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India Round-the-World/John 1 of 7

India Round-the-World, July 2 - November 8, 1971

This will be the last title I type before the trip, and will include whatever I want to type before I leave this apartment and typewriter for the bus to the airport. I even know that the entry for this title on the table of contents will be followed by the date July 3, which is Saturday, and which I won't be able to type up until I get back from the trip. And I know there's enough AFTER I leave the apartment to fill the page devoted TO today, Friday. I lay, fearing, in bed, seeing that John might or might not be awake, but we're not communicating. Watch the light increase until finally I can't stand it anymore and go into the bathroom, seeing that it's just after 6AM. Lay back down, stomach churning only very slightly, and I decide that I really should take a Compazine for my nerves, and do so, and lay in the bed waiting for the drug to take effect, smiling to myself that THIS will be the solace I was looking for, that I'd wander lethargically, but not fearfully, through the day, take another before leaving for the airport, and float through to San Francisco without a twinge. Let's hope so. Then put the last set of tapes on the player, and sit down to type these pages, of which this is the fourth. Have only details left to take care of, and it's now 8:30AM, now only 9 hours to the flight, and I just can't stand sitting here typing, so I have to get up and DO things. But I'll be back. Now it's just after 10, and all I have to do is pack and get the last one (or two) visas, depending on if Plaut comes through with string-pulling. But at this point I'm simply too keyed up to continue much further with this, so I'll stop now and include it in the book, and that'll just be one more finished thing before I leave. I'm sweating even though the air conditioner's on high, and I smell. Now it's about as much time to the time I get ON the flight as I'll spend on the flight itself, and that's a nice point to get to. Oh, again, for that switch that just turns off the mind, and lets the person go through time like an automaton: but that's the very thing I DON'T want, and one of the things about being ALIVE is fearing and anticipating and worrying---and being happy sometime, too, I hope!

July 2, 1971: (Start of Book 1 of Trip Diary). Dash through getting tapes rewound and calling John for bus and gate number and talking to Marty about plants and his date tonight and then I only have dishes to wash and tape to rewind and packing and finally get to packing at 3 and find to my horror that's about 50 pounds, the accordion file doesn't work, and I stuff papers into plastic bags and at 3:35 I'm putting little stuff into tiny satchel, turning off the air conditioner, and leaving, remembering to put the passports into the little bag at the last moment. Out to the subway, but bag is SO heavy I get downstairs, say goodbye to Margaret and try to hail a cab. It's VERY slow, getting to 50th and 9th on $1.60, and I say I have $2 and a subway token and he shuts off waiting time and I get to 40th and 9th at 3:59 and give him $2.30. Dash across floor and up to gate 164 and John's 10 people ahead on bus 107 line, and gives me $1 for 65 cents fare and we get on 4:10 bus at 4:10. Sweat through SLOW bus and SLOW trip and terminal at 4:40 and cart HEAVY bags over to United, too late for insurance and check-in, getting first comment from black couple behind us on our stack of tickets, and through door with carry-on stuff at 5, and plane loads quickly (get good double seats, window on left, front of wing!), at 5:15, and takes off at 5:40, going north over Finger Lakes to Buffalo at 39,000 feet, and over Lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron and Michigan and over Milwaukee and then south to avoid bad weather over Cheyenne, going over Denver and seeing bit of Rockies through clouds. Fairly rocky over hills and clench teeth once for a fast turn. The movie is awful (we don't pay for the earplugs, but it's just killing and chases), and they serve dinner at 4PM, SF time. Clear for Bryce Canyon (they say) and Death Valley goes on valley after valley. They announce Yosemite, and I recognize the steep cliff of Half Dome, Bridal Veil falls full, and the backside of El Capitan in the twilight-filled valley. Through more desolation and see Lick Observatory above San Jose, we race the setting sun to land at 8:40, and Hamp and Hollister are waiting with his idiot-son, Matt, and Matt cuddles against me on our trip down into Santa Clara to 9:20, and we have champagne and chocolate crepes of exquisite heaviness, and we look at paintings and talk and nod, and we're into bed at 10:45 (1:45AM NYC time!).

SATURDAY, JULY 3. Wake at 1:40 for drag-racing on the street outside, then at 4 because it's 7AM NYC time. Lay and doze and lay and up at 6:30 for Compazine (leaving it out, and bless John, HE picks it up). Pack, giving some stuff to him, and into car after coffee at 7AM, getting into traffic along nice route north past SF reservoirs, Stanford's linear accelerator, and Kenyatta, spelled Canada, section of California. To airport at 8 and check in LONG line by 8:30, buying $150,000 insurance for $5 for Bill and mailing it to him, and BOTH bags weigh 41 pounds! To wait area and get poor seats second and third from window on right over wing, and 8:45 flight leaves at 9AM, but it's 6AM Hawaii time. "Jane Eyre" with Susannah York and George C. Scott goes on at 6:45 and goes to 7:30, some intermediate time, fairly good, and we eat LUNCH at 8-9, then I read a bit in "Revolt in 2100" and talk to woman who's visiting Tahiti, and we land at 10:55, good flight, coming north of clouded peaks in Hawaii, and PAST all of Waikiki waterfront, with Diamond Head at right and clouded central peaks at left. Out (John getting me to say I wasn't worried about Pan Am's putting our luggage through to Lihue), and we check in, getting to wait area at 11:30 after riding around summery airport with MYRIAD smelling flowers in little 25 cent shuttle with BEAUTIFUL Eurasian girls, and there's a tour and flight delays and delays and I read book and we're on at 12 and off at 12:15 for FAST up, AGAIN past all Waikiki beach, over VIVID blue ocean and glowing huge heaped white clouds and fly level for ten minutes and start down, past impressive Kawelikoa cliffs and Lihue, ENORMOUS central massif hidden under black clouds, flight taking twenty minutes. Into terminal looking for Holo-Holo: nothing. I ask attendant, he says he hasn't heard. Luggage come in and ours is MISSING! John finds NO Holo-Holo in phone book, calls Hilo information for the number, dials for 65 cents, and finds we HAVE no reservation! Morse's not in and Mrs. Wallace says we can SUE if we want. UGH! Finally luggage arrives on SECOND flight from Honolulu (but I've lost PAPERBACK of "Revolt in 2100"). Call Hilo again and Burduck says he SAID we can have one that someone else wanted for Sunday? Finally Mrs. Wallace calls me SECOND time to say Sunday people cancelled (Hilo hadn't told them) and we GET it. John's sewn his torn suitcase strap, guy comes to pick us up at 2PM, all looks OK. To Rice Street terminal to pay $75 for three days and hear they probably haven't cancelled, and they'd be in tomorrow. TOUGH. Out at 2:30 for groceries for $16.20, into camper at 3:15, and drive NORTH. Past old town of Kapaa, the huge rock at Anahola, the lovely north view from Kilauea, fabulous Hanalei Beach, and past the Haena Cave at 4:30, to the end of the road, into swim suits and into the water. John says "You're really sick if you can't get right in, it's WARM," and I CAN'T. Walk a bit in hot sand and decide to take 11-mile hike: into boots on salty tacky skin and walk 1/2 mile from 5:25-5:35, look at GREAT view over NaPali cliffs and MILES of Pacific and lots of hikers, and back down at 6:10. Shower back in Haena Beach and walk along shore and see Liz Taylor's brother's guests strung out on the beach watching the sunset. I feel VERY out of place and walk back to camper and make dinner, getting steaks on charcoal and hibachi AGAIN too soon, and clouds are GREAT but go out too soon, and I'm into camper to FINISH steak, John comes in to read, I fix bed and climb in and write this FIRST set of pages, and I'm now up to date, and VERY tired, at 9:30, which is 3:30AM NYC time, or even 1:30 if I change one hour per day. John, hot, insisted on swimming DESPITE warnings of discomfort of tacky skin, but he's been gone for a half hour, and I'm starting to WORRY about him. He likes swimming in the moonlight, but this is TOO much. Kids still shouting outside with flashlights at this late time, and the sound of the surf is pleasant in the night, and I'm warm and tacky, and don't even need a sheet tonight, and where IS John? JUST as I finish that, he comes in and fusses around a bit and moans that he can't brush his teeth because there's no water, and comes to bed at 9:45. He goes quickly to sleep and I try to, but suddenly there's the high whine of a mosquito and I swat and swat and swat and can't tell if it's one that always gets away or if it's many. I look around in agony and think that the top screen is the most possible entry and I close it and try to lie down resignedly, but still the buzzes sound and still I slap and swat when I feel the tickle. Then they seem to go away and there's the chance for sleep, but there's a truck droning down the road, it stops, and soon there's the whack-whack of someone driving in tent posts and there's the bright all-around flash of a Coleman lantern, coming and going as people cross in front of it. I get up, disgusted, to watch the five or six guys as they chop wood for the fire, fluff up sleeping mattresses and set up their camp. Down again and mosquitoes again. DAMN! Then I look at watch at 11:10, then there are a few more cars and people shouting and I drift off to sleep. Up at 1:10 to more cars going past, and at 3:30 some crazy rooster crows. Up at 4:10 and gloomily watch as windows get brighter, then doze off and up again at 4:30 and ask John if he's awake and he says yes. We talk a bit and start rubbing cocks.

