We were nearing Tunnel’s Beach, and traffic was getting really congested. Cars were lining both sides of the road, parked illegally, according to both our guidebook and all the “No Parking Any Time” road signs. People with beach bags and swim suits were walking along the narrow road; cars going both directions squeezed in the constricted space between parked vehicles and pedestrians. We got worried. It was crowded; parking looked grim. At Ha’ena State Park, the end of the road, a sign declared “Road closed,” and we were turned around. Crews were doing clean-up work after the recent heavy rains. That’s why parking was such a nightmare: all the parking at the state beach was unavailable.

Thinking that maybe the cops (who were also inching along the clogged roadway) were turning a blind eye to the parking situation today because of the parking lot closure, we parked right under one of those ubiquitous “No Parking Any Time” signs, like everyone else.

We were wrong, like everyone else.

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We were standing on the helipad of Jack Harter Helicopters, watching helicopters land and take off.

It wasn’t perfect weather. The sky was full of dark clouds and it seemed awfully windy. Orange airport flags flapped wildly, their slender poles bent over. But the pilot (who’d been flying for something like fifteen years, including two years in the Army) didn’t seem concerned with the weather, so why should I?

Martin and I were ushered into the two front seats, grinning our fool heads off, and strapped down. The propellers roared overhead, competing with the wind.

And then suddenly we lifted smoothly off the ground, sliding sideways. Nose pointed down, we skimmed along the outskirts of the airport, and then rose miraculously and breathlessly up into the sky, where dark mountains and green fields and the blue ocean opened up before us.

Martin and I squeezed hands tightly, grinned wider and wider, pointed here and there. Martin was shooting lots of video footage and lots of photos, although I’m not sure how he did all that composing and metering and camera-fiddling while simultaneously holding my hand, pointing out sights, and hanging out of the helicopter.

Oh, did I mention that there were no doors on the helicopter?

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Today was the Jungle Hike day – an attempt to find a poorly-marked trail and follow it to a picturesque waterfall cascading into a tranquil blue pool. So we piled into the Jeep (and of course it immediately started to rain, the skies seem to watch our every move), and drove back up to the arboretum.

When the road disappeared into the Wailua River, Martin kept driving, as we did that first day – right into and across the river. But instead of parking on the far side, Martin shifted the Jeep into four-wheel drive, and started inching up the steep dirt road in front of us.

And so our adventure began! We crawled up impossible inclines. We jounced over jumbled rocks and boulders. We navigated deep ruts. We splashed through muddy puddles.

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Martin was up again before sunrise and out of the condo in his quest for Sunrise Pictures. Hope does spring eternal. By the time I rolled out of bed, several very-civilized hours later, the sky was as it’s always been: grey, with darker grey patches and slashing rain on the horizon. Heavy brown surf pitched in the bay, and wind whipped through the coconut trees.

And Martin is out there somewhere, facing bravely into the wind, camera optimistically set up, waiting to see if the sun just might burst through the heavy bank of black clouds.

I just love him for that.

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Martin and I awoke to pounding surf, grey skies, and threatening rain. We stood on our little lanai in the dark, overlooking the leaden bay, listening to the roaring surf and howling wind, and watched the sun struggle to come up.

Despite such iffy weather and threatening skies, we decided to venture out, driving up Kuamo’o Road to ‘Opeaka’a (“Jumping Shrimp”) Falls. We admired the view of the thundering waterfall, then drove on, stopping frequently at other overlooks along the road and admiring the flocks of handsome “red junglefowl” (really, a bunch of chickens) pecking freely through the wet grass. The Keahua Arboretum was at the end of the road, where the road plunged into the Wailua River.

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Los Angeles Times, March 8, 2012: “Anyone dreaming of a sunny winter break in Hawaii this week can forget it. The governor has declared a disaster area on Kauai after days of relentless rain that caused flooding, mudslides, water-spouts, hail, and dangerously high surf. The weather service said a low-pressure zone is getting ready to dump more rain, including possible thunderstorms.”

Ah yes. Of course. The forecast is for rain.

Lots of rain. Every weather website displays icons of black clouds and slashing rain drops, usually graced with fierce lightning bolts. Day after day after day.

The Beebees must be going on vacation!

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