Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Hawaii
Nice, but a bit damp
Ok, I'm back and getting settled into work after two weeks on the road. Hawaii, I am sad to report, was kind of a bust. I think it may have made the news here, but either way, Hawaii is having some freak weather. Of the 12 days or so I was there, it rained (not a passing shower type thing, but all day down pours) for about 10 of them. Still, I was in Hawaii and 70 degree weather with rain is better than 40s and rain. But it gets better.
For some reason, perhaps the dry air on the plane, I caught a cold. The cold kicked in full blast the morning of my speech and after an hour and a half of talking, I was beat. I scooted back to my hotel to get my stuff and flew to Kauai for some R&R. Arriving in Hawaii, I pretty much turned blue walking up the jet way and had to head off to the emergency room...my bronchitis apparently was severe enough to cause an asthma attack (which is pretty severe since I never had asthma before this trip). Anyway, spent some time in the emergency room where the pumped me full of drugs and sent me off to my cabin on the North Shore for bed rest.
All was not bleak however. After two days of bed rest, I started feeling better. The clouds lifted long enough for a helicopter tour of the island. I did the Inter-Island Helicopter tour which uses small helicopters with the doors removed. It rocked. My final two days were sunny and nice. Made the effort to drive around the island out through the muddy sugar cane fields to "Barking Sands" beach...which was as beautiful as it was remote. Certainly not the ideal vacation, but even with the rain and the illness, it was still fun.
Ok, I'm back and getting settled into work after two weeks on the road. Hawaii, I am sad to report, was kind of a bust. I think it may have made the news here, but either way, Hawaii is having some freak weather. Of the 12 days or so I was there, it rained (not a passing shower type thing, but all day down pours) for about 10 of them. Still, I was in Hawaii and 70 degree weather with rain is better than 40s and rain. But it gets better.
For some reason, perhaps the dry air on the plane, I caught a cold. The cold kicked in full blast the morning of my speech and after an hour and a half of talking, I was beat. I scooted back to my hotel to get my stuff and flew to Kauai for some R&R. Arriving in Hawaii, I pretty much turned blue walking up the jet way and had to head off to the emergency room...my bronchitis apparently was severe enough to cause an asthma attack (which is pretty severe since I never had asthma before this trip). Anyway, spent some time in the emergency room where the pumped me full of drugs and sent me off to my cabin on the North Shore for bed rest.
All was not bleak however. After two days of bed rest, I started feeling better. The clouds lifted long enough for a helicopter tour of the island. I did the Inter-Island Helicopter tour which uses small helicopters with the doors removed. It rocked. My final two days were sunny and nice. Made the effort to drive around the island out through the muddy sugar cane fields to "Barking Sands" beach...which was as beautiful as it was remote. Certainly not the ideal vacation, but even with the rain and the illness, it was still fun.