SUNDAY, JULY 4. Get going fine as day brightens, and I come MOST gloriously for what feels like the first time in a week, and is probably first in 4-5 days. John comes and day is bright at 5, and I'm up and dress and out to get Hibachi and sky is light before sunrise and tide is WAY down to show tidepools and large seaweed stretches. Roll legs up and walk out in water to calves and gingerly step on lava rock with sea urchins lurking beneath, but they seem to not to WANT to be stepped on, fine. John comes out in swimsuit with two oranges, stepping overly gingerly. Tide pools are ALIVE, and receding waters strand long sea worms, segmented and pulpily purple and yellow, with tentacled mouths that seem aware of their impending crisis by drying. Enormous sea slugs look like starfish with all but two opposing legs cut off, about 4-7 inches long, bulbous as a pliant cucumber. Looking more closely I see tiny flat transparent flatworms that ripple themselves over the corners of the coral. A small boy comes past with a stick, capturing angular spiny shrimp, like bits of red and white bead necklace with antennae. Deeper pools have fish-life, sometimes 5 or 6 kinds: angelfish with diagonal white and brown rising stripes, bright green or blue fish with eyes marked by white and black spots of startling contrast, muted green/blue fish, and small minnows of brown and green. Some are snub-nosed like the humahumanukanukaeaea, which point almost straight upward for air in their exhausted pools. Then we look up and the sun has risen: not only are the clouds pink now, but the hills are lit bright yellow, and the greens are vivid and living. The sun comes up as the tide goes down, stranding huge pulsating masses that wait for more moisture. A rainbow forms (second one, one last night, too), and the sky is bright blue except for the white, gray and black clouds as they get closer to the peaks. We've about seen it all, and carefully pick our painful way over the sharp rocks to the beach at 6:30. In the camper, we pump the faucet and water comes, great, and John cleans his teeth and shaves while I unpack everything and arrange it much more sensibly in the suitcase, separating out the trip information into now, India, Southeast Asia, and stuff to keep in the satchel for general use and passports and shot records and cash for the messenger bag. John finishes and we boil eggs and have coffee and juice and take pills and I'm glad to have unpacked, even putting ALL books in since boots are out. Out of camper at 8, boots on and up the trail. Pass point of 1/2 mile in 20 minutes and views are lovely in early morning light. Fish flash in sun, either fearful of jaws from beneath or from the joy of the leap into the air. John says "And people push each other INTO the water." At 1 3/4 mile we see an idyllic stretch of beach, fresh-water inlet along the shore, two guys and one girl prone on towels, and another girl, braless, smiles "hi" as we pass her rock. To a free cave, looking at crabs and mudskippers, and swim nude, LOVELY, in perfect green water. Boy passes, ask, "Mind if I take my clothes off?" I say "No." John hears and strips and swims. Guy comes up and tries to be deep: I'm writing, by looking through a window and not participating. He says "looking glass" and I say "in mirror you see yourself only, but in window you see outside, when it's DARK outside and it BECOMES a mirror." Straights swim past, we don suits. I touch his hair after they leave and suits are back off, saying, "You have nice hair," and he says "It's all snarled," mistaking detail for SENTIMENT and goes swimming nude with John. Now it's about noon and there's smaller and smaller space to hide from the sun. His nose is burnt and greasy from sweat, his legs are extremely thin and there's no meat to his build. His chest is nicely modeled, but the form is a girl's and there's little appeal from his body or from his pale cock. But a lovely tanned Adonis, much aware of his broad hairless chest, puffing it out as he emphasizes his small waist, strips off his red trucks with a shout and dives into the nearest wave, surfacing like a porpoise, pale ass gleaming as if under an oil sheen with contrast to his wet tanned torso. John and I go back to strip and bathe in the fresh-water stream and shampoo and dry ourselves off. Walk back up to the Loop Trail around the valley, and take off on it though there's no mileage marked. Through forests so huge-leaved that each of us looks about three feet tall next to the foot, foot and a half leaves. Rest under an ENORMOUS tree for lunch, and for good-looking guys to pass us, the leader shirtless and pleasantly chested. We catch up with them at a stream and get to what appears to be the end of the trail. A small stream pool beckons to John and he strips and goes in, while I decide to push upstream. Find an even larger pond fed by a rill over rocks, and even I strip to enjoy the cool water on my hot flesh. The sun is DIRECTLY overhead at 12:30, and though I wear a shirt, my arms and thighs are pink. Four guys pass and seem not to notice us. Pity. Then it's time to turn back, seeing too late the trail to the falls, since we want to get back to the car at 3. John wants to retrace our steps and I insist on going forward and we see the huge fireplace of the old mill, a couple of shelters with families eating surrounded by drying linen, lots of bedding, blond babies healthy in the sun. Continue down the shorter trail, spectacular view of the opposite wall of the valley in the clearings and back to the rock to find most of the bathers cleared off. Immediately back over the two-mile trek to the car, and the afternoon heat reflects off the dusty red path, burning my forehead and nose and ricocheting off my legs. I push on and on, John tired behind and I carrying the knapsack most of the time. We'd been sipping sake for refreshment on the trip and after lunch my legs got a bit tangled. Later we used the jar to drink water from a stream, taking some along "in case." Pass many people on this July 4 holiday, and VERY tired back to the car at 3:15. We'd forgotten to sign out on the log, so it was good we were safe. Change and drive out of the lovely campsite and stop in Hanalei for groceries, including a snorkel for me at 4. Continue driving, bypassing Wailua Falls and the Fern Grotto, to get down to Hanamaulu Beach for dinner, and HERE there is a flaw in paradise: the water is brownish and full of grit, and each foot of the beach displays a bit of flotsam: log, coconuts, branches, bits of trees, greenery---a real mess. Kids scream and carry on in the water and I wander down to the tidal lagoon and watch kids fishing, but I won't be trying my snorkel this evening. John's gotten the hibachi started when I get back in time to turn the lamb chops, and we eat inside as the sun goes down across the island into wet-looking clouds. When the sun strikes through, the light is beautiful in the wet-looking leaves (not a speck of dust on ANY of these) and grass, but the effect is gray and foreboding. I read for a while as John goes through the books to get an itinerary for Maui and Hawaii, and then I do the dishes as he showers, and I get out to shower. It's dark then and we're tired and get into bed at 8:45. But it's July 4 and the kids are screaming and shooting firecrackers and we lie down and John goes to sleep and I count seconds between fireworks, absolutely disgusted with children, until I finally manage to get to sleep about 10:30.

MONDAY, JULY 5. Wake at 4:30 again, the sound of the sea nice outside in the silence, and the bug bomb thankfully worked, since I wasn't bothered by bugs. Toss and turn, looking out to find no sign of dawn, and John's up at 5:30, so I slip over him to the john, surprised to find someone's HEAD out of a blanket in the last one. It's cold and VERY windy, a cold spray of sand feeling like water. The lava block architecture of the john is very Japanese castle. There's a bit of pink in the sky, and John's up. We dress and sit by the window looking out at the pinkening sea and I play with him and he loves it, so I start doing him, he asks for Baby Magic and I pull him into bliss just before the sun comes up in a blaze of amber and purple. Fill the tank with water at the pump and leave at 6AM, traveling around the south of the island, again amazed at ALL the flowers and red earth and it starts raining heavily, not stopping until we get past Waimea. Pass it and get to Menehune Road, which John wants to see, and pass the swinging bridge before we realize THAT's it. See the ditch and the sign and I even wade in a bit in my shower clogs, but it appears to narrow further on, and the spiders have festooned the ceiling and my hair with webs. Look for stores, but all are closed on the holiday. Pick ripe mangoes off the ground, such lovely tropics. Up the main road through acres of sugar cane on the surprisingly flat land, and up to the end of the road at Polihala State Park. The sand is nice and the water is clear again, but there's nothing much to see in the water. Anyway, I walk out on horrible rocks to try to get into water, but it's too rough, so I have to go back to the sandy margin and incur the wrath of the fishermen. Lots of blue-green water but the bottom shows only colorless rock, with a few tiny fish hiding from me. Also, I hadn't put in my contacts, my arms got quickly weary of swimming, my shirt protected me from the sun that the clouds hid, and my eyes started smarting from the salty water. UGH. Out and back to lie exhaustedly on the blanket. One early boat brought in three ENORMOUS sea turtles and a turquoise three-foot fish that John reported. I looked at a second and it only brought in people. Back to read a bit and John came to the car at 10:10, saying we could go on. We showered and got four "Hawaiian Apples"---mangoes? From a guy and John gives away the first touch-me. We got back down to Waimea, and drove up to the Canyon. Fabulous. Absolutely incredible. Greenest greens and reddest reds, waterfalls and rivers of white for contrast and gray and white clouds in a blue sky. Rich green and red, with black rock-lines in shapes of pyramid and ship-prow and black, made Grand Canyon look colorless, although it was certainly bigger. Stare and stare out at the vividness of the colors and the beauty of the lines, though the constant strata lines on ALL formations fooled the eye into thinking that it was all painted flat in 2-D. John's hungry and I'm hot in the sun, so we're back into the car, I climbing to another lookout later, and up to Kokee Lodge, where we're out at 12:30. John has a tamale made of hamburg and cheese on corn fritter, which he says is good, and I have barbeque beef which is rich and tangy and sweet with tomatoes and pineapple. The pineapple cole slaw is an odd combination, but the cabbage is so crisp and fresh the whole effect is nice. For dessert I have passion fruit pie, and it tastes like mango chiffon, and John has guava sherbet, pink and tasting like the guava juice on the first flight to Hawaii. I buy a tree book, and the whole bill is $6.91 and we both buy postcards. Out at 1:30 and look at the museum, but they have no maps. Drive past appealing side drives and get to Kalalau Valley Lookout, and there's a breathtaking view onto an absolutely inaccessible valley rimmed with walls so sheer they remind me of sharks' teeth. A waterfall, double and triple, sounds across the wide valley and, as in Waimea, white birds ride air currents up and down invisible escalators in the sky. Impossibly sheer angles retained trees and plants, and red earth and black rock made eye-shattering contrast. John was very tired, but I HAD to go down the forbidden trail, coming onto a dangerous point after a steep descent, but it looked over the entire valley unimpeded in view, all the way around to Niihau in the south. John came down with a beer with me after we changed into boots and we liked the view. Fresh blackberries added some, but they weren't too sweet. Up again to look at the shirtless wonders from the local school groups and down a side path to another parking lot and back to the camper to drive up the new road, getting above the Kokee Guided Missile Radar shapes to a view HIGHER above Kalalau Valley. John sat idly by, but I was keen to go on, and he said I could take the mile trail across the ridge to Pihea at 3:05. Mt. Waialeale is still fogged up, but the expanse of the Alakai Swamp to its foot is a solid maze of green and gray branches of the same kind of tree, undulating for miles to the base of the wettest spot on earth. The vista to the left changed rapidly, with electrifying clarity of rock walls and forested ridges, and I slogged onward, convinced of some mystical vision when I reached the top of Pihea. Across mud-rutted roads, past cave-ins on the way, over narrow ridges with superb views on both sides. I nibbled blackberries and trudged on. At the base of Pihea and climbing, I entered a region of rain forest: gray and oozing under matted grass in the middle of the path. Trees began to grow aerophytic plants, moss covered rocks, a strange gray lichen took over whole areas like soot-dirtied frost. In my fatigue (sweating under the long-sleeved white shirt I'd put on to stave off the sun, and under my white sailor hat to protect my forehead) I began to think of it as a mission: something electrifying would happen to me at Pihea. I would masturbate, clouds would gather and lightning would transfix me the moment my semen hit earth. The Apocalypse of myself and I dashed onward under the hot sun. Over rocks, up steps hewn in the soil, hacked in the rock, then clambering over tree roots, then whole trees that ground covered at this high altitude. Up and up, to meet my beautiful fate jacking off at the top, to heaven! Past fire-burnt tree stumps, through mud and rocks, over tree limbs, dazzled by the bizarreness of the mountain, struggling to the top, looped by tree roots, rocks, pain, fatigue. And then the top! 4082 feet, next to Waialeale, EVEN the lookout I'd come from, OVER the valley, OVER the swamp. I dropped my pants and jerked off slowly, enjoying the milky drops falling between my feet. Nothing apocalyptic happened, but it felt good. Then, weakened, reclothed, back up the hill and down the slope, past the incredible views: clouds covering all but knife-edges of green on sheer cliffs. Back to the camper at 4, where John had napped, and waved to the big-cocked doll of the four who'd passed me on the trail---but they were with girls, regardless that he looked sideways at me and rubbed his beautiful pectoral. Into the camper to rest, then behind the wheel to try the Mohihi Drive, 6 miles from the road, on which to sleep. The road STARTED fine and level, but as it got more and more backwoods, it got narrower and narrower, steeper and more rutted, until we came to a sign "Four wheel drives only." Well, the HILL looked smooth, but at the bottom the ruts got IMPOSSIBLE, and John was worried about rain making the road slippery. We turned back in a horrendous fuss with me backing up in the narrow valley with John hysterical and myself trying to drive, but we finally got safely out and back to the main road, gas now our only problem, with 1/8 tank and everyone closed for the holidays. Back to Kokee, but the office is closed, so finally we're parked on the asphalt lot, while kids shout in trees and dogs bark and cars abound. I start writing all THIS, but by 7:15 it's quiet, darker, all the cars and kids and dogs have gone, John's made a lovely tuna salad for dinner, and only the goddam roosters seem prone to ruin the night. Now to dinner. [[7/8, 9:30AM]] eat and a car drops off a fairly cute fellow, and John goes to the john to talk with him, and he's Hans from Austria. Then I chat with him and he says that a fellow fell to his death from the top of one of the hidden valley falls while bathing, and that explains a comment I heard on the Kalalua lookout. He'd hiked back to the end beach---11 miles in, hard climbing with a pack, and there were 20-30 hippies living on fruit (though some lips were broken out from too much mango) and goats shot by local hunters and food left by campers who pack too much in. He said they were quite solitary, didn't even mix much among themselves other than a greeting, "Hi," and there was nothing HE saw of a religious cult, but the nude bathing he thought was very surprising. I somehow don't trust him and though John would like him to sleep inside, I leave it to him (who's talking about Prague vs Vienna = New York vs Chicago, the new music and art, and out Business Administration trained guy doesn't know much about art or dance or drama. At 9 I leave it to John, saying "I'm going to bed, but you can talk," and Hans leaves and John and I get to bed. It's gotten quiet, thankfully.

