Wednesday, February 27, 2002 Mahukona, Hawaii

It woke me up in the middle of the night last night. There was something different. It took me a little while to realize what it was: the wind had stopped blowing. There was a full moon overhead, so bright I felt like I could read by it, instead, feeling that all was well with the universe, I rolled over and went back to sleep.

I couldn't find my cereal so I had Raman noodles and veggies for breakfast before going out for a snorkel with Tom. Last night I was playing my guitar in the Pavilion at the campground when Tom came over with his three harmonicas. One of them worked with The Midnight Special played in E and another worked with Island Women Blues played in G so we had good time making music. Tom is an architect from Washington State who likes to swim. It is nice to have some company in a new place, especially a coast as exposed as this one is.

There are so many whales cruising the coast here that the sounds of their songs accompanied us as we swam. I spotted the first shark I've ever seen in Hawaiian waters. It was a cute little thing less than three feet long cruising along the bottom twenty five feet below me. I picked up a nice sized sea urchin shell. They are so fragile that I think I'll fill it up with plaster of Paris so that I can get it home without breaking.

I'm slowly getting over the last of my cold. One problem is that sometimes when I dive down I get headache behind my left ear. Must be from the residual stuffiness.

February 28, 2002 Happy Birthday Sophia!

A beautiful clear sunny day. I've been working on trying to see if I can put out a CD of music that I recorded on my video camera. I started off with a one minute test project. First I captured a one minute clip in Premiere. Then after putting it on the timeline I exported the timeline audio only as a .wav file with the output audio set at 44.1K (which is the sampling rate used on audio CDs). Then I used CD Creator to record the one minute file in the Audio CD format to a recordable CD. After burning the CD I put it in my trucks CD player and lo and behold it played! So feeling like I had the whole thing figured out I tried capturing 47 minutes that I taped a few nights ago down at Hookena. That's when I started hitting the bumps in the road. For some reason the charger for the Sony PC100 seems to be causing the inverter I have plugged into the dash of the pickup to switch off at random times. It took a while to figure that out. Then the batch capture file I was using had some wrong numbers in it so I have to go back and capture two more little segments and then I'll have the 47 minutes in the computer. Then I have to edit it down into individual songs which I'll then save in the audio CD format. Like too many things in life it is a lot of work. It is hard to get a lot of work done while on vacation.

While some of the capturing was going on I locked up the Truck and went for a snorkel swim from the pier at Mahukona Park down the coast to Lapakahi State Historical Park where I was able to land on a little rough gravel beach and then walk back along a path to the campground. It took over an hour so I feel like I got some exercise for today. I'm still a little stuffed up, but hopefully the cold is almost gone.

Friday, March 1, 2002

In Hawi getting a cup of coffee and a bagel.

12:03 PM I've just finished recording my first CD: Live From Hookena 2/24/2002. It's got seven songs, and introduction and a talking break. I've made a couple of extra copies to send to Sophia for her birthday and Marianne because I know she'll get a kick out of listening to it. It certainly isn't a studio recording, but I like the ambiance of the live recording on the beach with the sounds of the surf and people partying in the background.

So Let's try putting in a version of Island Women Blues from Live From Hookena 2/24/2002.(NOTE: I'M HAVING SOME PROBLEMS TRYING TO PUT MY MUSIC UP ON THE WEB- BUT DON'T DESPAIR, i'LL KEEP WORKING ON IT AND COME BACK HERE AND FIX IT WHEN i'VE GOTTEN IT FIGURED OUT)

Click here to hear Island Women Blues recorded live at Hookena.(DON'T BOTHER, DOESN'T WORK YET!)

Tuesday, March 5, 2002

I'm back at the Coffee Shack overlooking Kealakekua Bay. I broke camp at Mahukona and was all packed up and on the road before 8 AM. After breakfast at the greasy spoon in Kawaihae I went to Spencer where I plugged in my computer and video camera and uploaded the songs I recorded last night to my computer and made a test CD to see how it sounded playing with Tom and his harmonica. When I was done I went for a long swim before heading south. The water is quite murky until you get about a quarter mile off shore from Spencer. I wonder if it is due to pollution from the Park.

March 6, 2002

Hookena was pretty full and there was no good place to pitch my tent so I decided to head on down the road to Milolii and check it out. It was totally empty except for a bunch of guys playing basketball to the sounds blaring from the open doors of a jacked up pickup truck. I checked out the bathroom, which was clean and OK, but I couldn't find a shower. It was getting near sunset but I decided to take the path along the coast to Honomalino Bay, which is down the coast about a mile. I got there just before the sun set. It is a nice beach in it's own little bay. A few people were camped there, but for me it was a long way to carry my stuff and I don't really want to leave my vehicle where it would be so easy to break into. I have too much stuff to risk it. I walked back to Millolii and played my guitar to the sound of the waves as it got dark. I was working on "Ain't No Use to Sit and Wonder Why" and "Like a Rolling Stone" it takes a while to remember all the verses and get everything in the right order. It is interesting how it does come back to me if I just keep playing around the parts I'm missing until the old memories wake up. I recorded some of my messing around with my video camera. It is nice to have worked out how to get the sounds onto a CD so I can listen to them as I drive around. It is helpful to hear how it sounds as a recording. I find that I like the "live sound" feel. The background noises of surf and people talking are part of the scene.

I decided a few years ago that my artistic credo would be to work on things until they are "good enough", then to declare them done and go on to the next. So I guess that's the way I'll approach putting together a CD of my songs. I'll use the tools and time I have available and see what I end up with.

Saturday, March 9, 2002

I'm feeling like I'm getting into pretty good shape. Yesterday I swam to the far point south of Hookena, a goal I have been working up to. It took me 24 minutes to swim over. I landed and looked for shells on the beach. I was able to find only one good one. Theresa and Babesh seemed to have cleaned it out. Swimming back took 28 minutes. I spent some time diving for sea urchin spines. Then before sunset I did my walk/jog up the hill. I've been starting to run for the first time since I hurt my back a year almost two years ago. It feels good to be able to run again. I'm starting out slowly, working my way.

A Family of Whales Cruising by Mahukona at Sunset

 

Later, having dinner at Bamboo. I'm eating at the bar. It has been a wonderful day. I spent the morning boogie boarding the wedge at Hapuna Beach State Park with the teenagers. The surf was small, but fun. I made lunch in the back of my pickup and called both Jenny and Chris on the cell phone. This is the first time I've traveled with a cell phone and I will say I've been glad to have it. Later I ran one lap on beach in 9:20 and swam for 20 minutes. I'm feeling the exercising I've been doing. I'm trying to be careful that I don't hurt or strain anything. That's why I ran only one lap on the beach and my right elbow is telling me not to push it too fast. I'm in much better shape than I've been in a couple of years, but I've learned the hard way that as you get older it takes a lot longer to recover from injuries and overuse. So easy does it; work into it slowly.

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