Still on Hawaiian time........

I don't think we got over the jet-lag feeling for days after we got to Hawaii....... sure was a long flight, both going and coming home. While we were in Hawaii, we kept waking up at three o'clock in the morning, which would've been breakfast time here at home (Texas time). But then last night, my husband woke up at two o'clock in the morning, which would've been dinner time (in Hawaii's time zone). I guess our bodies are still a bit confused by all the coming and going.

We keep talking about how beautiful it was there..... no billboards, no miles of four-lane highways, no mile-high buildings, no litter to speak of along the roadway. And I still can't get over the tropical flowers...... everywhere you looked, you saw such pretty blooms. Just as we have tiny wildflowers growing here along the roads, Hawaii has huge tropical flowers wherever you look. Except, of course, in the lava fields, where the land is just covered in black lava. And the lava will be there till the earth can regrow itself, I guess. Thousands and thousands of acres of lava fields on one side of the island, and not a thing growing at all. Not even a bird in sight, nor a lizard.

Then there was another part of the island that seemed to be covered with a desert-like landscape. Everything was very brown, very dry, from the top of the mountains to the shore by the ocean. There were trees that looked like pine trees, only their branches weren't quite so full. Those trees would make pretty Christmas trees, if you liked the minimalist style of holiday decorating.

The prettiest part of The Big Island was the green, lush side...... and forgive me for not remembering if that was the east or the west, or the north or the south. As always when we're on vacation, my husband did all of the driving, so I wasn't paying too much attention to which direction we were going. (Except, of course, when I noticed that there was a "cute little shop" two streets that way, then turn left at the yellow flowering tree.)

I have a stack of beautiful postcards, showing all the views that we were lucky enough to see. Those will be my "pictures" of our trip, and I know I'll be looking at them from time to time, wondering if we'll ever go back there. I would like to........ but I'd like to see one of the other islands. Maybe Maui next time.

While we were in Hawaii, I ate mostly fruit, fish (ahi-- which is their tuna), and vegetable salads. The same things I eat here, come to think of it. Somehow, the fish was much better there, as were the salads. And the dressing on the salads--- so good..... made from all kinds of fruit juices and very good oil, and that's it. Totally delicious.... maybe that's why the salads were so good.

I splurged one morning for breakfast and ordered macadamia nut-pancakes...... now those were a treat. Light and fluffy pancakes made with buttermilk, and the batter was sprinkled with lots of crushed macadamias....... total heaven. They gave me three pancakes, and I could eat just half of what was on the plate. I hated to leave the rest, but I just couldn't eat anymore.

I usually come home with a lot of books from wherever we go, but I didn't find all that many in the little shops where we were. I had expected to find a lot of books on Hawaii's history, but the best one I found was a book of letters that Mark Twain wrote while he was in Hawaii in the late 1800s. He went to Hawaii for just one week, and ended up staying for five weeks. During all of that time, he never picked up a pen because everything was just too beautiful to look at and he didn't feel like writing there. The book is called "Mark Twain's Letters From Hawaii." I'll be reading that book for the next couple of days.