The Voyage

<---- Sunday Feb. 3 we drove to Buffalo and spent the afternoon doing a little shopping then Mike watched the (Dallasless) Superbowl at our hotel, the Comfort Inn near Buffalo Airport where we stayed and parked our car for the month - great deal.

Up very early Monday morning to get the shuttle to the nice little Buffalo airport for our 6:50 commuter flight to Chicago. Since we crossed the border into the USA yesterday there is no customs check at the airport making the boarding a lot quicker and easier. A short flight and we're in O'Hare airport for breakfast and a reasonable two hour wait for the substantially longer flight out to Honolulu. One interesting aspect of O'Hare airport, which is a transportation crossroads, is the large number of young kids (18-19?) in sailor and soldier uniforms. At first I thought they were part of a Sea Cadets' trip then realized of course, these were the fighters for democracy and freedom in the world.

The flight from Chicago is about ten hours. Activities consisted of reading popular novels, watching second-rate movies, and doing more Sudokus and Crossword puzzles than I want to think about. Oh yes, then there is the food "service" - wanna buy a box lunch of packaged commercial goodies? Yep, for five bucks, at least it is something to do. More packaging to unravel than food to eat but it passes the time...

Getting closer to Hawaii and the expectation of the tropical warmth heightens our activity. Put away the books and pens, check the glasses making sure Mike does not leave his in the airplane again then gawk out the window at endless expanse of ocean until some speck of land pops into view. What do we recognize? Is THAT Maui? See Pearl Harbor? Then we're on the ground hoping the ten hour rigidly tightened knees and nearly-paralyzed legs still work and that blood will flow to those unused muscles. Can we walk off the plane with dignity? LOL! Yep - and there it is - Honolulu airport with it's rain forest jungle waiting area.

A reasonable one hour stop in Honolulu then connect to an Aloha Airlines inter-island flight to Kailua-Kona. The bus-like "first-come-first-served seating" flight goes quickly as the attendants pass out the little plastic cups of syrupy sweetened Passion Fruit juice. Something else to unwrap and pass the time. The short flight comes to an end as we deplane in Kailua-Kona down a ladder walkway to the tarmac and out to the baggage area that is just a small covered pavilion. There is no airport as we know it here. Just a parking lot, runway and baggage pavilions. The weather is fantastic; a comfortable 75 degrees with clear skies and the sun setting in the western ocean.

Betty is waiting for us and we load up her car, accept our lei's and head up to Waimea. Tired and jet-weary we talk, have a little dinner, then it's off to sleep ... in paradise.

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