who put papaya there?

Today is the start of our third full day here on the island of Kauai. Here is a quick summary and some highlights of our day yesterday:

Woke up terrified to the confusing noise of a rooster crowing outside our window at about 6am.

Packed a couple of things and went for an early morning run along the golf course, through a tunnel of trees and down a steep sloping muddy hill and out onto the beach. We got some good exercise running back up the hill and back to our house.

We made a great breakfast of eggs, toast, yogurt, fresh papaya, and %100 unsweetened grapefruit juice...and coffee of course (we drink that like water around here).

I took my first outdoor shower, and nearly ran out into the yard naked after I saw the biggest spider of my life showering with me.

We met many more great people who were so friendly and very interesting.

I got to pull out guava trees and bring them to the dump. We tasted fresh guava fruit for the first time. Quite an odd type of fruit but delicious.

Hope and I walked to the local library and splurged on a little cup of ice cream to share.

We worked with about 10 people in the community garden for a couple of hours. I used my bare hands and feet and the soil is bright red here so I was looking pretty filthy afterward. I got to eat a fresh carrot right out of the ground; what a great way to connect with nature.

To our surprise, we had to quickly clean up and eat so that we could go to choir practice. They assured us it wasn't a formal choir, but we felt quite out of place and inadequate trying to sing our Soprano and Tenor parts along with only about half a dozen others, all at least twice our age. It was an interesting experience though.

We started a movie and then got tired and went to bed.

Today we had a vehicle to use so we're going to drive to Hanalei Bay and borrow some boogie boards and hit the waves. Hopefully we can make it to a thrift store too because when I chose just one pair of sandals over bring both before we left, I guess I grabbed two left feet; so I've been going barefoot a lot. And it is colder here then we thought, so we need a couple more warm shirts.

Later this afternoon the guy who runs the food pantry is putting on a concert at a local food court in the shopping center, so we're going to go eat some Thai food and listen to him. Then it's game night at Glenn and Mary's (and ours I guess) home. These people didn't realize that they invited the Scrabble Champions of Minnesota so they're in for quite a shock.

Enjoy the pictures. We miss everyone and despite all of this beauty and warmth we do miss our true home; wherever our friends and family are. We're thinking about you all. May God bless you today and always.

z