(the theme song, "Barefootin' It" cover by The Shades Band)
7:05 pm: The first day is closing and I am without shoes.
Today I left the house and headed north from Kailua Kona to the area of the Big Island known as North Kohala, where the biggest city is called Hawi Town. I am just outside of Hawi town, and an outdoor adventure resort, which I acquired for 30 dollars rather than 85 for the night due to the owner having a completely empty establishment and me agreeing to do two hours of chores in the morning. They are really nice people.
This area is important for two reasons: it is the birthplace of King Kamehameha I of Hawaii, who united all of Hawaii in 1810 under his leadership; and it has the first oldest library on the island and the second largest in Hawaii, being built in 1929. However, the first oldest, also built in 1929, is no longer in the original building, so it doesn't count anymore (see my page for more information on libraries while I travel).
Hawi is an old sugar town, but it's major claim these days is that it is the last town on the road to the Pololu valley, which I hiked down today and is really spectacular:
(image by biketrouble--flickr)
The hike down was not long and full of terrific boulders and I saw one other barefooter doing the trail:
(image by S Carpenter--flickr)
This was the trail to the first valley. The trail to the second valley is supposed to be even better, but they say Pololu eats people after the second valley so tomorrow I'm going back but only to the second valley.
The drive up from Kona was really bad because I had my 9' surfboard on softracks on the top of the car and the wind was fierce. I'm going to have to tie it down to the front bumber or something to keep it stable. But once I got out of the valley and into the mountains I forgot about the surfboard and was taken in by the lush greens and terrific animals that are in the area. I saw a horse and a stork having a conversation with one another, which was the highlight of the trip, and the road up to Pololu has these little one-lane bridges you have to cross. Really country, really Hawaiia, really cool.
Hawi sucked. Tourist trap central. Over priced everything and all disgruntled servers. I had two green teas and did some homework.
Finally, I made one important decision today and learned one important fact. The decision was to buy a pair of Vibram barefoot shoes to take on the trip with me. I'm not counting wearing these as going barefoot, but it's better than wearing shoes:
Check them out, they're pretty cool.
Also I realized that King Kamehameha, who united all of Hawaii, did it barefoot.
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