TUESDAY, JULY 6. Up about 5 and we do each other nicely (sex so far has been fabulous on the trip) and prepare everything, then sit around waiting for Hans to get ready, cold and washing outdoors. WE'D washed at shower at Polihala and wouldn't wash again until the morning of the 8th. Drive down to Waimea but the sun's already up by 6, but it's only just above the clouds that bank the east rims of the canyon. Peaks beside us are bright yellow, but the bottom is far from light: a universal gray green, with shapes dimly visible. Niihau, however, and its small neighboring peak, are brightly lit by the sun and the peak appears volcanic as an enormous white fluffy cloud rises from its vicinity, but then Hans remarks about two after-harvesting cane fires at the canyon outlet, and I figure they're burning where yesterday I got out of the car to break off a piece, puzzle at the woody blandness of the cane, and get shocked at the quantity of tiny cactus-like spines left like fur all over my fingers and palm. Climb atop a metal fence for the view, but John hasn't the balance. The sun's risen higher, and some middle peaks are outlined in the sun, and birds begin floating on the air currents. No one else looks at the canyon while it's unclouded and it clears up so much that 7-8 ridges of higher peaks behind the canyon stand out in majestic relief. Then celestial spotlights begin to fan down from the sun, unbelievably theatrically pointing out this bluff, this hanging valley, that section of bottom stream. For a long time the viewpoint is unclouded, but finally the clouds build up so that almost the entire sky is covered, and the spotlights, or whole rows of arc lights moving toward us, have even more dramatic effect. John goes in to make coffee and Hans tries to clear his camera lens from the flecking of the mist that drops from the clouds. Cold viewers come to the gray edge wrapped in blankets and quickly go away. We've seen the voluptuous best by coming in the afternoon, when colors were at their height, and in the early morning, when shapes, picked out by spotlights that heighten the 3-D effect, stood out most spectacularly. Into the car at 8 and drove the rest of the long way, letting Hans off for his day at Polihala, saying we might see him on Maui the day or two following, and filling up on gas. The road is quite slow and when we stop to mail cards, buy tape for John to protect his luggage strap and stamps for cards that we mail, we have to pass up Poipu Beach and get directly back into Lihue at 10AM. Check in and they don't NOTE that we lost the spare set of keys, that John dropped the sink drain cover somewhere, but they demand the boy take us to the gas station to fill up while we both fret at 10:20. But the airport's right there, the Japanese driver who told us he went to school in Montana and that 1/3 of the Hawaiians were Japanese helped us off with our luggage, and we get everything checked in quickly and sat down to read as we waited for the plane at 10:45. But two small prop planes took off before the Funbird landed at 11, and we took off steeply, John sitting in front on the right, I three seats behind, after we'd agreed to sit on the left. But the plane took off and circled around Hawaii to the right, and we saw Molokai and Lanai slide beneath us as we went from Oahu to Maui. Read during the 20-minute stop on Oahu, again seeing Waikiki and Diamond Head, quite late, and fly over much of the west side of Maui, seeing the dirt curved road along the north and the cloud-shrouded peak of Haleakela, and land about 12:30, bracing ourselves against the stiff breeze. Airport is open, bird- and tree-filled, and beautiful. John searches for the baggage while I call the camper rental, she says she hadn't heard my name, but the woman in charge has a pink blouse and brown pants and a little boy at the airport. Find her, get panicked when SHE didn't hear of us, but she HAS a camper available, and THEN find she's NOT Holo-Holo. CALL Holo-Holo after apologizing to her for the mistake, and HE said he'd never heard of us. I explode and say he should clear things with Hilo and call us back, and John has bags and I eat apple and get GREAT topological map of the whole chain to scale, and copy off additional information from their government map which isn't for sale there, and the guy calls and says he has just nothing. I'd called Hawaiian Campers, and reserved one for us, so I tell him to go HANG since he couldn't get us anything till the 10th, and to stuff the idea of having one ready for us in Hawaii tomorrow. Angry and tell John to follow me, and we lug bags over to Hawaiian rentals, and she tells us she can give us the camper for TWO days because of a recent cancellation, and I'm back to airport to call Hilo COLLECT and get assurance we'll have a camper in TWO days, then to Aloha Airlines to change reservations one day earlier, and everything's OK, so I'm back to find John checking the scratches on the larger camper, but there are things different we DON'T like: it's $30 a day, not $25, the pillow cases are paper, there's no hibachi for cooking, the neat pump of the first is not a switch under the side, which is very awkward, and the sleeping section, though higher, is all varnished wood which is dark and tacky. And they SAY the tank reads 1/2 when it's full, but she suggests we fill it up to check, and we add six gallons and more for $3.50, which she pays back to us based on our receipt at the end. We finally get into camper and on the way, greatly relieved, at 2:15. Up to Pukalani for groceries for $16, including booze and wine. Into the car again at 3 and John's been very angry since the Holo-Holo thing, even sending off a complaint to the Chamber of Commerce. He continues to complain about everything, saying he's tired and hungry and negating everything I say. Finally I snap, "John, get the burr out of your ass or wherever you have it," and tomorrow he says "I'm sorry I was so testy yesterday." Maui looks completely different from Kauai on the ground: the mid-section is level and farmed with low pineapple bushes, rows of red earth visible between planting areas. Few trees eliminate the boredom of the landscape and practically all the grasses and hedges we see are yellow-brown from dryness. Doubt there's a dry inch on Kauai. Into the foothill of Haleakela and it's still dry and barren, but the houses are far more elegant than Kauai. Poor rich people. Start up the hill at 2000 feet and wind back and forth until we get to a eucalyptus grove where we stop and eat at 3:30, and John asks if I'll be ready to eat dinner at 6. "We haven't eaten at 6 yet, and I see no reason to start now." He's silent. Later he says he gets annoyed when he doesn't eat regularly, and he's not been sleeping too well, feels tired, feels rushed and not seeing anything, the trip isn't what he planned it to be, and it also turns out later he's been constipated. We talk about that while climbing upwards, and step into the Visitor's Center to get good trail maps and I buy a book on Haleakela and on volcanoes, at $1 each. Back into car just before 4 and up and up, past each 1000 foot height marker and pass three hitchhikers. I stop and say we can take two, and the gal and one guy get in as the other guy keeps walking. One's from Texas and the other from the states, too, and they tell us about poor Kahoolawe, that lights up at night with the Army's bombing. Pass the side viewpoints to get to the park lookout, and there's a great series of metal plaques before the cloudless view over the crater. Because there's nothing to put it into scale, it's hard to believe that the Puu o Maui is 1000 feet high and the whole thing could take Manhattan whole. Look at the side hills and the traces of the Sliding Sands trail and the other cones of cinders, then back in and up the hill to the observatory. It's completely glass enclosed with its four commandments on the door: "1) No sleeping or camping. 2) No urinating or deficating 3) No smoking of marijuana, and 4) No defacing of property or staying in the building all night." Earlier, it seems, they let people sleep up here, heating the building, but it got too gross so they had to clamp down. Look down at Lanai and over the clouds to where Oahu should be 130 miles away, and east to the huge cones of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa, seeming near, though 80 miles away. Building gradually fills up toward 6:30 and the sky turns orange as the sun sinks. I point out the anti-sunset to John and someone else carries on about the one green flash he saw. Two guys are in hacked off blue jeans, and ONE guy amazes by displaying a meaty cock head, not quite to the glans, below his frayed edge. The side is slit to the hip, too, and he's fairly cute, though his non-showing companion is devastating in the intense-eyed Mike-way. The shadow of our mountain is projected onto cloud tops, appearing larger and larger, until, incredibly, the shadow reaches the horizon of clouds and CONTINUES UPWARD into the hazy sky, growing larger and larger as the sun sinks further below the horizon until there's an arc of blue beneath the sunset-orange, and that blue can only be the shadow of the arc of the earth. Many people leave JUST after the sunset, but we stay on in the silence, watching the stars come out, a light go on in Lanai and the clouds sink into darkness. Two goose-flights of cirrus clouds glow cherry far after the sunset has dimmed and inexplicably, below them, shreds of distinct cloud detach themselves from the cloud mass, move upward, and dissipate themselves in the air. I think they might be jets, but they don't come across our vision. I still don't know what they were, though John the NEXT sunrise saw a bunch of clouds "jittering" as their tops bumped like planes in the swift 9000 foot air currents. Find that we CAN camp in the parking lot, so we face back to the cold chilling wind near the john and we have spaghetti and awful sauce for dinner, made nice because our plates are cheap and disposable, and there isn't any dish soap, even though I steal the plastic tank of liquid from the ladies room, and the orange gunk WILL not go away, as won't the tuna and salmon grease from lunch and the salad stuff from tonight. Curse over the washing as a pristine white full moon rises and the sky fills with stars. John's out to the john and says it's great, and I sit inside and finish "The Man who Sold the Moon," and we're freezing even with the oven on. John makes up the top bed meticulously well, and we're in bed about 9:15.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 7. Up about 5:30 and I do him since he feels so horny, but look out at 6 and there's a trace of sunlight on the overlook roof---the sun's UP already. Dress hurriedly and dash back up to the top, but the sun's high, the crater's filled with clouds not about to break, and only Hawaii appears above the clouds. The girl says that the fellow (whom I'd stopped on the way down last night, who said he'd seen a lone fellow walking DOWN the hill, and I told him to TELL her that, so she wouldn't worry about him) never spoke to her, and she didn't know WHAT to do, since THEY had his sleeping bag! Down sad about missing the sunrise, and park and pack the knapsack with lunch and "Aunt Milly's Sauce" jar filled with wine, and John's sandals (that I blew up about his taking and he never wore), and my book, now starting on "Sixth Column" retitled. Start down at 7, the crater still filled with clouds and chilly, and sign out that we'll be back by three. Down the sliding sands, and the sun and walking is warm, and I'm comfortable in white shirt, jacket, and jeans. Switch off path here and there, and get low enough at 7:30 to MEET the clouds, which sift cold water down on us with unpleasant effect, and we sit under a rock to wait for the sky to clear. It does about 8:15 and we're down again, along the side where the side walls rise green and craggy above us, much like Crater Lake walls. Meet the young guy headed for the far cabin that we picked up last night, and the girl was talking to a balding farmer Morgan Guarantee Trust banker who quit last year to sell real estate in Vermont, and is now bumming around trying to talk to guys like me and John (at least I thought so). Down and down and it gets quite warm, and finally we're to the crater floor, and the sparse vegetation is still scrubby and depressed-looking and though there was the sound of a waterfall from the right cliffs, we could see no water. Come across our first silverswords, silky like the milkweed, beautifully symmetric and graceful with their ribbed curved spines. Around one and another cinder cone, and after we stop and have eggs and an apple for a snack, along with some of Aunt Milly's sauce, I scale a cone and sit on a clinker throne to look 360° about me, at desolation, marks of very slow erosion, and heat waves rising. Down, careful not to wreck blooming silverswords, and we see our first blossom, huge purple bells surrounded with a sticky green tendril-halo, spiraling along a central staff. Dead insects remain forever, glued to the sticky spine, and there's a very slight, extremely sweet and fruity smell from the blossoms that should travel miles over the dry desert plain. Detour to Bottomless Pit, with green moss growing about 50-60 feet down and a sign "Bottomless Pit, 65 feet deep." Past Pele's Pig-Pen, a clinker enclosure, and then chat with people from the six-year-old commune (NOT steady people) near Haiku, and bee-line for Holua cabin. Get there about noon, to the sound of workmen putting metal screens over broken windows. Built in 1939, only in the past three hippy-filled years has there been widespread damage, looting, breaking in and damage. We sat, John stretched out in the hot sun while I sat in the shade and read, and at 1 I wash borrowed forks and we continue across the most desolate landscape ever. It's ACTIVELY desolate, not the flat bleakness of a desert, but pitted and eroded and convoluted and weed-overgrown, trails of lava and rock debris of many colors and the plants only serve as contrast to heighten the ugliness of the effluvia of 100,000 clinker-producing furnaces. Forgot: on the top of the cinder cone I sat looking out, meditating, and observed a rather straight line of three silverswords going up a near slope. I thought of a seed being blown up the hill from one flower to form another, and I could see the PATH of the seed in the straight line. From the PATH of the seed to the concept of SOME existence of SOME PART (namely, the seed) of the one silversword LINKING ITSELF to the second silversword, AT SOME TIME (the TIMES may be different, but the spaces stay the same, relative to the earth [though not absolutely, since the earth rotates, orbits and the center of the orbit, the sun, also orbits the center of the universe, which translates through space]), it was an easy step. But quickly I realized that EVERY silversword had to have this physical link (at some time, imagine a camera that shoots every millisecond, SUPER-IMPOSING each picture: that 2-D image of plant 1, seed 1, plant 2, seed 2, plant 3, forming ONE SOLID STRUCTURE to the FIRST silversword (since silverswords haven't always existed, there MUST be a first one, from which all over silverswords come and to which all silverswords can trace their origin). Suddenly the area became an enormous silversword tree, through time---the first plant at the root, each intermediate---now dead and gone---plant the invisible branches and twigs, and each existing silversword the now-living LEAVES on this tree of life of the silversword plant. [I told John THIS much, and he berated me for "making it commonplace" leading him every step along the way without letting him have his OWN "insight" and "reading it to me rather than telling me---I want the feeling it's for ME only, rather than for me AND everyone else." What would he have said had I told him the rest? I went on to see the seed of the silversword in the seed of MAN, and suddenly the fact of the TREE OF MAN was quite clear in my mind. Even if we had to go back to the first MAMMAL (if we, as is possible, had no "first" human being, but a SERIES of "first parents"), there would STILL be SOME root to the tree on which every living man was a leaf, and EACH leaf would be part of the same larger structure. Then I went the NEXT step and looked at the blasted lava around us and felt that, in the distant past, the volcano was an entire mountain filled with vents and flues through which white-hot lava curled like uncoagulated fudge. I saw the bits of lava as forming enormous cycles of solid, liquid, solid again through eras of time, and I was walking where the heat once was. Since the hike took so long, and the terrain was so desolate, and I got so tired, there should be more to say about it, but I don't know what it is. We finally got to the Halemaumau trail gate, and started our ascent. By this time all the pleasure had gone out of the hike---long gone, and we were only interested in getting back to the road, worried about hitching a ride back to the [[[[[absolute ennui overcomes me. I sit in Spencer Beach Park and the birds are making an incredibly varied twitter and chatter over my head, a bee zums past with an ominous deep tone, a party of, yes, Hawaiians, are, yes, playing a steel guitar something that sounds like a slow "Weemaway" and an incredible blond tanned hippy with what looks like short bloomers presents such a fantastically beautiful body I can't resist looking at it. He just passed again. I turn to check the guitar player to see if it isn't a radio, because the droning music tones of the easy harmonics make me think it must be the radio. The birds' voices are young, old, happy, squabbling, just like the families spread below. Across the way a father and mother are serving their three sons, aged 10-6, sitting with their backs to the sun, demanding, questioning, eating, fussing, and all the parents' (facing the sun) attention is directed to feeding them. John's back at the camper reading, ready to light the hibachi for the chicken, and I'm sitting in the shade of a HUGE banyan tree on a sturdy green picnic table on which is inscribed "G. Nagasako of Honolulu M.W.H." the Hawaiian group has gone into "Pretty bubbles---in the water," with trilled climax and all, full voices with laughter, and NO ONE ELSE IS WRITING EXCEPT ME, who feels this urge to record, to record. Why? So I'll have it written. This IS a fantastic trip and SHOULD be recorded. But I haven't used my OTHER recorded trips---yes, but when I read them it brings back SUCH memories of places and people and events. So quit stalling and get ON with it, so there'll be time left for the TRIP]]]. 6:30PM, 7/11: camper at the top of the hill. Up each switchback, counting: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, change knapsack, 7, 8, predict there'll be 20, 9 was a very long one, 10 short, 11 long, 12 really a cheat since we only rounded a corner of the mountains rather than making a switchback. Up far above the valley, looking back to the white-roofed cabin and the incredible square miles of rubble. Clouds sweep up from the lower levels, spreading over the peaks above us, and we stop to finish the last can of juice and switch packs and slog higher, one foot following another. It's getting close to 3 and we're not up the hill yet, but close to the road. Switchback 13, 14, 15, counting, upward, talking, trying to laugh to take the mind off the screams of the legs and the ache to sit down. Sit and breathe heavily, KNOWING it's less than 2 miles to go, but still wishing it were over. I tell about getting to 150 of 180 in exercising and thinking I'll DIE before I finish. Finally to the top and the long slope to the road, passing a girl, pausing to rest, and FINALLY the lovely sight of cars at the end of the trail. Up to hopefully ask the driver waiting for the girl, but they're going DOWN. Out to sit on the curb and two cars pass. I busily pen "Our car is at Observatory" and second camper stops, saying THEY'LL be doing the SAME thing tomorrow. They're from Berkeley and we chat on the way up. Top at 3:45 and gasp into camper. Decide to stay another night, and it clouds up and starts to rain, so we sit and relax and read and write some. Rain is heavier and it looks like no sunset, so John starts frying pork chops in gin and guava juice and they come out awful, though I don't have the heart to tell John exactly how AWFUL. Finish everything, of course. Then TRY to get to top of hill, but camper starts slowly, creeps up in first, and STOPS, motor racing. Try again and again, but it just DOESN'T work! Finally, since sun is definitely in clouds and definitely down in clouds, we laboriously turn around and come back down. Rain blowing VERY hard, rocking camper back and forth, and camper next door can't start at ALL and we talk through mattress and pillows, barricaded against the blow. Try to park perpendicular to the wind, but it changes around and we park against hill, but STILL the wind whips us around. We have salad and talk and read, and then there's nothing but bed in the cold. Climb into the over-cab bed and lay listening to the blowing wind, feeling the cabin quake and tip and dip. We can't sleep, can't sleep, and both confess to being afraid camper will tip over and John suggests we leave OUT clothes and rainsuits and pack everything else in case it DOES topple. Lay and listen and lay and worry and quake in cold and fear, and at 2AM we MOVE the bed downstairs, where the motion is less, we feel our weight stabilizes, not unbalances the light, full-wind-area camper, and finally get a few hours sleep in the close but warm lower bed.

