A bit of family history in Hawaii

My family has history in Hawaii and we got to stay at a hotel that is significant to us for the first three days of our trip. The Royal Kona Resort is a hotel that is partially on land that my family has owned for many years. I'm sure my mom or my Aunts will be happy to correct me if I get any of this history wrong! My great-grandpa (we called him Bamp) was a business man. He bought a parcel of land on the Big Island in Kailua Kona somewhere in the '40s. My mom has memories of playing on this land as a child back when there were just some "apartments" on it and lots of open space to climb and explore on the rocks and tide pools. Bamp, being the businessman that he was, put together a package of four parcels of land so a hotel could be built in this prime location somewhere in the '60s. (Interesting fact added by my mom...he had to petition in Washington DC and they said "Who would want to go to a hotel in Kona?") The land gets passed down only to descendants so currently my mom, her two sisters and their cousins are the ones that own the original piece of land. The hotel has a 99 year lease agreement. This is the hotel we stayed at for the beginning of our adventure here in Kona. 

I have not been to the Big Island since I was three when my grandma passed away so I was very excited to just be at "the" hotel and be a part of the Williams family history. Just so you know, no one at the hotel would know or care one bit about who I am so there were no deals or discounts to be had! The rooms are nothing to be excited about. Most of them are in need of an update as they have not been renovated since the '80s or '90s.  The best part of the room was our view of the mountain beyond the parking lot.

However, the lobby/bar/grounds of the hotel is gorgeous. So far, I believe, even the fancy resorts we've walked around don't compare to the beauty this place has going on. It was a perfect place for our family to hang out for a while.

Every where you go, there is a view to be had.

There is an open air bar and restaurant and lounge area that is right on the water. It's a bonus that kids are welcome anywhere, the Mai Tais are delicious, and they are a great price during happy hour.

 All of the lobby and hallways are outdoors with lush vegetation and a koi pond.

                 

          There is a peaceful "lagoon" with lava rock steps right into the ocean.  

There is a black-bottomed pool where you can swim or watch the sunset while sipping a Mai Tai on one of the lounge chairs.

Or you can just choose to do stickers as the sun sets if you're Wyatt.

 

There are fun Hawaiian-looking details everywhere. The whole place has a serene, peaceful atmosphere.

We felt "our" hotel was a delightful place to stay and relax and I feel so fortunate to have gotten to spend some time there. We will absolutely be stopping by over the next few weeks to enjoy a couple more sunsets!

So. Much. Luggage.

The length of our stay in Hawaii really hit me the other day when I counted out my 60 something fish oil vitamins. That's a lot! It occurred to me that I should have just brought the whole bottle. Or bought a new bottle there...

How do you decide what to bring with you in a family of 4 for a two month trip? The clothes part is pretty easy. Especially when the weather shouldn't be lower than 60 even in the dead of night. Throw in tank tops, shorts, dresses, Hawaiian shirts (Nate's staple anyway,) rain jackets and one pair of warm clothes for the top of the mountain and we're set. There are some adorable hand me downs for Ava that I can't wait for her to get to wear in the warm weather. 

It's the beach and baby gear that starts to get tricky. We had to ask ourselves what we value in terms of comfort and price when we are there that long. We don't want to be buying things we already have at super inflated prices but it's a lot of stuff! Do we bring the little potty or lift Wyatt up every time he needs to go? (BRING!) 

We also included...

...a little folding highchair for Ava
...her pack n play
...water wings
...beach towels
...boogie boards...

We bought Costco snorkel gear years ago when Nate and I went to Oahu so we definitely brought those instead of renting every time or buying a new set. 

This is something I am SO EXCITED for that I just discovered. It's called a snooze shade. It fits on our BOB stroller and blocks out like 99% of UV light. There is a cute little window that unzips so we can peek inside. The goal is to be able to pop Ava in there with a sound machine and a little fan to keep her cool and she will have wonderful relaxing naps on the beach while Wyatt plays happily in the sand and we read our books.  I'll let you know how that works out!                  

All in all we have four large suitcases, two carry ons, two backpacks, a laptop case, one diaper bag, two carseats and one stroller. Not bad in my opinion!

I'm writing this post from the bedroom of our hotel we're starting at for the first few days. (More on this another day!) so...we made it!! 

