Day 8 - zipline in Kauai

Up early for breakfast on the Lido and stretch class while we came into the harbor at Kauai. I’ve never been here before and it is visually gorgeous. Steep green cliffs coming down into the blue harbor. Kauai is where most of the moves get made and it is easy to see why. Another nice thing this morning was a hi there from Josh on Facebook. Love having the clear spot wireless.

Our tour today was called the zipline trek iki mua, and like all zipline shore excursions we had no idea what to expect. The information said to bring windbreakers and towels and waterproof cameras. Should we wear bathing suits, bring dry clothes? It was unclear. We decided to leave the windbreakers at home, but bring towels and cameras, although neither of ours are waterproof. We’d also talked last night and decided this trip would probably be something of a letdown. We had the most unbelievable time in Mexico when we were there, and there was no way this could measure up – that one had boats and unimogs and burros and a 50 meter rappel from a platform suspended from a tree. The important thing, we decided, was not to do any comparing in a way that would irritate each other – or the other passengers.

So with our expectations well set, we walked down the gangway (gang way! gang way!) and found the sign for our tour, where we got the first pleasant surprise – there would only be 12 of us. Our guide Dina took us out to the van, where we each got a cooler bag with drinks and cookies. We had 5 couples and two singletons, who were made into a couple by being given a single cooler bag to share. (Interestingly, when we finished the excursion they walked back to the ship together – zipline romance?) I stuffed my purse into our cooler bag as well. We left the dock and stopped and picked up our other guide Cory, then headed into the caldera. The drive was just spectacularly pretty. On the way to Kipu ranch, a private cattle ranch owned by the Rice family, we all introduced ourselves and said where we were from. We found we had 2 women named Ronda who both spelled their name without the ‘h’, which caused them both to squeal in delighted amazement. Paula and Parker from Austin were sitting behind us, and it was Paula’s 60th birthday. She asked us not to sing.

We got to the ranch and Cory jumped out to unlock and lock the gates. At that point we were on a dirt road and I was reminded of our tourguide Kana from Hilo’s joke about hula lessons – when we went over a bump he called it hula lessons because all our bodies swayed in unison. We got some good hula today, especially when Cory drove on the way back. Anyway, this is a very different outfit than the Puerta Vallarta adventure place we went to in Mexico, which was large and had a huge compound in the jungle. Dina pulled off onto the side of the road and she and Cory put on our gear. Oh, it was good to hear the clinking of the zipline harness again! I love how they clip your own zipline rope on and then just snap you on and off the lines. We walked a short way through the forest and got rained on a little, which just felt refreshing. When we got to the first zipline Cory did the briefing, and he started by saying, “it’s very important that you listen very carefully to what I’m going to tell you, because I am about to push you off a cliff.” As attention focusing statements go, I have to say that one is right up there. It was a fairly standard briefing and then one at a time he pushed us off a cliff.

In Mexico we’d worn gloves and could use them to slow ourselves down; nothing like that here – you jump off the edge of the platform and go however fast gravity takes you, and facing whatever direction you ended up facing. I have to admit my heart was beating a little faster when it was my turn. But as soon as I felt the harness holding me up and the wind rushing past my face it was all good. One of the reviewers of this excursion had complained that there were only 3 lines, and you did two of them twice, but I loved doing them twice. We walked back up to the top, got clipped on, and jumped again. I could have done it forever. The second time you went off the platform backwards, to prepare you for the Zippel. It was excellent. Because there were only the two guides doing the clipping and unclipping there was plenty of time in between to take pictures and chat. Next we walked over to the zippel, a combination zipline/rappel that was fun but I’d rather have done a straight zip or rappel. It took longer because you had to rappel down a flight of stairs – which is just as awkward as it sounds – so we had plenty of time at the bottom to hang out on a platform built around a giant banyan tree and watch each other. And drink our drinks and eat our cookies.

Last line is the tandem line, where you are encouraged to go upside down. We did that one twice too, which was good because I didn’t figure out how to go upside down the first time. On this one you fly across the river and appear to be about to crash into a tree, but then you get stopped and you fly back halfway across the river again, and then they stop you and you climb down a ladder to get down. Then you go across two awesome bouncy suspension bridges (the second time I made Dave go first and waited until he was off so I could bounce and swing the bridge to my heart’s content). The second time we did the tandem zip Dave went on the line that gets unclipped first. I’d figured out how to go upside down this time, so I did some of it with my legs wrapped around the rope and my head hanging down. While I was waiting to be unclipped I was hanging upside down and Cory was pulling on the top of the line so I was bouncing up and down. It was excellent.

Unfortunately it was also over, so we headed up the trail to the van. One thing is that nothing bonds a group of people like fear, so we were all talking and laughing on the way back to the van and while we got out of our gear. Dina asked Cory if he’d like to drive back, but I’m not sure she’ll ever do that again – it was some serious van hula. Just one more moment of terror to put the cap on a perfect trip. So no, in many ways the adventure wasn’t as good as Mexico. In others – the small size of the group, the more casual attitude of the guides, getting to do some lines twice – it was as good or better.

