Home Directory Yosemite FRAMED?
A week in Hawaii, the Butt State, where people smoke in restaurants and other public places. We flew directly to Kahului, Maui's largest city. Our first night in Hawaii the full moon shone over the ocean, lighting the yard as if it were day. A few days later the moon waned to half full. We saw no more stars out than we see at home. Hawaii's weather is like California's but with a narrower, slightly higher temperature range and more humidity. It got cooler at night but people still wore shorts. Hawaiians dress casually, with flowered shirts everywhere, including ours.Recommended accommodations are the Outrigger Pacific Island beachfront hotel chain. You can even take your room key home! Good service, food, open-air lobby and low-rise nonsmoking rooms. Restrooms are clean and graffiti-free. An adjacent shopping center is under construction.
Hawaii's second largest island, Maui has no public transit, local or connecting. Despite public need it went bankrupt due to poor marketing strategy. Transit between Hawaii's islands is only by air. Shuttles and trolleys traverse western Maui for $10 round trip day pass. Good thing the shuttles wait for each other when they connect at the Aquarium - they run every 2 hours. Open-air Shoppers Express trolleys run hourly between Lahaina and outlying Kapalua shopping centers and hotels. Newsstands carry San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York newspapers. There's plenty of 49ers and Raiders fans here. University of Hawaii football tickets sell out in minutes. Water and team sports are popular as is Hawaiian music.
For those visiting Hana on eastern Maui there's the Hana Road starting at the Kahului K-Mart, continuing through small towns like Pa'ia and Haiku, segueing past sugar cane fields into a twisting mountainside road through bamboo forests and past waterfalls we were supposed to see but didn't. Almost half way to Hana is a church and cemetery buiilt in the 1800s and still in use. Recommended is the famous Hana Guide, Maui's Original since 1985, cassette or CD. Even locals listen to the gentle Hawaiian woman describing Hana Road's points of interest. I searched the label for a website to see if she'd made other tapes. The southern coast road is under construction. Car rentals don't allow their cars there and won't assist you there.
Lahaina's Front St shopping, art galleries and restaurants mingle with a few historic sites. The Baldwin Missionary House charges admission. Their historic sites map is difficult to follow. See the Wing Ho Chinese temple and museum, a few blocks down Front St. The Wharf Cinema - where the trolley stops in Lahaina - is across the street from the bird-filled banyan tree across Front St from the library and the harbor. Good food is at Chicago Pizza and the Forrest Gump themed restaurant where if you sit by the window and throw crackers out you see fish. There's also Denny's. Crazy Shirts' Whalers Museum displays the owner's collection of whaling artifacts. The back yard has a Scotsman figurehead and a telescope offering free ocean views. A wooden sailor guards the front door, cheerfully posing with visitors.
If you're people-friendly, with fun things on your mind, take the Maui Princess dinner dance cruise. The 118-foot Maui Princess, gyroscoped for smooth rides, is too big for the harbor. From Pier 3 the Lahaina Princess ferries passengers to and from the Maui Princess. Notable passengers include 3 good ladies and their escort, fun to see and party with. I hope they see this writeup. The crew deserves raises for their friendly, efficient service. If you agree, and I hope you do, PLEASE tell the office!! Mahalo!
Rather than carry too much literature home I wrote down URLs, glad of that option. Flying over the Pacific ocean above the clouds all night we still saw few stars. Returning to the mainland early on a weekday morning the bus took us to within 3 blocks of our apartment. For friendly, fun people visiting Maui we hope these recommendations help make your stay a happy one.
VISITING YOSEMITE Greyhound at Mariposa transfers to the Yosemite bus. Entering Yosemite it turns a tree-lined corner and sees golden sunlight on El Capitan. Turning another corner there's Half-Dome. Yosemite retains Camp Curry tent-cabin on "bus holds" since the Yosemite bus arrives after the 5:00 arrival deadline. The cafeteria has good food and service. Evenings are presentations on Yosemite wildlife. Our first night at Yosemite we saw a whole skyful of stars, including Cygnus the Swan set against the whole Milky Way streaming across Yosemite's night sky. Stare fascinated. Such a view is seldom available even at Yosemite. The next night, cloud-covered, barely showed a dozen stars. In the parking lot stands the heavy steel tube used to return marauding bears by helicopter to their native high country Yosemite habitat, after marking their ears to show they'd paid Camp Curry a visit. Yosemite bears recognize picnic baskets and coolers by sight even through closed windows and tearing cars apart to get at them. They go in tent cabins if they smell food there.
Whether or not you can afford the 2-hour horseback ride around Bridalveil Falls and Yosemite Meadows, stop to pet the mules used for Yosemite's high country. After lunch in Yosemite Village, tour Yosemite's Museum. Stare fascinated at glaciers lopping off Half Dome's missing half. See Yosemite Indian life and crafts exhibits and craftsman at work. Camp Curry registration includes free access to Yosemite Lodge's swimming pool, surrounded by 800-year-old lodgepole pines. Mule deer graze Village lawns as if you're not there. In Yosemite Village there's Duane Tucker's one-man free show Range of Light, John Muir's losing battle against unregulated destruction of wilderness areas. Walk under redwoods past other Village campsites and the ice rink, closed until winter. Stop at the Merced River foot bridge, Yosemite's popular summer swimming hole. At Yosemite's Visitors' Center is an old Yosemite Valley relief map. A friendly resident Yosemite bat flies down from the rafters to greet you.
Hanging out in Yosemite Valley a couple days you see all there is to see there. Lack of connecting transit except for pricey tour buses confine you to the Villages. Rat study after rat study and bar graph after bar graph based on chicken entrails but still no real connecting transit. Despite their endless, inane parade of deadbeat transit consultants Yosemite's transit situation stays the same, with pricey employee entry buses. Transit ridership grows not by banning cars but by providing and promoting transit. Many parks have no transit either to or within them. Fund park transit with a 10% surcharge on park purchases except housing, a wonderful, simplified idea letting visitors pay their share without hardship. Why can't parks buy buses and hire drivers, expanding visitors' range (and spending) instead of turning them away yawning? Commercial enterprise would have buses up immediately, affordably, 24/7/365, no excuses.