Surprises in the Mail

On Thursday, I hiked into the Makaleha section of Eastern Kauai. This hike is a trail of use, not an officially maintained trail so it was a very wild experience. I'll give you a summary and a few pictures to whet your appetite, but the complete story will follow in a later edition. It involves wading thigh-deep through the stream, meandering through dense bamboo groves, crossing the stream a couple more times and it gets harder from there. At this point, the "trail" passes through hau trees whose branches grow up, down, sideways, etc. As a result, the hike turns more into a climb on a jungle gym - pardon the pun. I mentioned a machete in a previous post...well, now I have one and it's been used. In fact, following machete marks is the way to follow the "trail". The last couple hundred yards you wade through the stream to a convergence and at that point you're rewarded with a fairy tale view of 5 waterfalls, some of which are close to 1000 feet high, some a couple hundred feet and partially obscured. I included the view of the upper falls from the trailhead.

While I was working an extra shift today, Em called and told me I had a package at home. She said she thought she knew what it was, but I wasn't expecting anything so I had no idea.

If you've been keeping up with my posts or know me at all, you know that I'm hurting for high quality beer out here. I'm sure only a few can understand my pain, but when you've known somebody for 30 years, they understand. My long-time friend, Hark Johnny, sent me a package and from the first look I knew it would be good.

Life here on Kauai is pretty good, like a nearly perfect rainbow. All it took was a few homebrews from Hark to make the rainbow completely perfect.

I won't go into too many details on the beer, but the one on the left is the IPA we (mostly Hark) brewed shortly before I left for Kauai. I don't know how much it cost to get that sixer here, but it's got to be one of the most expensive ones I've ever had. Hark, that shipping's gonna payoff tenfold for you somewhere down the line. By the way, I already had one of the porters and the taste/carbonation was perfect. Mad props to Hark J!!!!