Friday, January 4, 2013

Waikiki Sunrise 1/4/2013 over Diamond Head

Waikiki Sunset Stroll 1/4/2013

Waikiki Sunset Stroll 1/4/2013 (youtube)

 On my walk today there was a nice sunset along Waikiki beach. It has been raining a lot all week  but luckily It cleared up enough this afternoon. Definitely winter time in the islands.  
While I was walking along the beach the Mynah birds were voicing their place in the banyan and trying to get a nice warm spot for the evening. The ocean is quite calm today but there is a lot of wind. The forecast is for more wind tomorrow.






As I got further down the beach I found a Hawaiian Monk Seal sleeping on the shore. The beach was taped off  to give the seal enough space for a good rest. It is very common for the seals to rest at Waikiki and there is a group of volunteers that do a great job of giving the seals their space.  When you see the seals on the beach please give them enough comfort space to rest. 







Ezogiku Ramen Waikiki


Ezogiku Ramen Waikiki, 2146 Kalakaua Avenue



 Akiko and I had Dinner at Ezogiku last night and it was quite good. Ezogiku is on Kalakaua avenue close to Lewers on the mauka side of the road. You can get FREE GYOZA with this coupon until 1/6/13! 




The service is really good and it is a typical ramen shop as far as the decor is concerned. I had a crispy noodle with seafood dish and Akiko had a vegtable salt ramen. 











Both dishes were great and we left content. We had been shopping earlier and forgot out shopping bag in he restaurant...oops. When we got home we called and the folks at Ezogiku had already put the shopping bag on the side in anticipation of our return. GREAT PEOPLE! Ezogiku Ramen is very popular for lunch and Akiko eats there a lot with her friends. I definitely recommend Ezogiku for a hot bowl of ramen, or in my case a plate of crispy noodles with seafood. 









Thursday, January 3, 2013

East Coast O'ahu, Hawaii Playing With my Swann Freestyle

East Coast O'ahu, Hawaii Playing With my Swann Freestyle (youtube video)



I stuck my new Swann Freestyle HD camera on the windshield of my truck and headed over to Tutus house in Kailua. I took the scenic route along the coast and passed through Hawaii Kai, Sandy Beach, Waimanalo, Lanikai and then in to Kailua. This video just shows where I could see the water. The remote control is great for starting and stopping the camera from inside the truck. I had the camera in the waterproof housing because it looked like it might rain. It was very humid from all the rain the night before and by the time I reached Lanikai the camera housing was getting all fogged up. Other than that it seemed to work pretty well.


The Hawaiian Kou Tree - Cordia subcordata

Kou Tree - Cordia subcordatakou We have Kou trees around Waikiki and around O'ahu. Kou Haole (Cordia sebestena) has a more orange flower and is slightly different than this tree. The city plants Kou trees all along the roadways and you will see them in many parking lots and parks. The Kou tree is an indigenous Hawaiian plant found around the Pacific region. The tree is very hearty and makes great shade on Waikiki beach. The flowers are used for lei making and the wood used for food bowls ('umeke). Long lasting with little shrinkage this wood is prized for large containers. Because of little sap or off flavors from the sap, this is a preferred wood for food containers. The leaf of the Kou is historically used to make a brown dye for Kapa, Hawaiian printed fabric.  

 

Mahalo Wikipedia - Cordia subcordata

In ancient Hawaiʻi kou wood was used to make ʻumeke (bowls), utensils, and ʻumeke lāʻau (large calabashes) because it did not impart a foul taste to food. ʻUmeke lāʻau were 8–16 litres (2–4 gal) and used to store and ferment poi. The flowers were used to make lei, while a dye for kapa cloth and aho (fishing lines) was derived from the leaves.[3]

Mahalo nui loa e Na Mea Makamae
'Umeke Nui - Large Calabash

This exceptionally large kou calabash is very rare. Kou wood was used because of its workability and fine grain. It did not impart a bad taste to food as did some of the other woods, such as koa. Wooden kou bowls were usually reserved for the ali'i (royalty), while the maka'ainana (commoners) used containers made of hollowed out gourds.

The kou tree once was common along the shore, but was attacked in the 1850s by a nonnative insect that almost wiped out the species. Though not common, the tree can still be seen at certain shoreline locations. This calabash measures 13.5 inches high and 16.5 inches across the rim.

Mahalo nui loa a aloha mai no kaua e +Jan TenBruggencate 

HAWAI'I'S ENVIRONMENTKou tree predates voyagers
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Columnist

The kou tree was so useful to early Hawaiians, and is so widely spread throughout Polynesia, that it made perfect sense for early scientists to assume it was one of the "canoe plants."

Those are plants Polynesians are assumed to have brought with them in canoes — the plants that they deemed critical to survival in a new land. Canoe plants included food plants, medicinal ones, and ones used for decorative purposes, cordage and more. Most of the nearly 30 canoe plants are found throughout the Polynesian Triangle.
Kou is perhaps most valuable for its wood, which can be carved into sturdy, long-lasting bowls that can hold liquid foods without imparting a taste to them. In addition, its orange flowers were used for lei, and its leaves could be used to dye tapa, as Isabella Abbott wrote in her remarkable book "La'au Hawai'i: Traditional Hawaiian Uses of Plants."
Other canoe plants were yams, sweet potatoes, gingers, bananas, breadfruit, coconut and many more.
It had long been believed the pandanus, hala, was a canoe plant, for the food value in its fruit, but perhaps more for the prized leaves used for weaving mats, sails and much more. But some years ago, hala imprints were found in an ancient lava flow, proving the plants predated human presence in the Islands. More recently, hala pollen has been found deep in sediment layers at multiple sites that date to long before human arrival, confirming the lava-flow evidence.
Now, it turns out kou falls into the same category.
Pollen studies in the Makauwahi Sinkhole at Maha'ulepu on Kaua'i have found that kou was part of the coastal forest on Kaua'i thousands of years before the first Polynesians set foot on the archipelago.
Archaeologist/ecologist David Burney, who conducted the pollen studies, said the find was a surprise.
He has been trying to plant a forest that looks like what was on the southern Kaua'i coast before Hawaiians arrived, and his plantings now include both the kou and the hala.
As Abbott has suggested, this still doesn't mean the first canoes didn't carry these plants. They were important enough to have been part of the canoe plant collection.
But in these cases, the early visitors would have been confronted by something familiar amid all the strange Hawaiian plants and creatures. And they could have begun fashioning food containers from the kou and sleeping mats from the hala without waiting for their canoe-borne materials to mature and reproduce.

A special mahalo to the National Tropical Botanical Garden




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Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Around Waikiki Beach New Years Day 2013

Hawaiian Monk SealAround Waikiki Beach New Years Day 2013 (video)


A short walk along Waikiki beach today, New Years Day 2013. The new year started off with some well needed rain but the sun was pushing through the clouds around Kapiolani park and along Waikiki Beach. Lots of surfers in the water and the smell of bbq in the air. A very nice day to start off the new year!

San Souci Beach Waikiki Nadatorium
Queens beach Waikiki Aquarium

Queens Beach Hawaii

Kapiolani park
Kapahulu Groin




humuhumunukunukuapuaa


Sony Open Hawaii 2013

kou







Happy New Year!