Saturday 22nd July
The hurricane out in the pacific to the north east of us is still affecting the weather here pushing more cloud cover our way. The warmth still continues unabated, the resort pools filled with laughter as holiday makers splash about relentlessly cooling off. Rainbows decorate the hills behind us with their multicoloured ribbons as light planes land at the small hilltop airport just visible from our room. The resort does seem quieter than our last visit in May 2016, talking with employees and taxi drivers seems to confirm that this season is a little down on last.
We are about to have breakfast when we receive a call from Amanda’s brother Jimmy. They have checked out of their hotel in Lahaina to go to the airport only to be informed by the taxi driver that a four car collision has occurred on the main road out of Lahaina. The collision occurred on a narrow part of the road that sits between rocky cliffs covered in wire netting that is supposed to contain any shards of rock that shear off the cliff face and the hillside that runs down to the ocean. An unfortunate passenger or driver is apparently trapped in one of the vehicles, the result is that the road is blocked and will be for several hours, cutting off access to the airport.
Jimmy, Susan and Gaby are stuck in paradise, they have booked a hotel in Kahului for the night and rescheduled their flights to tomorrow. We invite them over to have breakfast and spend the day at our hotel, hanging out.
It is our last day here, we want to ship some items home and visit Lahaina one last time to investigate the historical sites and museums there. After Jimmy and co arrive and settle in they decide to go to Whalers Village a seaside shopping complex. We take off to complete our tasks dropping them off on the way.
The museum consists of the original Chinese meeting House on Front street called the Wo Hing Centre, where the Chinese community set up a support group for the men that came out from china as indentured workers on contracts of five years or more. Many married in China before they left, not to bring their wives as they were unable to, but to tie them to their homelands. They would then send back money to their extended family at home, who often lived in squalid conditions. China was continually plagued by conflict at this time, warring factions roaming the countryside seeking conscripts, giving young men the added impetus to seek a better existence or die as a forced soldier in one army or another.
Along side this building is the cookhouse, remarkably in original condition, complete with wood fired stoves that housed giant woks to feed the workers. The cookhouse was also used as a theatre as it is today currently showing original motion picture films of Hawaii shot by Thomas Edison in the late 19th and very early 20th century, fascinating viewing indeed. The Front street facade looked very different in the early days, sitting on a Harbour as it does there where many fish markets run by the Japanese or Chinese ex plantation workers that stayed on and started businesses.
Next we visit the site of the first mission house built from lava boulders and then plastered over. Prior to this the missionaries lived in primitive conditions similar to the natives, dirt floors, woven roofs thatched out of available dried plant and grass materials. Walls would be only a few feet high to allow the breezes to flow through the house.
Originally built in 1834 for Ephraim Spaulding the New England style cottage house was mostly occupied by the missionary Doctor, Dwight Baldwin and wife Charlotte who succeeded Spaulding after he became ill and had to return to Massachusetts. The newly arrived couple had just married when they left New England and eventually had eight children, two not surviving past age three due to dysentery. A second story was added to the building in 1849 to to accommodate the growing family. The house was restored in the 1960’s but is still incomplete due to lack of funds, amazing since it is such a big part of Lahaina history and so many wealth people live here. The native Hawaiians always friendly, welcomed the missionaries and superficially accepted the new white mans God thinking it must be a powerful entity. They attended prayer services but the missionaries failed to completely convert the Hawaiians to Christianity, many still inwardly continued to believe in the power of their native gods. We chat with a native Hawaiian women at the house she tells us the meaning of the towns name, “Lahaina” it means “Relentless Sun”
We are certainly feeling it today not a breeze comes off the ocean or down from the mountains. We stick to the shade as much as possible, making our way towards an ice cream parlour for a refreshing ice cream before driving back to Ka’anapali and our guests.
Our guests are resting up on our return, having had there fill of shopping, sand and sun. We spend the remains of the afternoon chatting about our holiday experiences and current events in our respective countries while teenager Gaby snoozes on, on the couch.
Rainbows continue to appear and disappear behind us as the sun moves ever closer to the ocean through increasing cloud cover. Jim and Susan rouse Gaby, it’s time for them to drive to their hotel in Kahului, eliminating any possibility of a repeat of yesterday’s delay. Once we see them off, we return to the room and Amanda completes our packing for departure tomorrow. We make ourselves a meal using up the last of our supplies, cheese tortellini in a spicy tomato based pasta sauce. Open up the last of our wine, an Australian Shiraz labelled Layercake produced by Orlando probably for export for the US market, the wine certainly has a lighter feel to it, like many Californian reds. Apart from a few specialty wine shops good Australian wine is hard to find, plenty of cheaper export labels available. This I think has given Americans the wrong impression of Australian wine.
We spend our last night on the balcony in the warm night air overlooking the flickering torchlight of the resort and the myriad of path lights that light up the various pathways around the now dark tropical gardens. An occasional light from a passing boat breaks the darkness like star to far from heaven the ocean now one with the sky.
Tomorrow we fly to Honolulu