The town we're staying in is almost 3,000 ft above sea level and the temps are typically 15-20 deg cooler than on the beaches at Kona. Frequently we come home to misty showers with the afternoon tradewinds causing clouds to form and rain to condense at these higher altitudes, even though it is full sun down on the West coast. This is also rich grazing land and home to the Parker Ranch. Parker Ranch is one of the nations oldest (founded in 1847) and largest cattle ranches (250,000 acres). Hawaii has a long cowboy history to support this and other ranches and this town is the center of it!
This statue features local cowboy (aka paniolo in Hawaiian) Ikua Purdy who stunned the nation in 1908 by winning the National Rodeo Roping championship in Cheyenne, WY.
Connie and I have visited a number of different beaches along the South Kohala coast and the Waikoloa Bay beach is situated near a famous collection of Petroglyphs from early native Hawaiians.
These can be accessed via a 1/2 mile hike from a parking area, and has a nice loop trail through this vast collection.
Today, the trade winds are WAY UP, and we chose to take in a Whale watch "talk" at a local National Park Service Venue known as Puu Kohala Heiau, which features a monument erected by King Kamehameha.
We had a nice presentation on the natural history of the Humpback Whale Migration between the Hawaiian Islands (where they mate and calve December to March) and Alaska (where they feed primarily). The pic above features a life size depiction of a humpback whales tale (15 ft across). We even saw 3 or 4 blowing and showing their tales quite a ways offshore! Best part of all was celebrating the arrival of the whales with a whale cake!
Then we carefully chose a nearby beach (Mau Umae (a little hard to get to but a favorite secret beach of the locals)
and were visited by our friends the Francolin (something like a quail or partridge (in the same family))
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