The Big Island

Elmer and I visited the Big Island of Hawaii to celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. We both absolutely love Hawaii and were looking forward to a relaxing vacation. The last time we were in Hawaii (Lanai and Maui) was for our honeymoon!

One of our first stops (besides Costco!) was for shave ice. This little kiosk was so good that we came here three times over the week that we were on vacation.


Place of Refuge


South Point, the southernmost point of the United States. It was super windy!


Sea turtle at Punalu'u black sand beach


Kilauea Caldera at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park


Thurston lava tube


Devastation Trail, where a lava flow came through and destroyed all the vegetation.


This land is just a bit younger than we are!


Sea arch





Interesting lava formation


Glowing magma inside the caldera.


Rainbow Falls




Akaka Falls



Waipio Valley Lookout



Elmer was able to play a round of golf at Hapuna


The view from our "partial ocean view" room at Hapuna


The color of the ocean was beautiful. The pictures can't do it justice.


We were able to see many whales breaching off the coast from the beach and from our room balcony. This photo isn't great, but you can kind of make out the whale!


We are wearing heavy duty parkas, but we're still in Hawaii! We went on an excursion with Mauna Kea Summit Adventures. The stargazing was absolutely amazing. We've never seen so many stars in the sky before! We were even able to see the Milky Way belt.


At the summit for sunset. You can see some of the high-powered telescopes in the background. It was freezing. I got a little bit of altitude sickness, but recovered within minutes. Elmer didn't do too well, but he felt much better when we descended back down a bit for the stargazing.


We tried to take a picture of the night sky. Not a great photo, but you can see Orion's belt and Mars (the red dot), I think.


Sunset from our room

Madeleine

Welcome to the world, our little niece, Maddy!

Holidays

Elmer and I decided to test out our new camera by taking some photos at The Grove.

Hello Kitty

Elmer, Brian, and I went to the Three Apples Hello Kitty exhibit at Royal/T cafe. The event was being held in celebration of Hello Kitty's 35 birthday.

HB

After attending John Williams' performance at the Hollywood Bowl last year, Elmer and I decided to make it an annual event. So, this year was our second time attending. His theme for the night was Harry Potter!



I especially enjoy the second half of the night, when John Williams conducts classic movie scores.

Superman



Although I am not a Star Wars fan, my favorite is when he does The Imperial March (Darth Vadar's theme) because all the fans whip out their lightsabers and swoosh them around. I didn't record it this year, but I did get the Star Wars theme.

Happy Birthday Karen

Elmer and I went to Las Vegas to celebrate my 30th birthday. It was also a belated celebration for Elmer's birthday as well.

We left our place around 11 pm, when Elmer got off work, and stayed the night at Buffalo Bills. We left as quickly as we could to head to the outlets, and then to The Wynn.





We had dinner at The Buffet located at The Wynn. I thought it was just okay.





We spent some time at the pool and had some pina coladas (virgin, of course!). It was a short but nice and much-needed mini get-away!

Musha 2

I needed a reason to go to Musha again, and what better reason is there than my 30th birthday?!!!

We celebrated with Iris, Brian, and my mom. Here are some highlights from our meal:

Tuna poke: Yum


Baguette gratin: Super Yum


Grilled beef tongue. This was good, interesting texture, almost like geoduck. (I've only ever had my mom's braised beef tongue).


Udon vongole: TO DIE FOR!!! It's the chewy texture of the udon that does it for me!


And finally we got to try the black sesame icecream. It was pretty good. It didn't have as much black sesame taste as I've tried elsewhere.