Day 4 of the cruise - Hilo - Part 2

A little break from seeing what happens underground to see what grows above ground. The Akatsuka Orchid Nursery was our next stop and we were invited to browse the handful of rows that were inside the main building but not the large greenhouses behind it. The nursery owner encouraged us to find the orchids that smell like chocolate and root beer. I'd remembered the chocolate smelling orchid from our Road to Hana visit but don't think I found the root beer orchid. I did however spend $2.50 to get a root beer from the nursery's vending machine because they had my preferred kind. There were surprisingly a lot more people into ordering arrangements to send back to family and friends this time though. I recall hearing one lady counting off relatives' names like she was introducing someone at a family reunion.

You've heard of message in a bottle? Well here's orchid in a bottle:

Even with my house potatoes addition at breakfast, we were ready for some sustenance by now so Cousin Harry drove us to the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Factory. The "factory" part is a row of windows you have to climb a bunch of stairs to walk past. Most of us instead headed into the gift shop and through to the café which featured a covered but open on the sides area with tables and chairs. 

For the macadamia nut obsessed sweet tooth

Cousin Harry had told us about his favorite item here, a Portuguese hot dog which was more like a spicier sausage. I decided to try the hot dog while Dad ordered a turkey sandwich. The woman working the counter went in the back only to come back and announce that they no longer had turkey sandwiches. He reluctantly ordered a hot dog for himself instead.

It was a little tough finding a table and I snatched one as its occupants left while Dad paid for our food. Shortly after we started eating, we spotted an older couple wandering around with their food and offered to have them join us. Together we ate and chatted about our slightly different tours as they were doing almost the same itinerary in a different order via a Princess cruise line tour. I'm all for holding a table for your party in crowded situations like this but we will always let someone share our table if we have extra seats. You end up meeting some interesting people by being kind and sharing polite conversation.

Inside the gift shop, there was a woman at a counter offering to dish out samples of any flavor of macadamia nuts you wanted to try.

Cousin Harry told us about the sample counter and said his favorite was the Maui onion flavor. I gave in to my aversion to nuts to try his favorite. He saw me trying it in the store and quizzed me about how I liked it. I politely told him that it really did taste like a sour cream and onion potato chip and discreetly dumped the nut I'd tried into the nearby trash can after he'd walked away. Taste was great but once the seasoning came off the actual macadamia nut, I couldn't bring myself to eat it anymore. Dad tried a couple flavors but found the chocolate covered one so bad he got another drink trying to get the taste out of his mouth. We browsed the multiple containers of flavored macadamia nuts but Dad was hesitant to buy such a large package of any flavor. There were only a few containers that were personal snack size. The bulk of the inventory was packaged with the idea that you would be sharing it and gifting it to hundreds of your closest friends. It obviously was a marketable strategy though as we saw people walking out of that store weighed down with multiple bags of large variety boxes and packages. You'd think this was a $10 sale in the cruise shops on board or something! On the perhaps ironic side, Dad was so bothered by the displeasing taste of the chocolate covered macadamia nuts he tried, that he went back to the café and bought chocolate macadamia nut ice cream to change the taste in his mouth and happily polished off the entire thing. There's logic in there somewhere I tell you!

These soaps for sale in the gift shop cracked me up. Doesn't everyone want to rub soap all over their body that has a face on it?

Our next stop was Rainbow Falls. The actual falls is tucked away off the parking lot so there are multiple levels and means to get to where you can view the falls. The easiest path is to the right off the parking lot where there is a staggered set of stairs or a ramp that lets you climb to varying heights and view the falls from across the chasm.

The ramp goes up the center and the right side. Steps are on the left where the bulk of the people are heading.

Look at the top left of this photo and you can see the people who chose the steps.

This is what the steps look like from the parking lot.

Still a great view regardless

The other option is to veer slightly to the left from the parking lot and walk up a bunch of stairs to a viewing platform located behind the falls. This, we were told, was the best place to see and get a picture of a potential rainbow reflecting on the water. I headed to the right thinking that's what Cousin Harry had meant was the best view and got some nice pictures of the falls. Wasn't until I'd returned to the parking lot that I saw the tall staircase that went up behind the falls. By then we didn't have much time left so I opted to stay on the ground. 

One of the other things Rainbow Falls is known for is the wild boars that wander around. I soon noticed a group gathered around the trash cans at the far end of the parking lot and as I walked over, another guy walked past me to head toward them and announced "Oh I can smell the reefer from here!" Once I reached them, I saw a mama boar and several babies wandering around the trash can in hopes of finding their lunch. One of the group tossed their empty chip bag nearby the already overfull trash can and two of the babies ran right for it proceeding to fight over the crumbs.

Once back on the bus Dad joked that our tour must be about over because we'd already visited the money making venues. Cousin Harry soon announced that our last and final stop would actually be the Big Island Candies company. This store was much bigger than the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Factory store. In the back of the store, they had large open windows where you could watch them making the candy. It was really interesting to see how they have to hand dip each piece.

Cousin Harry talked up the brownies sold here that while small are very rich tasting the entire drive over. Frustrated at not being able to find something local to enjoy that appealed to my taste preferences, Dad thought to ask one of the employees to point out products that don't include nuts or some of the more tropical fruit flavors. I was surprised with how much she was able to produce that fit my likes. So much so that we walked away spending $56 on chocolate chip brownies (they come as an individually wrapped 8 pack), mint dark chocolate brownies (another combination that I enjoy and is frequently the only way I get to have anything of my own), chocolate dipped shortbread cookies (yay finally no shortbread plus macadamia nut!), a box of milk chocolate and dark chocolate whole chocolates, and a single Macadamia Nut Caramel Cluster with Milk Chocolate that Dad threw in at the last minute.

Dad ate the cluster as soon as we got back to the cabin but the rest of it we never got around to trying until we got home. The original agreement was that the whole chocolates and the mint brownies were mine while we'd share the cookies and chocolate chip brownies. After trying the chocolate chip brownies and finding that the chips were tiny chips in a layer on top rather than baked in, I let Dad have the rest of them. The cookies were okay and fresher than I expected but I let Dad have most of them too. The mint in the brownies was very strong so even I could only stand 1 or 2 every so often. The longest lasting item in the group was the solid chocolates. I'd brought them over to my desk here at home and each day I'd enjoy one milk chocolate and one dark chocolate as you could just pop them in and let them melt in your mouth.

Back in the cabin we found our latest towel animal and a return to the sweet treats. This time was a platter of mini tarts filled with chocolate, topped with cream, and a couple slices of fruit.