Leaving the ship today was a cluster. More to the point, the tours seemed organized but the independent travelers not to much. We made a tentative plan, then a lovely couple I’d met on the first snorkeling excursion came up to us to see if we had ideas. Long story short, we shared a taxi to Poipu for the start of what turned out to be a lovely day.
We got out at Poipu Beach. A very pretty spot, with beautiful water and a nice cove. There was an area cordoned off to keep people away from a nice-sized sea turtle. Clearly something worth photographing. We continued a bit of a distance to search for a cache that we never found….a sad introduction to geocaching for our new friends.
Then we meandered down the beach back from where we’d come, and continued. Another area cordoned off, this one for a seal. It was very still, laying on its back, so it was quite reassuring when we saw it breathe and move its flippers. Sadly for us, but likely wise for the seal, it remained there longer than we did.
We walked over to the (only) other traditional cache in the area where a rather long look finally resulted in success. Phew. Then walked to some native art — a few thousand miles north and I would have assumed we were seeing totem poles. Four poles, each facing a different direction. And lovely icons on the ground.
We figured we’d go into town for lunch so walked up a hill along a highway. We saw cacti — yes — and other plants, then spotted a restaurant whose sign announced it opened daily at 7am. This being lunchtime one can easily forgive us for assuming they would in fact be open. Silly us. But there was a delivery person who advised we head back near we’d been to a nearby restaurant that he recommended.
My ahi poke was probably the tastiest meal I’ve had this trip. The ahi was a melt-in-your-mouth buttery texture and absolutely delicious. June said her meal was very tasty, too.
The four of us took an Uber back — it was about half the price of the taxi — then went inside for a beverage. June begged off, but the other three of us took a free shuttle to the nearby mall. We poked our noses in a few stores, and I even made a small purchase at the ABC store (think Hawaiian 7-11, though with some souvenirs as well as convenience store items).
We walked along the water, meandering our way back to the ship. I’d already done the research that the nearby cache likely was not retrievable, but we gave it a shot anyway. The short story is that we spotted it quickly but were unable to retrieve it. We tried sticks and chewing gum. A teenage local cacher let us know that it wasn’t possible to retrieve it. We continued. Then several adult non-cachers came to offer us help because they were so curious about what we were doing. Still no luck. Two cachers from the ship came to join us but did not contribute to the extraction process (though they wanted to claim the find). Eventually we concluded we had been enough of a spectacle that we gave up, and returned to the ship.
Then relaxed a bit, went to see some ship entertainment (the sand artist we’d enjoyed earlier), went to dinner (today we doubled the number of people we have no interest in dining with, from one to two). A disappointing end to an otherwise wonderful day.
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