THURSDAY, JULY 8. Wake very early, at 5, and determined to see the full sunrise this time. But try and try and try the camper and it just WON'T get up the hill, and so I decide to walk. John would hitchhike, but I say it'll only take ten minutes but he goes back to the camper. I DO walk up in ten fast minutes, breathing icy fire at 10,000 feet, and look at the glasses glowing orange from the horizon. Many others up there: many praying to the sun by closing eyes, holding hands out, and cupped at waist, but it's funny he worships by NOT looking at his "deity." Many sleeping in bags or under blankets on floor; a cute guy who gets up only when Ranger appears at the door, advance-warned by others, and a very young Spanish-looking girl with an acned guy and a heavy blonde girl, and others who speak around the room, bragging about having broken ALL the rules of the place, wondering how the car got up NEXT to the door (I did too, not believing there WAS a road.) Straights come in and look wonderingly at the shambling hippies, who complain about no john and the narrow road. Sun comes up after unending orangeness dimming back, then orangeing again, to a vivid line that stays for minutes before resolving into the blinding arc of the sun. Not REALLY much to see. Hawaii lit early, Lanai little latter, moon paling in the sun, and I hitch ride down in the back of a truck. Some small breakfast and the rain and clouds begin to let up and John sees the sunrise from below. Drive down about 7, curving in and out in the bright low sunlight, looking out over almost cloudless West Maui, and we miss turnoff for side road, so turn right in Pukalani and go down an incredible dirt road that curves and twists through old wooden houses with corrugated roofs and grasses on either side of the road, threatened by rain which never comes, until we get to the Hana Road quite far from the coast. Turn left and after too long a distance (the road map is wrong for the thousandth time) find Hoopika State Park, and drive down to find lovely indoor showers where we LUXURIANTLY wash ourselves (John losing my Dial down the drain, seemingly bottomless) and it feels SO good to be clean. He suns while I go down to look at boring tide pools and watch the surfers way out who are so experienced that they simply never fall down, which must make it something of a bore [[[[a poor caterpillar is undergoing the torture of Sisyphus: unable to effectively walk on the loose sand with his dozens of legs, he exerts himself patiently in one direction for a few spasms, falls back, tries again, turns over, whips his entire body in a frenzy to get back over, pauses a moment, tries again, slides back, almost lashes himself into a knot, then tries again. At times he lifts himself almost entirely off the ground in his frenzy. Horribly, the whole sand area is covered with slight marks, as if he'd been there for days, twisting, writhing, struggling with every particle of energy to cross the six-foot sand spit. Hungry, thirsty, tired, he struggles in his impossible task. What parallels to man could be drawn here?]]] Eat one last yogurt and John drinks some soda and I'm back to the cab to get my book and write. John chats with two surfers, one of them a thickly muscled construction worker, and they offer us a joint which we refuse, and they say it grows very nicely all over the island, and tell us where we could have eaten in restaurants. John moans that JUST as he's getting used to the island we have to leave, but I comfort him with the thought that we'll be on Hawaii for six days, more than enough time to get used to it. Off to the airport at 10:15 and get to the camper place to find they have no gas station. We're directed two miles into Kahalui to the nearest station, and I cash my first traveler's check for the kitty, and they demand identification. Back to Hawaii Campers at 10:45 and they say nothing about our being late. I pack very hastily, putting too many books and junk into mine, and wearing only shower clogs, shorts and tee shirt, so my bag is VERY full and I have to sit on it to close it. Everything's checked out and we're across to the airport, panting under luggage, at 11:10 and we check in and over to the snack shop which has nothing but sandwiches and franks (later we see they have a restaurant on the other side) and I cash another check for my own cash for the roast beef sandwich and 15 cents ice cream cup with chocolate sauce, and I sit writing while John strolls around admiring the architecture of the airport. Make comments that Aloha Airlines is ALWAYS late, and the line forms early at gate 7, John can't take it and sits down, and finally at 12:30 we start boarding the continuation flight, so most of the seats are taken. I zip to the back for the last right window seat and John settles for an aisle seat in the front. There's a long delay as everyone's ticket is checked to find the three who shouldn't be there, and I start reading "Universe" in "Orphans of Space." Finally take off, buffeted by the strong winds, and look down over the beaches we just left, fabulously blue and emerald and clear to about 40 feet down, hundreds of yards off-shore, and watch tiny dirt roads slip past, and then there's only the jungle-covered slopes of Haleakela, incredibly verdant, cut by tiny Waimea canyons of sheerness and shadow, down which white waters race. Pass over a number of unannounced waterfalls, white streaks in the green verdure, and then the rocky coast of Hana, where a huge hotel occupies one rock outcropping. We flew past the crater, the white dots of Science City clearly visible at the top, the Puu's now dwarfed by distance. There may be other day-hikers in there now as tired as we were yesterday, but we'd never see them. Over the ocean and Hawaii is quickly in view, cloud-shrouded and immense. Dip toward landing and see hills through clouds, but then severe shaking takes over and I grab the chair arms in fear. The blond, tanned, shorted hippie two seats over continues to sit though the entire trip with his eyes closed. Down lower and the pilot finally starts using the upper wing flaps to slow our descent through the rough air and the passage is smoother. Through breaks in clouds I can see the rough coastline, again laced with canyons with a waterfall in each, and a particularly high one which could only be Akaka, easily 400 feet high. Lower over the luxurious coastline, and each house has its swimming pool and some even have their own rocky promontories, which are continually pounded by the surf which promises the house somewhat less than eternal life. Some are even above rock caves that must be below their basements. Terrifying. Hilo is flat and uninteresting and we land under lowering clouds. Out, retrieving my stuff that falls over on the steep takeoff, and into the terminal searching for our man with the camper. Look a bit and a young blond comes up and asks, "Are you Mr. Zolnerzak?" Great. We stand together and talk about business (good), the weather (it rains some every day, but if it's bad in one place, go to another: it'll be better) and Holo-Holo (best here, tough getting managers for other islands, family affair, connected with archeological digs and the Bishop Museum). My bag comes in sprung open, but partitions kept everything in place, including suntan lotion, which slides out as I try to repack. Cute guy helps me sit on it, and we're off to a tiny yellow frame mail-truck with Holo-Holo on it and load and get around to a family of five and a sobby kid with seven suitcases. To the dumpy-looking office with the campers outside and we get one just like in Kauai, except that this has up and down water pump which is more of a pain than the back and forth kind, and a large supply of silverware and dishes, which is great. But the refrigerator is lit from the inside and "sometimes goes out." Our stuff in fast and John gets maps and direction, and we're on our way at 1:45, a new record and we're gratified that it is. Stop for gas on Highway 11, down to Tanaguchi's huge supermarket for $21 in groceries, load up the fridge and we're off! Get to Macadamia Nut farm entrance at 3:05 and go down though the sign says closed at 3. Other people at the end who say they are harder than butternuts, and I take some and can't dent them with a hammer. But it IS closed, so we go back down jungly road beside the SMALL "largest plantation," and back to the road. Guy said Kilauea was foggy today, so we head down toward Kalapana. Terrain is fairly level and lava-covered, but the vegetation has neither the brownness of Maui nor the lushness of Kauai. Turn off on a side road toward Opihikao and it's lined with papaya groves and other fruit trees, and we get to the ocean that is absolutely spectacular with its pounding surf. Park at a level space for the night, deciding it's lovely, and go to the edge and look at the surf for long refreshing minutes. The waves are entirely blue, breaking in a lovely blue-white hue on the black rocks, sending spray up 50-60 feet at each thrust. When the foam dies and the big waves dig down into deep troughs, the weed-covered rocks can be seen 20 feet down. Crash after crash, some so strong I can FEEL them when I'm sitting on the cliff face. Take a blanket down and spread it at the edge, John reading "An Unfinished Life" by Ruth St. Denis, me finishing retitled "Sixth Column" and giving it to John as good Heinlein to start with. Light the charcoal and wait good long time for it to start, and put my large steak on way before his. Sip drinks and watch the sunset, then to the edge to eat the juicy, perfectly done steaks. Watch the moon rise and get to bed very early, listening to the surf, feeling very good about this first relaxing day on the Big Island of Hawaii, which John says is his favorite.

