Chapter 15: Bruce

It was another early-type morning, but we only had to be in front of our hotel for our bus-van to pick us up at 2:05 AM. It rolled up with Polynesian Adventure Tours scrawled across the side and Bruce inside with his jolly personality in full force.

Somehow Sarah and I had got the idea that this was a six-person tour, but by the end there were twenty of us on that bus- the four of us, eight Chinese people from San Diego, an older couple from San Francisco, an Asian couple and a family three Aussies and one Bruce the tour guide. Now, the road to Hana (and away from it) is beautiful, but this man made it fun. To the Aussies he said, "Some Kiwis got on my bus the other day and I told 'em I'd had some Australians before them. You know what they said? 'Were they prisoners?'" And the Australian man laughed and said, "I thought it was 'Baaa.'" Our first stop was technically Bruce's red truck as we stopped to pick something up, but then we were off to North Shore and a continental breakfast which Bruce said is defined as "next to nothing" on Hookipa Beach. There was a whale there at Sarah saw and beautiful roaring surf. We took pictures and I listened to Bruce and my dad talk about motorcycles. "I sold my bike because I realized I was reckless. I'd start out and be good for about a month, then I'd be on a narrow stretch of highway behind three cars and think, I can do this. Nothing can hurt me except Kryptonite! And I'd roar off and pass them and then realize... I could have died!"

We were then headed out to the Ke'aneae (Key An Eye) Peninsula where there was a church made of lava rock which had entirely survived the last tsunami except for its roof. I bought the best banana bread there and delicious coconut candy. We walked out to the water, dancing atop lava rocks and watching the fishies in the tide pools. I saw a black crab scuttling about and relished the sound of the waves crashing against the rock and the contrast between thier clear blue and the dark lava.

After Ke'aneae was the long trek to the Black Sand Beach. This was especially cool for two reasons:

1. There was a lava cave we got to duck into and take fun pictures.

2. There were mongeese. MONGEESE!

We took the short road that was the rest of the way to Hana- all the while Bruce rattling off all the information he'd gleaned about Hana and Maui, driving as fast as he could, and squeezing past cars on the tiny road.

We at lunch- 1/2 pound hamburgers, Lord help us- and were back on the road after an hour. We were headed to Oheo (O-hey!-O) Gulch aka The Seven Sacred Pools. Apparently the second name is all a marketing ploy as there are more like twenty pools and none of them are sacred. Sarah and I hiked down to the pools, she changed under her towel while I held it and then we waddled into the water which wasn't bad at all once you really dove in, which you shouldn't because there were many large rocks. And pointy ones. We swam in the first pool for a while, then limped over the rocks to the next one over where we met a waterfall... that we jumped off the side of. There was also something crouching in the rocky shadows up there which looked to be a crawdad.

We got out of the water, climbed back across the rock bridge to the bus side of the pools with the wind off the ocean doing its best to push us to our doom or severe injury and then hiked, huffing and puffing, to the van-bus.