Another great sunrise…
Time to tie the ship to the dock…
The high school rowing crew is out for their morning practice…
We are in Molokai!
We have a full day of traditional Hawaiian events planned. Our driver Hans has arrived to pick us up.
Molokai is a beautiful island, very sparsely population.
We took the main road (!) to the far east end of the island.
Stopping at the overlook…
We were at the Halawa Valley for a day of traditional Hawaiian culture.
The valley features a beautiful cove and beach.
The Solatorio family has lived in this valley for many generations. This valley is Hawaii’s oldest continuously inhabited community.
Pilipo Solatorio was chosen at age 5 to be the cultural practitioner for his family. He has carried on his cultures traditions and practices, educating natives and visitors with his stories and songs.
One of the stories he told was surviving the 1946 tsunami.
His son Greg is carrying on this tradition. Below he demonstrates how to make Poi out of Taro.
The remains of the church in the woods is one of the few structures that survived the tsunami.
Hey I left my car in the woods and now there are trees growing through it. In reality Hawaii has a real problem with people abandoning cars; these were less than 200 yard from the beautiful beach.
After our day with the Hawaiian family we headed back to the docked ship to get ready for our evening event. But first, another sunset with the evening rower.
Hans returned (with his van’s disco lights in full function) to take us to our evening event.
We went to the Molokai History Center for a pa’ina (feast). The hostess explained the traditions of food and music for the pa’ina, then we enjoyed an amazing meal.
Traditional Hawaiian dancers entertained us along with the beautiful guitar music. An amazing evening to end a fantastic week.
Once again, a thanks to Captain Gavin and the Uncruise crew. (and we must bring good karma to their cruises, as we didn’t have any rain in Hawaii either!).