FRIDAY, JULY 9. Up early and I want to watch the sunrise, but John and I get involved in sex and both come very nicely, and then the sun's up. Eat and wash dishes and into the car to drive back to the entrance at the south of Kilauea: [[[5PM, 7/12]] Wahaula. Pick up good maps of the National Park there, and listen to the recorded tapes about the great arrangement of living areas which boiled down to tiny autonomous kingdoms possessing fishing, living, ruling, farming, recreational, and upland living all around a section of an island. The Kapu system sounded fierce: death to anyone walking where the king walked, violating his manu (spirit) or getting caught in the smoke of a sacred fire, or any more of hundreds of things to placate the gods. Their reasoning: the gods would avenge themselves by taking his life eventually ANYWAY, and if THEY permitted him to live the gods might kill THEM, too, so they killed him first. Our discovery of the City of Refuge on Sunday made this easier to take, since the "sinner" could be purified there and not HAVE to be killed. Out to see the ancient temple there, mainly fences and platforms of stone, and back to see how far up the Chain of Craters road we could get. Along the elephant-skin pahoehoe lava for miles of the coast, passing a hitching surfer going the other direction, and go just a bit inland and see the end of the road even before the old petroglyph area, which must be many feet under the thick lava crossing the road. We get out and clamber about on it, noting how the asphalt melted next to it on the road bed, and how many square feet had been removed by souvenir hunters, and even I took a small piece of charcoal-light, cellular pumice and stuck it in my pocket, feeling slightly guilty. Signs forbade our going further, and we got back to the road to pick up the surfer at one of the sea arches overlooks. At only the westernmost of the three overlooks were there actually two arches branching across the roiling tides, and we stood for minutes watching the beautiful blue-white surf roll back and forth, hoping it wouldn't take THIS moment to pull our sections of the cliff into the water 80 feet below. Surfer's going back to his car in Pahoe, lives in a house 400 feet from the top of Akaka Falls, has another house for surfing in Oahu and talks of his father's "business." Must be nice. His right thigh's greenish red from "hitting bottom." "I haven't done THAT in years," he said wonderingly. He tells us all about Hola (also pandanus and screwpine) and ginger that we have in our vase along with the two lovely kinds of wild orchids we have in such a sweet-smelling vase that the bees knock themselves crazy against the screens trying to get in to them. We stop off at the Queen's Bath and he's happy for the chance to jump in, which he does from the rocks, while I have to get splashed before jumping in from the lowest rock. Back for snorkel stuff and there are a few fish and the plump kids and it's fun to dive in the clear sweet water. Out refreshed and find passion fruit, which he says grows on vines, different from guava on trees. Past Kalapana again to Pahoe, let him off, and drive up to Olaa, where, since it's noon and John's wild about macadamia nuts, we go BACK to the nut factory, get a handful of free samples, and he's turned off when he's told they sell for retail prices, since local merchants would complain if they undersold them, but she said they could be found cheaper at discount. Back down to route 11, get gas in the city called Volcano, where I buy a couple cards, and think we might stop at Volcano House for lunch at 1:30. But the tour busses are there, it's an enormous crowd of three lines waiting for the buffet and packed tables, and I see sign that the last film of the day is at the Visitor's Center at 1:45. Back there and into the auditorium for corny slides of the latest eruptions (1967 and 1969), and the teasing tale that current activity can be seen from the air from an inaccessible part of Chain of Craters road. The film is pretty good, and we're out at 2. I stop to ask about Mauna Loa strip road, filling out a request, saying I'll call back to check how far it is from the 11,000-foot observatory on the gravel road to the 13,000-foot top. Eat in the parking lot, John's starved, and we start on the grand tour: Sulfur banks are small and poor, except for the "experiment" that grows crystals for the tourists to see. Steaming bluff has warm steam vents, but again not too great. Kilauea Overlook shows us the steaming Halemaumau Firepit, and we drive around and get out at the crater's enormous parking lot. There's a lot of steam right at the overlook, and the lava in the crater is tortured and black, but there's very little life to be seen except steam. Walk down the trail a bit, but the stink gets through to us and we're coughing as we get back to the car. Past the deep Keanakakoi Crater where the Hawaiians used to get basalt spear points and get off at the Devastated Area, where I pick up a glassy cinder and look at all the dead trees. Back to the car to the Kilauea Iki overlook and look at the trail across the 1959 lava, not cooled to its depths. Around the road to the Thurston Lava Tube, and it's nice to walk through the lush fern jungle on the way there, meeting a definite Jane-like creature with wild long blond hair and two differently colored kids and a third, a little squaller with bowed legs from walking too soon. The Tube is effectively dimly lit, and water drips from the ceiling which is a perfectly Spanish stalactite roof. Around to the Byron Ledge overlook of Kilauea Iki, and amazed by the height of the reported 1900 foot lava fountain that caused the impressive Puu Puai. Into the car and back to the Chain of Craters Road, ignoring the notice that it's closed at 4 [[[and it now dawns on me that THAT may have been why the road gate was locked when the road looked so safe! And we probably left before it was OPENED!]]] and go along, seeing the vastly overgrown amphitheater of Lua Manu Crater, the open vastness of the Puhimau Crater and the between-size of Kohoolau Crater. To the end and decide to walk out to where we see smoke coming up and look at small Heake and larger Pauahi---600 feet deep and quite wide, and John stops and I walk on to 5PM to see what looks like Puu Huluhulu (which John says someone said was a growing mountain) and to the right a shield dome with a sharp crack down the center, and smoke coming from the left side. Look hard, trying to tell myself I see fire, but don't quite do it. Back to John and to the car, seeing that we could see that questionable hump right near the gate. Turn down the Hilina Pali road and it's very narrow and winding, and thankfully we meet no one coming the other way. I read that the sunset from Hilina Pali is spectacular, so I'm hurrying to get there as the sun sinks lower and lower toward the summit of Mauna Loa. Pass Kipuka Nene, seeing it crowded with three or four cars, many children, and no showers, so we continue down the road, which gets worse and worse, across fords which plainly read "Do not cross when water reaches red marks on poles," and hope to get a better view east over the new fires, but that doesn't happen. To Hilina Pali just after sunset, parking level and getting out to look at the wisps of high clouds still red while the clouds shadowed by Mauna Loa are dark already. John's been marinating the leg of pork in a Chinese barbeque sauce, and I start the fire and look out toward the dubiously sugar-loafed form of Puu Kapukapu and look at the rest rooms and stand on the rock pile to watch the last of the sunlight go in brilliant colors on the clouds. To the east all is cloud, so the hoped-for fire- glow isn't there. The pork is delicious, though John's not fond of the sauce, and we're out late to look at the scintillating stars, brilliant and twinkly and then stand and watch for the moon rise, surprisingly like a sunrise in the inky blackness. Even to the bright line at the top of the cloudbank just before its appearance. It rises just part full, a bit of the upper face gone, and we watch and watch until we're quite tired, still catching up from the lost night's sleep at Haleakela, and bed at 9. At 2 a truck and car come blasting in, and my first impression is that we're parked illegally and it's the cops here to chase us out. But we both fall back to sleep quickly.

