Admittedly, our posting pace has been flagging recently. Unfortunately, your beloved today's blogspot crew has been engaged occupationally and otherwise of late. However, to bridge the blog gap, here are some excerpts from an unfinished, relatively unedited travel piece I started ages ago. It's about a trip around the outside of Hawaii's big island in a white Westfalia pop-top.
Here's the final installment to date. The rest is yet to be written.
WHITTINGTON RECREATIONAL PARK
What we found was a sort of revelation. Whittington Recreational Park is a tiny stretch of grass, lava rock, and giant banyen trees that the locals planted many sun-drenched years ago. Our companions consisted of a smattering of locals and a school bus full of idealistic, patchouli-rolled post-adolescent birdwatchers—the Audubon society, to their credit, was searching the nooks of Hawaii for good night parking as well.
We pulled our white land yacht into a spot as far from anyone as we could find and set up camp with a speed that only those with mobile accommodation and boy scouts can match. Dinner was fried ahi fillets accompanied by a vaguely sweet seaweed salad, an overindulgent number of local beers, and the quiet sense of self-satisfaction that a secluded beach can bring.Serenity’s moment ended in an explosion of cowbell and power chords. “Heartbreak, the soulshaker! I’ve been told about you!” The strains of Nazareth’s Hair of The Dog blew across our bow. Glancing around, we discovered the source: a beat-up old sedan that I was surprised to find parked only about twenty feet away. We exchanged furtive glances as a man with a seventies ‘stache and the most extraordinary white Einstein poof of hair stumbled in our direction. After we’d assured him that weren’t overly bothered at the concert in our ocean living room, and my girlfriend had endeared herself to him by requesting a set list that included Steve Miller Band, Whitesnake, and sundry other bands with more hair than talent, ‘Bernie’ officially introduced himself.
A joker and midnight toker for the ages, Bernie had a way of speaking that involved evocatively waving his hands—beer in left hand and the joint in right—in order to illustrate his points. Apparently, his family had emigrated from Germany when he was still in short pants, making Hawaii their new home. Pointing across the way, he explained that his uncle had planted the largest of the large trees that formed the Southern border of the park and that he’d been coming to Whittington for more than thirty years. When I asked him about the “Say No to Drugs” sticker that adorned his rear bumper, he explained that it didn’t refer to drugs of the earth, but rather the “ice” habit he’d kicked two years prior.
To be sure, we had our reservations at first. But a few eighties hair metal tracks and beers later, I think we all felt like we’d made a new friend. We even helped execute the latest strike in what we learned was an ongoing battle with the park rangers, using a tow chain and a crowbar to shift one of the concrete blocks placed to keep the locals from driving their cars to the far point to watch the stars.
It wasn’t until after we’d said our farewells to Bernie that I started to empathize with his determination. Hundreds of miles from the mainland, the stars in Hawaii are spectacular. Under the pinpricked sky, like wide-eyed children, the three of us exchanged gasps as we lay on the grass pointing out constellations and keeping watch for shooting stars. Who could blame Bernie if he wanted a little private time with the heavens?
Overhung and blinking the sleep from my eyes the following morning, I sat up with a start. In the distance, I could hear the sounds of large motor. I slid one of Whitey’s curtains aside to see a fleet of large Parks and Rec trucks pulling into the lot. They headed right for the concrete block we’d moved the night before, surveyed it, and went to work towing it back into place. In the distance, across the park, I could see Bernie eyeing the destruction of his handiwork through a pair of binoculars and laughing.