We got back to the ship around 11:30 and hung out in the room until lunchtime. We ended up at a table for four with Duncan, who will be 94 the day after tomorrow, and his wife Julia. Duncan has no short term memory at all – and not much long term memory either – and is Julia’s second husband. They turned out to be absolutely a blast – Duncan treating his inability to remember with great good humor and Julia taking cheerful care of him while chatting up a storm. I have to admit my heart sank a little as we were led to their table – they looked and sounded old – but they were more fun than many of the younger couples we’ve sat with. I particularly enjoyed the part where Duncan wanted coffee ice cream but Julia kept telling him he’d already ordered cappuccino. Well, you had to be there.

After lunch we got off the ship and walked over to Nawiliwili park. It turns out the park is at the ned of a long pier, so we walked out to the end of the pier, which was full of Hawaiians fishing and having a good time. While we were there a giant tour bus pulled up – apparently it is where the tours go when they get back a few minutes early, since if they just came back to the ship early there would be much complaining. Dave and I had gone to the end of the pier to take a picture of the ship when there came Mama – it was her tour bus! They had gone on the Canyon tour. We got a nice picture of her and me and Merna in front of the ship.

They got back on the bus and we walked off the pier towards the beach. There were many surfers in the cove – both regular and stand-up board surfers. The stand up boards are bigger than regular surf boards and (as you might have guessed) they stand on them rather than lying on them when they’re heading out to catch a wave – they have a paddle that they use to move themselves. I can’t decide if it looks easier or harder than regular surfing. We also saw something I’d never seem before – a little hiobie cat sailboat came into the cove and caught a wave too! It surfed the wave almost all the way into the beach, it practically looked like it was flying. Very cool. At that point we’d had about enough sitting on the wall , so we walked past the park to the Anchor Cove Stores, full of more Hawaiian schlock. Well, it was higher quality than what we saw in Honolulu last night, and we did find a little something for Tim at the ubiquitous ABC store. Then we walked back to the ship. The rain that had cooled us nicely on the shore excursion had completely cleared, and when there was no breeze it was pretty warm.

It looked from the dock as if our verandah would be in full sun, but when we got up to the room it turned out it was mostly in the shade. We sat out there for a while, but eventually I got tired of hunting for the cursor in the bright sunshine and moved into the climate-and-light controlled room. After an hour or so of typing I decided it was time to go to the gym, so I suited up in my halter top bathing suit with the men’s swim trunks and went and did a boot camp workout. Afterwards I was all hot and sweaty and as I passed the midship pool on the lido deck I thought wow, that would feel really good. I got in, and it did feel really good. I swam around and was enjoying myself very much, which is how I caught Dave sneaking over to the taco bar.

By the time I’d gotten showered and dressed we were already pulling out of the harbor, which was too bad because I really like watching us pull out of port. We did get a good look at the mystery ship we’d been seeing at anchor out by the breakwater, but a close up look didn’t leave us any more enlightened than we had been peering at it from various places on the ship and shore. It looked like a giant canoe with an outrigger on either side and a giant blue folding lawn chair in the center. Or something.

Then it was time for dinner, although we stopped at our cabin on the way and may have seen a whale spouting. Dinner was fun as usual – our tablemate from last night wanted to come join our table but we were full tonight. John and Carol had gone on the other zipline adventure, and although Carol had been very nervous about whether it would be too strenuous they had a great time. We shared shore excursion stories and Rita and I had a good laugh at Gus fighting with a long cheese strand from his French onion soup. We were all pretty tired, though – Carol in particular looked like she needed the reclining chair.

After dinner we went down to the cabin and stepped out onto the verandah to see a beautiful crescent moon. It seemed a little windy, so we decided to put on warmer clothes and head topside to see what we could see. We could see a lot – it was beautifully clear. But it was also very, very windy, with an apparent wind speed of over 40 knots! That’s windy enough so that in the front of the ship you could lean way into it and not fall down. It’s windy enough that my hair got completely snarled. And it was windy enough to give me a total fit of the giggles. Also we were watching the lights on the waves when I saw one that didn’t look like the others. It turned out to be some sort of large white bird, apparently able to keep pace with the ships’s 11 knot forward speed. We watched it for a while trying to figure out what it was up to – we’re probably 50 or more miles from land at this point. Maybe it was in training for some sort of bird marathon?

After going back to the cabin to detangle, we went to the crow’s nest for some guitar time with Chris, who is from the south and seems to be a little homesick – many songs both yesterday and today about various points in the south. It was really nice up there, although the ship is rolling and shuddering quite a bit because of the wind. But it was a long day and I was having a hard time staying awake. Tonight’s show was Bernie Fields, virtuoso harmonica player (!) with the HALcats. We went to the 10:00 show and the HALcats were tight, really swinging, but a harmonica is a harmonica, and when it’s miked and amplified it sounds… well, I thought it sounded awful. Dave liked it, but I was alternating between falling asleep and sticking my fingers in my ears, so I left a little early.

Before I reveal tonight’s towel animal I need to mention that our room steward has also been showing his artistic ability in the folding of the toilet paper into a point. The first night it was a very basic fold, which I amused myself by replicating before we left the room. He seemed to take this as a challenge, and has been showing his flexibility and versatility as a virtuoso toilet-paper-point folder. I haven’t had this much fun with a roll of TP since Dave’s dad and I would have the silent but intense struggle over which way it should come off the roll – over or under. Tonight’s towel animal: muscular goose. We think.