynous and mean spirited humor, though I do remember laughing a lot.  When we arrived, we sat down and started talking to our seatmates, a Jewish couple from New Jersey.  Then another couple sat next to them and another in front of us, all Jewish, all from New Jersey.  Several conversations erupted in the group, with each of our neighbors moving effortlessly from one conversation to the other.   I was the odd gentile out, hardly able to join in, but Susan, who is Jewish, managed to hold her own, as much as anybody from California could.

One of the men was surprised that the others didn’t know Jordan Zimmerman; though the conversation was moving so fast I could never figure out just who Jordan Zimmerman was and why he should have been so memorable…”Yes, Jordan Zimmerman. What?  You don’t know Jordan Zimmerman?” At one point I was convinced they all knew each other.  When I asked, they assured me that they had just met, looking at me with suprise at my question.  I thought, “Wait a minute, this isn’t possible, they’ve planted actors throughout the auditorium to warm up the audience.”  I turned around half expcting that I might find Larry David sitting behind me as he started the performance from the crowd. ” No,” Susan assured me.  “None of your suspecisions are correct.  This is the real deal.”   Life imitating art.

The next day we went through the newly opened Whitney Museum, top to bottom.

It was thrilling to go through a brand new museum but we wern’t alone at the end in being foot tired and needing a break.

We sat at the bar in the café and had a cup of coffee to give us the strength to head off on our next adventure.  We were served by a tall dignified, black man, very attentive, making sure that we all got the special little caramel treat that came with our coffee.  “Did you get the caramel with your coffee?” he asked a very Upper East Side woman carrying a fancy logo-ed hand bag that I’m sure cost more than we spent for dinners all week. “What?” she asked.  “The caramel, you get one with each coffee,” he answered. “They’re a special treat for the opening.”  She asked him to repeat himself two or three times and each time he was clearly more uncomfortable that she couldn’t understand his courtesy.  “Oh,caramel,” she finally laughed, “I thought you said Karma.” and turned away.

A little self consciously, he leaned over to ask us, “Is it car-mel or cara-mel?”  He was concerned that he wasn’t pronouncing it correctly.  The women immediately lost interest in the conversation and the moment passed.  Susan, thirty years a community college English teacher glared at the woman and  said, “No you said it perfectly, both ways are good and so are the caramels.  Thanks.”

Some people know that their lives will be all right, whatever that means to them. like the model on 5^th Avenue.   Then there are those for whom things simply aren’t working out, like the sad girl in Hell’s Kitchen.  You can see it, at least a little, as they pass.  I want to stop everybody on the street and ask their story. But they stream by, without a pause, and the people and the glimpsed stories merge into our day in New York.

Index of links:
Bryant Park
New York Public Library
Shake Shack
Lincoln Center
Julliard School of Music
Babbo Restaurante & Enoteca
Public Theater – Shakespear in the Park
Fish in the Dark
Whitney Museum
How to pronounce Caramel
Human Beings of New York – a book by Brandon stanton

See the next post Not Exactly a Guide to New York for more suggetions of what to do in New York