Read on to find out how the getting here went...

7:00 Sunday night: Arrive in Auburn so my mom could drive us to the airport the next day. Realize we left Ava's favorite sleep sack at my sister's. (first thing we forgot.)

8:15 Monday morning: Head to the airport with my mom. We all fit in the CRV with all the stuff!

9 am ish: Unload everything at the airport. Take a picture of ALL the stuff. 

9:20 am: Try to check our bags but the machine won't comprehend what we are trying to do. Nate checked us in the day before, selected our number of bags and it only charged us for one. (The stroller and carseats are always free so we should have been charged for 4.) We thought maybe we had been gifted some free bags because the airline had changed our flights a million times and we had complained to them. Not so. Apparently the system had failed us and continued to fail us the next morning. We ended up stuck with a lady who spent OVER half an hour trying to fix the problem. I eventually tell my mom who had been waiting around to make sure all our bags were under the weight limit that she better head to work.  It KEPT not charging us for our bags and she insisted on entering and entering and ENTERING our bags until it finally charged us the right amount. We thought we should have been given at least one free bag for this inconvenience but she didn't agree. 

10:00 am: Security. They sent us and a million other people to a different line because the closest was full. The line they sent us to was temporarily closed for a shift change. Huh. Made it through with Wyatt only running a couple people over with his roller backpack. We were complimented on how fast we were at loading everything onto the conveyer belt.

10:25 am: An hour till take off. Our gate is at the farthest of the A gates so we enjoy a couple moving walkways along the way. We are able to check our "extra" carry-ons at the gate for free so we don't have to handle them again until we get there.

11:25: Ava has been awake since 7:30. Too long! We are on the plane but hanging out a bit. She eats, we swaddle her and we watch her slowly fade into sleep withOUT a peep! 

11:40 am: Take off 20 min late. Ava sleeps almost the entire flight to San Fran and Wyatt plays with stickers, drinks his juice, eats lots of snacks and enjoys his iPad. I actually finish a book while holding Ava. This is amazing and a glimpse of what I hope airplane flight will be like all the time for us in about 10 years.

1:45 pm: As we are getting close to landing the flight attendants ask that those who are heading to Honolulu deplane first so they can rush to their flight waiting for them. We are grateful we insisted the airline fix the flights they changed on us that had made us have a 40 minute layover. 

2:00 pm: Instead we have a 3 hour layover. :/

We eat, take Wyatt to a rather lame kids area where he plays tag with the other kid there, use a whole bunch of moving walk ways and teach Wyatt to not run the opposite direction. Before we know it, it's boarding time again.

5:00 pm: We take off in a flight that has a ton of empty seats! People are laying down across three seats all over the plane. We decide to take up two sets of seats as a family. In the next 5 hrs, 23 minutes Ava sleeps twice, fusses a bit, smiles at people and plays happily lying down across a couple seats. Wyatt alternates between stickers, iPad, snacks and his water color book. And he drinks about three cups of apple juice. And pees in the tiniest of bathrooms about 7 times. Nate and I alternate duties so we can each get a few minutes of time with the free in-flight entertainment or a nap. 

10:30 pm our time 7:30 Hawaiian time: We arrive! We are having a shuttle take us to the hotel and the man who greets us gets all our luggage for us onto a cart and takes it to the shuttle. That in itself was worth the cost of the shuttle. The man who drives us tells us all the important things we are passing as we go...like Costco and Walmart :-) 

Wyatt falls asleep within about a minute of our drive and he is OUT (though occasionally talking to us and following directions with his eyes closed) through all the unloading, carrying him to the stroller, putting him in his PJs and laying him down in bed. Ava is bright eyed and bushy-tailed until we put her in the pack n play. 

10:00pm Hawaiian time, 1:00am our time: We are all in bed.

I am pretty proud of how we all did for such a long day. Nate has a cold, Wyatt and Ava are both fighting lingering snotty noses, I tweaked my back the other day and was still a bit sore but we didn't let those things totally ruin our ability to deal with the exhaustion that is traveling. I wrote this post while Wyatt was taking a 2.5 hr nap so I think we might be recovering for a bit.

Next up: Why we're staying at this particular hotel for a few days!