SATURDAY, JULY 10. I'm up at 5:10, looking at the pinking sky, finally waking John at 6 when the sun is just about to burst through. [[[It's now 6PM, I've been writing for ONE hour, though I'm STILL 2 days behind, I HAVE to take a break. I'll do another hour later]]]. [[[9:15AM, 7/13, John got me so drunk with sake last night that we went to bed at 8:30! This is written just below 11,000 feet on Mauna Loa. Everyone's breathing heavily. IF you count the 18,000 feet Mauna Loa rises from its base on the ocean floor, we're 29,000 feet up the mountain, or the height of EVEREST! John's not impressed]]]. But the clouds are in the way, so we wrap ourselves in blankets and stand on the hill in the cold (and I've pissed on the edge of my blanket when the wind whipped the edge past my stream) and the sun comes up in glory and lights all the hills behind, the ocean below, and the slight slope of Mauna Loa to the side. In for breakfast and drive south along route 11, stopping for gas and water in Naalehu, and it's been raining, yet John's still impressed with the casualness (and the amount of time we have to spend) of the Big Island. Stopped along the road BEFORE Naalehu when it looked as if it were about to pour rain, and ate at noon, then we picked up two Peace Corps trainees for the Marshall Islands who were off for the weekend, and we left them off at the unmarked turnoff for South Point. Down the narrow road past cows grazing in the brown fields, many farmhouses, and passed a couple of cars that caused us to veer off the road---but everyone ALWAYS waved at us. Near the end they were bulldozing dusty red earth around for no discernable reason, and we saw the small lighthouse and turned left past the dozens of foundations for barracks and officer's quarters for the old airbase, though there were no traces of the airstrip. Later in the fields we saw deep scoops of the earth piled in front that could only be about 40-50 gun emplacements, badly eroded but still obvious. It's quite cloudy still, but we're out of the car with our knapsacks on our backs at about 2:30, watching the Hawaiians swimming in the bay and throwing rocks at the dilapidated jerry-built house with its phalanx of gas, water and other tanks all connected by long pipes. I was wearing only trunks and shower clogs, sunglasses and watch, and John had sandals, knapsack and glasses and bathing suit. The roads were paved with large lava chunks, and more than a dozen times I snagged the edge of my toes or heels on the sharp rocks that I could feel distinctly through my shredding shower clogs. The wind was in our face, making going rough, and we were aghast to see a camper bounding over the hill on three wheels, and he said the green sand beach was about a mile up the way and continued to ricochet his camper off the rocks. Took drink of water along the hot way, watching the beautiful surf against the rocks and walked over point after point, aiming toward the cinder cone that the bay was supposed to be near. I scouted by climbing a hill and couldn't see whether the last bay was sandy or rocky like all the others we saw. Passed a few other cars and people, and finally climbed through the last gate and over the last fence to see that the cinder cone's base had been eroded by the waves to form a perfect cove of green sand, up which the waves pounded with lovely regularity. But all the approaches were VERY steep, and we could see a well-worn path connecting what appeared to be caves that could be lived in just below the lip of the cliff, but we could find no way down to the path. To the center of the cove, down some ledges that were actually less steep than they looked, and tried to find the best way down. It turned out that the under-cropping was sheer rock, impossible to get a purchase on because of its steepness, but sand and rocks had slid down in some places and we could skid down this by removing our shoes and gripping with our toes and heels. Made our way to the bottom with a run of joy and we took off our suits and bounded over the olivine sands to the green water. The waves were lovely, though there was a slight undertow, and we swam about, then into the surf, lying and sitting in the wash, letting the waves wash us back and forth, pouring sand over our loins and muscles, and John got an erection that he played with in the cold water. We investigated the rock face, where the waves had undercut very deeply and then it was about 4, and we knew it would take over an hour to get back, and we were concerned about showering, getting meat for dinner, which we'd forgotten to get earlier, and finding a place for the night. The walk back was sunnier, but the wind was at our backs and we KNEW how far we had to go, so it was easier and we made it in 45 minutes. Walked most of the way nude, a tiny bit concerned when we saw clothed children living in the ruins, but then their nude mother waved to us with a white expanse of teeth and we felt just great. The father was noodling on a guitar, paying no attention to us, on a nearby rock. Back to the camper, where the soaked yellow blanket that John hung on the mirror was finally dry, so I folded it and put it back under the seat, hoping it would remain dry, but not really caring if it got wet again. Drive back north to the road, and just north of the turnoff the road got very good, just where all the estates were being sold, and we passed Manuka Park doing 60, stopped and turned in the middle of the highway, the most dangerous thing I did on the trip, since cars were coming very close to our road-straddled awkwardness in turning. But though the grounds were nice, they had no showers, so we were back up, passing the road to Milolii and headed for Kahaluu Beach Park. It was getting dark as we drove down the curving hill for Keauhou, and we were sorry to see that it was right next to the tawdry torch-infested grounds of the Keauhau Beach Hotel, noisy with guests. And then there was the sign saying overnight camping was not permitted. Out to shower and I waved at a very cute kid in a VW, and who later appeared in his crotchy striped pants, trim waist flaring to broad shoulders on a cute short body. As we showered, people stopped to look, particularly an older plump Hawaiian in yellow who kept fingering himself, and John said we'd found THE cruising place. I looked for the kid in the VW, but sadly he was gone, and then the others looked not as good, and John asked the Hawaiian where the bars were, but he wanted sex for himself only and refused to give free information. John looked at the verandah and said it was dirty and smelly and filled with garbage, and he hated the whole place, and didn't want to stay another minute. By this time it was completely dark at 7:30, and we decided we could only go to Nepoopoo. We'd stopped earlier at a "scenic point" for sunset, and were chagrined to find that a house cut off 3/4 of the view, and a barking dog scolded, adding just the wrong touch of atmosphere. Oh, and we'd found a supermarket open at Hookena, with a lavishly fruiting sausage tree outside, but the best we could find was some canned hash. Drove the dark road to Napoopoo and John was very tired, hungry and irritable and I was getting angry at him because he seemed to blame everything on ME. Started when he sighed deeply because he couldn't find a clean spoon for lunch because I hadn't washed breakfast dishes, and then when he said, "Oh, WE forgot to get meat for dinner," the tone of voice was "Oh, YOU forgot to get meat for dinner, I TOLD you to remind me." He later said this was my imagination, but it rankled me quite a bit that day. He also insisted that the road sign did NOT direct to Napoopoo, so he got out of the car and walked back to the highway to verify that it DID. Down a road that seemed never to end, a constant shifting from second to first to slow our descent and avoid the dogs in the streets outside the houses, and after about a half hour I remarked that we must be at LEAST 200 feet below sea level by now. Down and down, and finally into a tiny town, and at the main intersection just decide to turn right. At the end there's a tiny concrete-walled jetty filled with two screaming campers, and John gets out to read the sign to find that all the paint's been rubbed off. Decide to go the other way, and it passes what turns out to be Kealakekua Bay, but there's no place to park there either. Keep going down the narrow road through scrubby vegetation, passing many houses and private roads, and we seem to be on a broad lava ledge halfway between the villages on the cliffs and the uninhabited shoreline. Find a turnoff and park there, John trembling with hunger as he pours out both cans of the dog-food-like hash. It tastes worse than it looks, and I'm VERY sullen and depressed through dinner, not looking at him, surely making HIM more tired and depressed, and he's drinking much whisky to ease his tensions. He's into bed very quickly at 9, and I stay up a bit writing until just before 10, and crawl in with him. He wants to cuddle, and I passively let myself be touched, but he moves away, repelled by my pique, and I'm hoping he'll ASK why I feel so lousy, but he never does, and I just make MYSELF miserable, kicking myself. Quickly to sleep, thank goodness.

