Hawaii 2012, Day 3

Sunday was another great day. We drove out to Waimanalo to meet up with a colleague who had just retired, and to deliver a package that I'd carried on the plane for him. I guess we never drive out on the windward side on a weekend because I was struck by the fact that I'd never seen so many hand made signs enticing people to stop by for homemade food, flowers, coconut water. I really wanted to pull over for some smoked fish, but we had places to be.

We met up with our friend in front of the Akebono statue in Waimanalo. He took us to a new farm, close to the Ko'olaus, where we met up with the young folks running it.

Its an amazing piece of property, with loads of different fruit trees and exotics. It was fun to hear about their plans and work, while chewing on cinnamon bark and . They've done an amazing amount of work in a short amount of time.

We saw these cute toads sitting in post holes on the property.

Then we went to Sweet Home Waimanalo and had some yummy vegan food. Or at least I did! A fake meatloaf sandwich. What's not to like? If you're in the area, I highly recommend this place.

The ladies we met last trip at the Nene Goose Bakery had recommended Big Country, a bar in Waimanalo, for local music. We stopped in on the way out of town to see what the deal is. The deal is that tourists must not go there very often because it was if the needle slipped off the record when I walked in. It looked like a cool place, but sadly we had to make a choice between staying at Big Country or going to see Led Kaapana that night. We decided to go see Led.

He was amazing, as usual. Warmed up by playing a full set over the sound of the radio. Then he played his set at the usual time. Funny. His sister accompanied him this time, and there were dancers who sometimes did their hula on top of the bar.

The highlight, though, was meeting a nice family from St. Louis who were huge Ledheads.  By the end of the night we'd given them our recommendations for things to do and to see on the rest of their trip. We had a nice time chatting with them, and that was really the first time we'd met people along the way on a trip.

We said good night and went on our way.