Sunday evening

I've stopped tracking what day of our vacation this is. I expect a time will come when I won't even know what day of the week it is. That's a good thing.

Today started with an upscale breakfast at the Hau Tree Lanai. They've done away with the linen table cloths and napkins, our society's inevitable march into entropy I guess. But the food is still wonderful, and the view can make you feel that you've slipped back in time to the era of Jack London and slow luxury liners.

The reason for the special breakfast, aside from the fact that it was a beautiful Sunday morning in Hawai`i, was to bid "aloha a hui hou" to Liz and Rae. The remainder of their summer vacation will take them down a different path, as Aaron's already has. We drove them to the airport, endured the slings and arrows of Homeland Security, and packed them off on Hawaiian Airlines with the traditional gifts of orchid leis and apple napples.

Although I'm glossing over it, please reread my earlier post of the misery of American air travel. It applies even if you are just attempting to get two teenage girls onto an airplane. Mooo!

At this point we also bid aloha (without the breakfast, leis, or pastries) to PBJ, our faithful Alamo rental car. Sue and I will rely on our month-long BusPasses to get us about. We took our community chariot to Ward Centre for a micro-brew, a Kua `aina sandwich, and a little shopping. I picked up a couple of CDs - The Barefoot Natives' self-titled disc (which is playing at the moment) and Hapa's Maui CD. Now we're back at an unusually quiet condo, reading the Sunday paper and watching the beginnings of a sunset.

A new phase of our adventure has begun.