Sea Turtles and Roof Tiles

Hi, everyone!

After I got up and saw my shadow on Ground Hog Day, Grandma and Grandpa took me to have lunch at Puka Dog! They each put on their Puka Dog t-shirts from Thomas so they could have free lemonade with their Puka Dogs!

Puka Dog is a very popular place on a sunny day at the beach! The line started outside and around the building! There are four choices to make about each Puka Dog ordered, so new customers take a lot of time to order. Grandpa knows the code name for the combination he and Grandma always have, so our order goes in quickly! We took our lunch to the picnic table by the shore. It was yummy!

After we ate, Grandma and I went to check out the beach for turtles and seals. There were lots of turtles in their usual spot on the children’s beach. While I was eating lunch, I saw two monk seals on the opposite side of the beach. When Grandma and I walked over, there was only one! The seal protector said the first seal there didn’t want company and chased the other seal away. When we went around the corner, there were two more monk seals napping. In between the two seal spots, somebody built a very nice sand castle!

We watched sunset from Brennecke’s Beach, then walked back to Poipu Beach. Even more turtles were arriving, and the monk seals were leaving!

Monday morning, the roofing crew started back to work on Building 8. When I went to the beach, there was one sea turtle left from the overnight group. Grandma and I walked over to the fish ponds at the Kanei’olouma native village site to look for nenes. There was more water in the pond after our rainy day, but the only bird we saw was a fishing stilt. When we walked back on the greenbelt, I was happy to see the fence had been moved! There was a little path that let us get back to our unit without a detour!

Dim N Den Sum was only open on Monday, so we ordered extra gyoza and shu mai and egg rolls to put away for later in the week. After lunch, I made some new flower friends. When we went to Makahuena Point to watch for whales, I made a side trip to the lava arch.

We decided to watch sunset from our lanai, so I could see how much roofing work had been done on Building 8. It was a cloudy evening, and the sun set between two layers of clouds.

Tuesday morning, Grandma gave me a new job! She had noticed that the magpies didn’t try to fly on the table during breakfast when I was facing them. So my job for breakfast and lunch was reminding the birds to stay off the table. When we did our morning check of the beach, there were sea turtles but no monk seals. We did stop to listen to the ukulele group that meets in the big shelter at the beach. There was a very good dancer teaching hula to another lady as the musicians played.

.We took another trip to the beach later to recycle our Hawaii five cent deposit bottles. On the way, I saw a bunch of bananas with orchid-like flowers on their ends. I never knew each banana had a blossom! The roofers were busy on the side of Building 8 that faces the greenbelt. When I dumped our cans and bottles into the barrel, a family of chickens jumped up to make sure I had put them in the right place!

We watched sunset from our lanai again. I could see how much work had been done on the Building 8 roof. We didn’t have clouds for this sunset!

Wednesday morning, my job got a little harder! The magpies stayed away, but a Hawaiian cardinal hopped into the box Grandma uses as a breakfast tray and ate the muffin crumbs. Grandma said as long as he stayed on the box, that was OK. At the beach, I saw sea turtles arriving. On the way back from the beach, the loaders were lifting roof tiles up to the workers, so they could stack them on the roof or use them right away.

My special friend Joe-san was flying from Rochester to join us for the rest of our stay in Hawaii. We were tracking the flights he was supposed to be on. His flight from Denver to Lihue was delayed by two hours! Grandma and Grandpa took me to the farmers market at Kukui’ula to get another sweet pineapple. There was a long line waiting to buy them before the market opened! One of the pineapple ladies recognized me from last year and came over to say hello before she started selling. When it was our turn, she helped me pick out a nice big ripe pinapple to buy!

While we were standing in line, Grandpa’s phone rang. It was Joe-san, and he was in Honolulu already! He had missed connections to the flight that was going to be late and flew straight to Honolulu from Chicago, instead. His flight from Honolulu to Lihue would arrive about the time we first expected him! It had started to rain, and we drove through a rainbow to pick him up. Then we got caught in rush hour traffic getting back to Poipu. The sun had already set when we got home!

Thursday morning, we had a pretty sunrise. I was able to see what the roofers had finished on Building 8 before the rain started. When I came downstairs, the microwave told me it needed a hug! I kept the Hawaiian cardinal from perching on anybody’s plate, but it did walk around the table during breakfast.

Grandma and I took Joe-san to the beach to look for turtles and monk seals. We saw one turtle, but no monk seals. Somebody had spread out a lot of crackers and cookies for the chickens to eat! To help Joe with his time zone shift, Grandma made dinner at our resort unit. I helped her go shopping for fresh fish. At the Big Save, I was surprised to see bananas sent to Hawaii from Ecuador!

We had afternoon snack of lilikoi goat cheese and rosemary baguette. Then we took a look at the Building 8 roofing progress and watched sunset from our lanai. The moon and Venus showed up after that!

Friday morning we checked out the beach again after breakfast on the lanai. The cardinal stayed away! We saw turtles, but no monk seals. We spent a little time watching for whales, too.

For lunch, we drove to Hanapepe to eat at Midnight Bear bakery. We picked up another order of bread and had yummy sandwiches made to order. Grandma had a chance to talk to Ursa about the blanket she sent for Ursa’s new son last year. Then we took another trip to Makahuena Point to watch for whales. We saw spouts and some backs!

When we went to the beach this morning, there were lots of overnight turtles sleeping in. And it looks like the roof of Building 8 is done!

Love,

Lion-san