Some Mondays are better than others…

(scroll down to see HD video that doesn’t fit in this column)

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While vacationing in Maui my brother and I went on a day trip to the Big Island to visit Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  You can almost feel the Earth simmering just below the surface.

You wonder if it makes sense to build roads here.

But they did and you can drive to the newly formed coastline.

Driving up the volcano it becomes dense rainforest.  There’s a lava tube you can walk through.

There is something about Maui that is good for the soul.

Something in the sweet warm air, the fields of sugar cane and pineapples, the palm trees swaying in the trade winds, the Humpback whales passing by, the soothing surf lulling you to sleep each night, the conch blowing at sunset, the macadamia nuts, poke, laulaus, papayas, Maui chips, Hawaiian sweet bread French toast, sandy beaches, rainbows, waterfalls, volcanoes, tropical birds, tropical flowers, lounging on the lanai with a pina colada and mahi mahi right off the barbeque, swimming with turtles and schools of tropical fish, and spending halcyon days barefoot and carefee.

I miss it already.

Here’s where we stayed:

My brother and I went on a short hike to a blowhole:

Random flower shot:

Short video clip from the blowhole:

I’m back from a weekend in Seattle, one of my favorite cities.  I stayed at a friend’s place and on Saturday we wandered around downtown where the Space Needle looms overs you the entire time:

Right by the Space Needle is the Science Fiction Museum which I wanted to visit.  Here’s the entrance with the monorail cutting through it.

The museum has Captain Kirk’s chair, a Death Star model used in the first Star Wars movie, and tons of other stuff.   The same place houses the Experience Music Project which features a lot of guitars:

It was typical March weather in Seattle:

I was convinced to take a tour of the library which is architecturally interesting and bold in its use of color:

Wandering around downtown was fun, but the highlights of the weekend were an amazing dinner at Cafe Juanita and the best latte I’ve ever had at Vivace.