SUNDAY, JULY 11. [[[5PM, 7/13, just arrived at Laupohoehoe Point Park, watching a VERY strange Datsun truck drive around and around and around]]]. Up at 5:30 and do him nicely and eat and decide to see where the road goes. Sunrise was so delayed by the hills to our east that it was nothing to speak of. Come to Homaumau and the City of Refuge, and it's open even at 7:30, so we wander out, after using the john and listening to the three speaking devices telling us about the origins and use of the City of Refuge, and John admires the walls greatly, though I say Cuzco is far more meticulous, but these walls have the facet of being UNdressed stone, and quite nicely fitting together. Look at the fish in the two Royal Fish Ponds, and John's saying this would be a PERFECT setting for the restaurant he's been talking about for the past few days which would serve and show and introduce Hawaiian foods and cooking and fruits and their growing and preparing in different ways. Continue out to the tide pools, and there are lots of small brown fish, but in one deep chasm that's never cut off from the sea, I see a round blue fish about 10 feet down, and later John finds a school of five or six orange and black and white fish. Look along the shore, and it appears to be perfect for snorkeling, so I'm back to ask if it's legal, and she says it is. Back to the camper to put on contacts and go with John out onto the rocks and gingerly lower myself into the cool waters. There are small short-spined sea urchins scattered about and the swinging tide makes it difficult to avoid them. But I get in deep enough to push out and the fish are actually all OVER the place, in deep water, and shallow water, all sizes and shapes and colors. Out farther and they get more colorful: schools of pure yellow ones, the incredible psychedelically-neon of the bar-striped green, blue, red ones, then round angelfish and Moorish idols, tangs of every color, and even a few needlefish about a foot long that move by waggling their tails like tadpoles. John swims out and I persuade him to hold my wide eyepiece around his narrow head, and he sees some fish and says he must get some goggles, since he knows they're the only things which will fit him. [[[6:30PM 7/13, after laboriously packing my suitcase for the flight to Japan tomorrow]]]. But he's easily frustrated with them, and goes back to sun himself and read, and I continue out, where the sea urchins aren't anymore, and the deeps blue bays hold more fish than I can tell about. A huge Christmas ornament of a Crown of Thorns is busy eating the coral, and a red spiny thing I think is a plant turns out to be another kind of sea urchin. I also asked about the slime on the various pieces I try to hold onto to avoid being dashed against the rocks by the surf, and am told that it's "just moss." I'd forgotten how eerie, just like in "2001" my breathing sounds in my ears, or how sore my teeth get from clamping around the two rubber flanges on the snorkel, and how my teeth don't seem to fit together when I bite down afterwards. I forgot how hard I have to breathe to fight the pressure of the water on my chest, and how funny it feels to swim in a tee shirt to avoid getting burned on the my by the sun. I forgot the feeling of closeness and largeness everything has through the magnifying power of the water. Forget how quickly I get tired: my arms from propelling myself through the water, my neck from looking up all the time, my eyes stinging from the salt water, my nose runs, my feet panic from so much unnecessary holding away from rocks that are really feet away, and only at the end did I relearn the convenience of having some salt water IN the mask to slosh back and forth when the inside of the faceplate gets fogged. Exhausted from fighting the waves and having seen no startling new fish (no sharks, no rays, no eels, no squid), I made my way back to shore, urinating as I went, and gingerly picked my way through the sea urchins to find that it was just 11. I'd been tired out from only an hour in the water. Well, it was preparation for longer stays later. Lay in the very hot sun for half an hour, on my wet shirt on the hot lava rocks, then to shore to see a loincloth-clad regally-weighted old gent showing how to "clean" sea urchins (by beating the sharp spines off with a stick while it was still in the water) then snapping it open and fingering out the tannish flesh, flecked with black things. John got a bit and oohed and ahhed and said it was a very fishy clam, only softer, and I tried a bit and it WAS a salty fishy taste, soft though not slimy, and thankfully the taste did NOT linger in my mouth as John so happily reported it did in HIS. Then we were back to the car before noon for lunch, ignoring the appealing remark that they were burying the pig for the Keauhou Bay luau at 12:30. John said he wasn't interested, and though he said he'd come along and pay the $11 if I wanted to go. I refused, saying I know how ironic and sarcastic he could be throughout the meal. Back north along the same road to see that we HAD been at Napoopoo, at the tiny beach with campers, and a pavilion and barbeques at the side, and we drove back up the hill till I spotted guavas growing, picked them, tasted and found them greenish and sour, and they sat around the camper until John used them up as flavoring slices in vodka and tonics. Then I saw a sign for the Painted Church, and we went through long backways to get there, and the interior was vastly improved with the painted Gothic vistas and I thought it appropriate that the panel of Hell looked as if it had been burned. It was all very Vasari and overly simplistic. Out again, taking Route 18 to bypass Kailua, and it was a mountainous road past lavish gardens outside wood and tin houses, and up to Kamuela for gas and across for Hapuna Park, to find at 4 that it was illegal to park after 6PM, since just before Christmas, and a later hitchhiker told us that many hippies were living dirtily on the beach, and they had to stop it. Picked up a guy and gal hiking to the beach, and she STANK to high heaven of a combination of seaweed and underarms. Hapuna IS the best beach: perfect white sand, very broad, lovely regular waves, two side arms of coral for snorkeling and even a bit of rock in the center that I didn't look at. Off the left side, they said "Watch out for the sharks, it's far out to the good part, and we'd seen men-of-wars, so be careful." I got half way out, got very tired, and walked across to the right, which was much nicer, more shallow, and all right there. Lay in sun for a bit, but it's blazing hot and I'm worried about tonight turning out like LAST night, so I say we have to find Spencer. Drive and we do, going past to puzzle about the barracks for Factfinders "patrolled" and back and park under the LAST palm tree to be away from the families. I write some more [27-30] at a table on the beach, then watch the sun set behind clouds and the waves, and John comes out after lighting the fire and back to have lovely hoisin chicken breasts, giving the bones to the local cat in the morning. I still feel guilty and impatient about being so far behind, and I want to read more, too, but the drink comes with the meal, and after I wash the dishes the only thing I can think of is to get into bed, lulled by the booze and John's tiredness, and so we DO get to bed about 8:45, listening to the Morse Code bird going "do-do-dah-do" and other lonely birds calling idly in the trees. Tired.

MONDAY, JULY 12. Up and he does me and I do him and have breakfast and decide to drive up north. But the clouds are coming down the hills, and we'd read in Sunday's paper that a rare hurricane was coming close to Hawaii for only the third time in 70 or so years, and as we drive north it gets cloudier and cloudier. Look down at what MIGHT be sandy coves hidden by the ridges, but there are no good roads leading down for us to take. Turn off at Mahukona and are surprised to see that it's one house, and an old railway station company, and an old sugar company, and a broken down pier onto water that's totally rocky, not a bit of sand. Back up to the road and there's a lovely rainbow over the ocean, but nothing of interest there. Up to Kapaa Beach Park, and there's a dingy pavilion with one poor, face-scratched, thin yellow tabby cat who mews pathetically like a kitten when we offer to pet him, and he rubs miserably against us, almost too weak and thin to move. He has the energy to take a flying leap at a dragonfly, however, and we hope he has the guts to survive. Again the coast is quite rocky, no sand, not even good surf, so we decide to return to the only sunny spot we've seen: Hapuna Beach. Back down the coast with a rainbow, sometimes pieces of a double rainbow, to our right, and see all the boats and people leaving the beach area. The hurricane was due in at noon. The beach is emptier than yesterday, and we're off to the right and I get right down to the business of snorkeling. The tide is lower than yesterday and the reefs are aswarm with fish, including two giant parrotfish (about 18" long) turning in great circles to look up at me, and an even larger fish (maybe 30"), dark, swimming at the edge of a cave in the rocks. A school of foot-long, half-inch thick spearfish wriggle through the blank space where the little side beach is, their stick-shadows stark against the bottom sand. Fish and fish and more fish, and colored corals in yellow and bright pink and green and chartreuse and violet. The sun is at a great angle for seeing, but close into the rocks the sand breaks up the vision and my panic at being crushed against an outcropping overcomes my delight at all the things to see. Simply get very tired and find it's only 10:45, I've only been in the water 45 minutes. Sun for a bit but it feels VERY hot and burning, so I go under the shade of a tree and write for a good long time, watching worms and mice and the fishermen, and the girl who starts talking to John after he does his stretching exercises on the beach. About 12:30 he's had enough of the sun and we're in to shower and Lou Ann pops in to say that she WILL be riding to the saddle road with us. Into the camper and out to Kamuela to the Shopping Plaza for the last groceries and charcoal for the last two nights, and she gets some apple cider and melba toast that she shares with us, telling us about the Philippino who built her house for her (no electricity, no water) and she tells her typical day: up with the sun, pick a mango or avocado from the tree for breakfast, to the beach, usually with friends, then scout for lunch and back home about 3, when it usually rains in Kailua, and that makes it cool for the evening, when she goes to bed with the sun. The conservative Japanese who control the economic end of the islands hate ALL the hippies because of the dirty ones that give the movement a bad name. The Christian Commune, with its free school, is appreciated, however, Pot grows wild on the island, and an old Hawaiian told her he was smoking even before she was BORN: HE knew where it was at! She wasn't into acid or hashish, and never knew any hash coming from the local plants, which were the best she'd ever smoked. But if she smoked in the morning, she'd get too spaced out for the day, so she usually didn't smoke. Let her out at the intersection and go up the saddle road, stopping at 12:30 to have lunch and wash the dishes over the road, then continue up through a fairly clear afternoon, and there's expanse after expanse of naked lava, and the sign said it dated way back to 1845, so not much grows on it if nothing's MADE to grow on it. There are an incredible number of enormous puus around, even more than in the crater of Haleakela, and there seems always to be a half-dozen in sight. Stop at the park in Pohakuloa to use the john and stare up at the humpy slope of Mauna Kea above us, only shreds of clouds blocking some tiny corner of the sides, and it's clear where the trees, then the vegetation, stop up the almost 14,000 foot slope. Continue down to the road to Halepohaku, and it's a dirt road which doesn't look bad, and we go up a bit and meet a little blue car coming down, and the driver says we have ONLY to watch a soft area right ahead, and then it's clear driving until he got to a ranger station with "about ten of them sitting around. I didn't want to press my luck, so I turned around." I thanked him and John said we could go up. The view was quite nice, across to the steeper nearer peak of Hualalai and way out to Mauna Loa, and down to the coast we'd just come from. Again there are puus all over the place, and I wonder why they don't make them more accessible to tourists. Maybe they don't WANT every peak to have the "easy drive-in" quality of Haleakela---and then it DOES furnish a nice contrast. Up and up the bumpy road, marveling at the large trees at this height, and jouncing over cattle barriers every so often. But none of the unending lava walls we'd begun to associate with every roadside on the island. The guy said the ranger station was in 10 miles, but in three miles we got to the Halepohaku Ranger station. John went to use the grim john, and I asked the fellow how high we were. "Oh, 'bout 9000 feet. That's about as high as you'll be able to take that truck, it gets pretty steep from here on up." Since I'd noticed a decided slow-down on the climb even in first gear, I'd about decided the same thing myself. Down a bit to where we'd seen a pull-off spot, about 6-7 feet, and we pulled off, tried to get level, and lit the refrigerator for about the twentieth time. John began stuffing plates and paper bags in the back to stop the breeze from the ill-fitting framework of the whole refrigerator, and it actually stayed lit for the rest of the night. It was raining almost continually, and I sat and read "Orphans of the Sky" and wrote a bit [35-40], and then the sun started going down. We decided it was too rainy to cook outside, so John pan-fried the steak. It was pretty bad, but there was a lot of it. Just at sunset I looked out to see sun-lines on the hills, so I put on my raincoat and dashed out in shower clogs. The near hill was no good, being blocked by a further peak, so I ran past the camper and across the main road and started up the lava-covered slope of the near puu, heading for the receding sunset line. My clogs started slipping in the rain, and I took them off and battered my feet mindlessly racing up the hill, panting, dripping, to catch the last of the sun. Past the demarcation and up a few more steps, then turn and drink in the orange disk dipping to the cloud-covered hills, and the pink and white and dark clouds were everywhere, and sunlit rain sliced diagonally across from right to left. The camper was a tiny listing white dot in the bleak moonscape of black lava and dark green trees. Soaked in the sunset, then back down the hill more slowly, clogs feeling every rock, and we had vodka and tonic soured by guava slices, and hot sake with the meal, so my head got foggy and I went to bed with hardly a thought of what I sorrowfully reminded myself of today: two more nights to the four-flight day to Osaka.

