This is another post from past travels our family took prior to me starting this blog. It was 2005 and our boys were 10 and 12 years old at the time. Since we had already gone to a couple of Hawaii Islands (Oahu and Maui), it was time for something a bit different – The Big Island.
The Big Island is the biggest of all Hawaii islands and the first to be occupied. The Big Island was believed to be the first island Polynesian voyagers from the Marquesas Islands set foot on 1,500 years ago.
When we first stepped off the plane, we knew this island was like no other. Many of the areas of the island are volcanic rock.
Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park
One of first excursions was to visit Kaloko-Honokohau, a site early Hawaiians settled. They built sacred temples here and created fishponds that trapped fish.
You can see old artifacts that illustrate what life may have been like many years ago. The carving below was interesting enough to entice Ryan to stop using his Gameboy for a few minutes.
Here is a fishpond that would be used to trap fish to feed the locals.
Swimming with Dolphins
We arranged for the boys to swim with dolphins through Dolphin Quest at the Hilton Hawaiian Village and they loved it. The dolphins are well trained and really put on a show.
The Green Sand Beach (Papakolea)
The locals kept talking about the Green Sand Beach and how beautiful it was. So we took the 2.5 hour drive along the Kohola Coast to find the trailhead.
What we didn’t realize was that it was another 2.5 mile hike just to get to the beach. Ryan was about to have a melt down by the time we made it there, as evidenced in the picture below.
But it was definitely worth the hike, it is beautiful.
The green sand gets its color from olivine crystals created from eruptions to a dormant volcano years ago. Nestled in Mahana Bay, this is truly a unique place and one of only two green sand beaches in the world.
Traveling around the Island
We saw most of the island and even took a helicopter ride to see the volcanic ash create new land along the ocean coast. I would love to show you those pictures but I accidentally deleted all of those pictures right after we returned. But I did save some of our pictures as we traveled around the island.
Conclusion
I hope you enjoyed this little blast-from-the-past of our trip to the Big Island. If you are not subscribed to our blog and would like to subscribe so that new posts come directly to your email, scroll up to the right top section of this page and type in your email address.
I’ll leave you with a final picture of Cameron and Ryan.
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