Waipio overlook
Yesterday we stayed around Kona, paid some necessary bills at the end of the month, and spent a bit of time down at the pool. In general it was just a day for rest.
Today we travelled across to the windward side of the island to Hilo. It was quite windy there, but fortunately only rained a little bit right around noon. For the rest of the day it was sunny while we were north of Hilo, and then cloudy but not raining for the rest of the day.
Our first stop was at Waimea where we thought we were going to the Parker Ranch museum. We really couldn’t find it, and one clerk in a store said the old museum was closed, but there was something about a half mile away. We didn’t bother looking anymore, but just continued on.
We drove to the end of the road at Waipio. There is a very nice viewpoint out to the north and it was sunny and bright. The dark blue of the water and sky contrasted nicely with the white surf and clouds, and the many shades of green on the cliff walls.
Anthurium in Hawaiian Troical Botanical Gardens
Next we went to Akaka falls where we quickly ate lunch since it was raining, then walked around the trail. Fortunately the rain stopped, so it was a good walk through all the tropical plants. After the falls we drove to the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Gardens. We spent the bulk of the afternoon in this garden which has some spectacular tropical plants and flowers from all over the world.
After the garden we drove in to Hilo to the Banyan Tree drive and the Liliuokalani Gardens, which are a Japanese garden on the waterfront. After a short walk around there we headed back to Waimea where we ate supper, and then on to Kona. It started to rain just as we stopped for supper, and continued almost all the way back to Kona. It was dry when we arrived here, but is now just raining lightly,