Big Island was our second of the three islands that we visited. Since the only way to travel between islands is by plane, the 30th October was set aside for packing up at Maui, returning the car to the Maui Island Kahlui Airport, flying to Big Island, picking up our first convertible (we lashed out, and upgraded from the economy option to the convertible option – a Ford Mustang!) and checking into the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel.

The Mauna Kea was definitely our favourite hotel as it was designed (and renovated within the last few years), by a person with vision that we could relate to.  After establishing that our keycards did not let us into the room, the bellboy played a special ‘unpublished’ song for us in our room on his ukulele.  Several hours later, the hotel decided that fixing our keycard was too difficult, and so we were upgraded to a large luxury suite, free of charge!

That night we ate a clam bake buffet dinner, and I sampled 7 different crustaceans that I hadn’t ever tried before.  We had a special private table, set up on the lawn just at the edge of the sand of what is possibly the most scenic beaches on the Big Island.  The sun set as we ate our way through the courses of the buffet, listening to a Hawaiian gentleman play acoustic guitar.  After dinner he invited Morven and I to the dance floor, and a few other couples followed our lead.  Every time we clapped after a song, he would say “yeahhh,..  mahalo”, (mahalo means hello/thankyou) in the most chilled out voice we had ever heard. This became a feature expression used between us throughout our honeymoon, and we’re still saying it today!