On my way flying out to the big island, I messaged G, who had just returned after three weeks of vacation there, for any last-minute tips on what to do there.
“You should go to Carlsmith Beach to swim with the turtles.”
I dutifully put it on my almost first to-do thing.
It has been a decade since I could swim back in the ocean. About five years ago, I finally found a standardized swimming pool in a nearby gym that was clean and not crowded. I seriously picked up swimming again upon that discovery. Ever since then, I have slowly and patiently improved my aquatic skills. I self-learned freestyle swimming about two years ago. Then, merely one week before this Hawaii trip, I could finally dive to the bottom of the swimming pool and swim like a (clumsy) fish for as long as my breath could hold. Swimming like a fish at the bottom of a swimming pool has been a secret wish of mine ever since I saw one mom did so with her kids in a YMCA swimming pool many years ago.
The first moment I stepped into the warm water of the famed Carlsmith beach of Hilo, Hawaii, I spotted a giant turtle near the bank waiting for me.
She was a very gentle soul with curiosity and obviously enjoyed playing with humans. I swam side by side with her, freestyle but with my face sided towards her, merely one foot away, under the water thanks to the snorkeling mask. I could watch her so close.
She glided effortlessly in the water back and forth while I tried my best to catch up with her so I could keep my face to hers at that one feet distance for as long as possible. She occasionally threw me a look that I read as pity for my clumsiness in the water, especially when she made turns that I had to follow suits and try hard not to collide with her.
Then it was getting dark, and the tide kept getting bigger and bigger. The turtle turned around and gently dove into the deep bottom, heading towards the open sea.
Aloha Oe!
Thank you, G!
One friend who traveled with us bought a one-pound Kona coffee bag in Hong Kong for over $300 a few years back. During our Big Island tour, he was keen to find the best and most expensive Kona coffee.
As the enthusiastic group trip planner, I did some homework ahead of time on Kona coffee and learned one thing: only those marked “100% Kona” are the real deal.
“Heavenly (Coffee Farm) has a coffee which is $30 a cup. It’s the best on the island.” G also offered valuable tips on this.
To best indulge the coffee tasting, I put my daily coffee hand-pour gears into the luggage on our way to the Big Island.
I gathered another trick to build up the right tastebuds for this ultimate $30/cup coffee is to make comparisons. In other words, we need to start with some less impressive Kona coffee.
So the first thing we did was to do some grocery shopping as soon as we landed. I read somewhere that the only Costco on the island offers some good Kona coffee.
Armed with my latest knowledge of how to tell the real from the fake ones, I was disapointed to find out none of the four kinds of Hawaii coffee I found in Costco qualified for the real deal. The only closest was this 10% blend.
Being a very loyal Costco customer, I treat this almost a personal insult. How come Costco could not get hold of any 100% Kona coffee on the Big Island!
In the end, I bought the $29/lb 100% Hawaii Kauai Peaberry as a starter to build the baseline of our taste journey.
The following day, I made the very first cup of Hawaii coffee. The coffee beans smelled very pleasant, but the taste was disappointing. I suspect the roast process was a bit overdone, so the coffee left a hint of bitterness in the aftertaste.
I later discovered the “100% Kona” coffee from the local Walmart store. It immediately became an obvious winner over the Kuai Peaberry. Just in two days, we almost ran out of it, so we ventured to buy another bag of 100% Hilo coffee while we were touring the Rainbow Falls Chocolate Farm.
The Rainbow Falls Hilo coffee was also excellent but quite milder than the Hualanai 100% Kona Coffee from Walmart. It was also very popular we finished them all in next two mornings.
With our fellow travelers’ coffee tastebuds trained and built up for the sophistication, finally, we went to the much anticipated coffee tour on this Heavenly Coffee Farm who claimed that they produced the best coffee in Kona. This frequent statewide 1st place award winer has a name very exotic and misleading — Geisha.
We soon found out Geisha was not referred to an elegant Japanese madam who pours you a cup of beverage but a place far away in Africa, in Ethiopia.
Our rich friend who was so into Kona coffee was very happy with the coffee. He bought us each a cup of the $20 artisan coffee so that we could all enjoyed in the farm’s open air cafe that overlooked the pacific ocean.
“Slow down slow down!” he commanded. “Pay attention to the aftertaste! Isn’t it so rich and delicious that you could hardly find in the other coffee we drank?”
He then bought us each the $75 4 OZ bag of it to bring home.
Lastly, he assigned a tough task to me the tour planner to reach out the business manager of the farm on how to purchase a small coffee farm nearby so he could try his hands on these lovely beans of Geisha himself.
Knowing so many coffee lovers out there even just in my own company, I figured it would be a nearly mission impossible task but I bite the bullet nevertheless.
I am still in talking with that beautiful business manager at this moment.
“Keep trying.” My rich friend is not a person easily to be discouraged.
