Road Trip!

We headed out early this morning for a road trip to the other side of the island. Our first stop was at Waipio Valley for a quick photo opp. Mark swears he saw a whale in the water below - I couldn't see anything but others also thought they saw shadows of something large.

Afterwards we headed south to Akaka Falls. The boys did a whirlwind tour of the falls, running almost the entire way. Katie was being a bit more difficult and kept insisting "I can't walk daddy!" So poor Mark had to carry her almost the entire way. Carson and Carter stayed and napped in the van with Grandma.

Our next stop was supposed to be the Pana'ewa Zoo, but it started to rain - and pretty hard. So we detoured to the nearest Pizza Hut for lunch. Pizza Hut.... *drool*. (I may have just ordered pizza hut for dinner haha)

The rain finally let up and we were able to carry on to the zoo as planned. We had such a good time at the zoo. There were so many different colored birds and exotic animals - including anteaters, lemurs, turtles etc. (My favorite part of the zoo - it was FREE!)

The kids LOVED the playground at the zoo and burnt off a ton of pent up energy. 

Logan's favorite part of the zoo (and what he was looking forward to all trip) was the White Siberian Tiger - Namaste. Namaste was HUGE.



Everyday at 3:30 they feed the tiger. They lock him up in a pen at the back of his enclosure and give him his dinner of a raw chicken stuffed with all sorts of nutritional goodies. We got to go right up close and watch Namaste eat. Half way through he dropped his chicken and started snarling at us. He then let out a roar that startled even the adults! Definitely today's highlight!

Katie loved the peacocks that freely roamed the zoo. She wasn't afraid of them at all and kept running up to every one she saw to talk to them.

After the zoo we headed down to Kalapana - a district that was destroyed by lava back in the 90's. When we were here last January there was hot lava flowing right by the pathways - so close Mark melted his sneakers. Sadly this year the flow was far off in the distance on private property - so we couldn't get anywhere near it without paying a fortune for a tour. But it was still neat to see the cool, hardened lava up close. 

The rest of the family stayed until after dark to see if they could see the lava glowing off in the distance. By this time Carson had enough so our family of 5 opted to head home instead. Carson did calm down and we may have managed to sneak in a trip to the Ross in Hilo :)