TUESDAY, JULY 13. The side of the hill protected the camper from the worst buffeting, and we got a fairly good night's sleep. Up to a VERY cloudy day, and going down it was raining quite hard, so that we worried about the dry spot becoming muddy and bogging us down, but to our surprise we got to the main road without even SEEING where the problem spot was. The valley was cloudy, but there were small patches of blue to the west, and at times the cloud cover overhead thinned so that there were shadows of lightness on various spots. Drive back to Pohakuloa for a john and garbage, and debate going up to the observatory, on a road that's not marked with anything, and we decide that we have five gallons of gas left, which is good for 50 miles, and it'll be about 15 to Hilo, which leaves 35 for the road, and that means we can go 17.5 miles, taking the speedometer up to 80. So that decided [[[7/17, 7AM]]] we go ahead, but the road is discouraging because it takes enormous amounts of time [[[7/19, 1:45PM]]] going around the flanks of the hills, rather than climbing up the hill itself. As we go higher and higher, we start passing distance and height signs, but they give out too, finally, and the fog and rain get thicker and thicker, and John wants to go back, but I want to see how high we can get. [[[I don't feel like writing---I just DON'T feel like writing. I want to stop writing about the trip and simply ENJOY it. If I forget some of the details, well, I forget, and that's that. I can't remember all the things that happen to me ANYWAY. So again there's a crisis between will and discipline, and I'm tempted to let discipline go. But I WANT to do better with THIS round-the-world trip than I did with the LAST one, but when I have the time, I tend to read [today I brought ONLY this notebook, so I CAN'T read]. Part of my problem is that I'm SO far behind, it's now six days [five, counting the date line], and I DREAD the effort to get back up to date [and of course this type of writing takes part of the space], and I listen to the conversation around me, and fill the page with scratches, and fear I'll never get caught up, but I CAN always spend an hour, at the most, at night, after John gets to bed, or before he wakes. Tourist talk of places to go, giving lists of temple after temple, saying the ONLY one that someone HASN'T seen is one of the GREAT sights that mustn't be missed. If no one gets to Nara, you MUST go to Nara; if you've spent a day or two in Nara, you must spend a WEEK in Nara. The next step is to move into a private villa in the town and live with the Mayor. Everyone gives details, naming comparisons, giving lists of characteristics and delineation and demarcations and details, and it's now 2PM and the tour of Katsura begins]]].

RYOANJI

Stones can't hear
So the noises from the crowds don't bother them.

Sun slants across seas of stones

Milliards of snapshots can't capture an atom of their souls
They have them all
Still.

Anger, noise, stupidity
All these are brought to them
But they have none of it
They merely are.

Talk, opinion, labeling, discussing, wording
But the rocks
Just
Are.

[[[7/19, 10:15PM--- DETERMINED ON DISCIPLINE]]]. Soon we can't even see where the road climbs the next hill, and as John drives, there's the start of a whining baby's cry from under the car, and I fairly isolate it as coming when the right wheel splashes through a puddle, and fear that something might be going wrong with the brakes. He begins to take puddles slower, but still the whine is there, repeating but not getting worse. No blue patches above, no blue patches to any side, rain constantly. But then there's a white dome on the foggy horizon, just as we're getting to the 80 mark on the odometer, and John is all for turning back, but I say, "Well, the end of the road is JUST up there," and even though there's a sign saying "Observatory .8 mile, do not enter with vehicles because of scientific experiments: Sandia Corporation." We stop with 80.4 on the meter, and John turns around and I say we should wait a bit for the fog to maybe clear. John makes coffee and I write a bit [40-47], and it's 10 and then 10:30 and then 10:45, but we figure it's getting worse, not better, so I start driving. John tells me that we'd better coast down to conserve on gas, and that there's no protection under the engine, and if the spark plugs get wet, we'll be stuck for good. Also, if the gas gauge is off and we run out of gas, I figure I'll have to walk at LEAST down to the Saddle Road to hitch into Hilo for gas, and 17 miles is a LONG walk. I go down VERY nicely, swinging car around like an expert, avoiding all the puddles or easing through at about 5 mph, and I only get 2 whines all the way down. Sky BEGINS to get blue above, but it still looks bad. I breathe easier as we get to 10 miles from road, then 5, then 1, then to the road, without running out of gas. Then we see a milestone to Hilo and it's 26, and we'd planned 15. John says to coast in neutral, and I have a WILD time in HEAVY rain going down LOVELY hills, and coast about 15 miles without stepping on gas ONCE, and many times in neutral, most of time in drive, sometimes in 2nd, and even some in first on the brake for steep hills. Lovely for driving in such an "emergency" and loads of fun coasting. But finally make it into Hilo about 11:30, get gas, $2 for an empty tank tomorrow, and breathe easier. Pass sign for Kaumana Caves, and go back, put on rain stuff, take flashlight, and down trail with bright green wet leaves and flowers all around for a great trip through an old lava tube, double layered, back into dry and wet parts with turns and bends and lava marks all over. Great. John doesn't join me, however: he has only sandals on. Through Hilo, but no laundromat, so onto Hamakue Coast Road, stop at ugly scenic point for Hilo Harbor view, and drive off at Alae, for laundromat, but there is none, and drive down beach road for surfers in brownish waves, and cross bridge and come to turn-around where we eat lunch, smelling dead muskrat we didn't see till AFTER we finish. Wash dishes and watch cars turning around for the surfing beach, and further along road to dead-end in cane sugar with fucking car, and back to main road. Up to Akaka and up winding road into lowering clouds, and dress in full rainsuits to enjoy bamboo forests and fabulous green leaves and 8" Arum limes and ti-leaves and banks of ginger in the rain. Think the little falls is Akaka until we go around trail and come to dim line of white in a cloud, then it clears a bit and there's the wispy veil of Akaka, lovely in the clouds, and people come past and we gape at broken nosed, jut-jawed animal type in hairy-thighed shorts. Sit looking for a long time, then up to Kolokolo Beach Park in heavy rain to find john out of order and no place to park and pavilion being built and brown waves crashing up the river fed by falls. Decide to try further up and get to Lapohoehoe Point Park by driving down one of the sheerest cliff roads ever built to fabulously sprayed tarmac flat spot just feet from the ocean. Clean out glove compartment to find we haven't confirmed flight yet! Back into car and up the way to Honohina and get to tiny Oopeeka, or something, and there's a general store that lets us call Aloha Airlines collect and THEY call JAL to confirm flight to Tokyo, and we buy postcards and I drive BACK down lovely road. Decide to park under palm trees and I get out to look at surf-downed concrete lighthouse and new portable metal one, climb rocks to look at empty tide pools, and to the south side of the point for mountain-high spray off sheer rocks before rain drives me in. Write 47-48 at 5PM. Decide to shower before darkness and before AM cold, and John watches spray and cars and trucks drive around MOST suggestively. I take a half hour to repack everything NEATLY and close bag with no trouble and John makes hamburg patties on hibachi for last evening, I delay vodka tonic 6:30-7:30 by writing 48-57, or else, and we have last of vodka tonic and guava and sake for dinner and I'm properly high, but muster sensible talk when ranger checks our permit and says camper should be inspected. Up top to write while John packs HIS bags, and we sit and talk about last night, even in the rain with the blink of the lighthouse outside, and I'm so high I sleep easily, though decidedly fretful about tomorrow's FOUR flights.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 14. [[[11:10PM, 7/19]]]. Wake about ten after 5 and see the sky getting first pink, then it changes to gray and gets its second pink while I watch the surf crashing on the side. John's up about 6 and we watch the sun peek up then go behind clouds immediately. We have breakfast and pack the last things, and I wash the last dishes and we clean everything and sweep the floor, getting out of the park at 7:30. I drive back and again it starts raining very hard, and I'm worried about the flights: that they'll be rough, or that they won't be able to take off at all. Into Hilo about 8 and get 50 cents worth of gas because the tank's low again, and check route to Rainbow Falls. Out on road being torn up and John's rainsuit is in his trunk and so he STAYS in car, while I climb to platform and see the brownish water pouring over to become whitish falls. Dawdle at side while old lady trots around looking at falls, then I piss under huge banyan tree with mango garbage pile beneath. Down wet rocks in slippery shower clogs, then to a wide viewpoint framed by trees, and there's a huge opening gouged out by the fall basin, so that there's an arch in the rock to echo the arch made by the framing tree branches, but it's much too cloudy for an early-morning rainbow arch to add. Back to the car at 8:35 and John can ACTUALLY direct me back to the little road we found the camper on, and we're there at 8:45, and they don't even bother checking us out much, and we write traveler's checks for the balance we owe, turn over the keys, and load our baggage onto the back of a jeep for the jaunt to the airport just at 9AM. Check in and find to our amazement that NO one sells postcards, and I even go all over the strung-out airport and case the adjacent swimming pool. Dig into my "send home" envelope for two from my private stock and send them with the last of my US stamps, forgetting that we still have a stop in Honolulu! Get in line for plane and I've recommended left side and John gets in front on left and I'm in back on left, and I read part of "Orphans of the Sky" since I just DON'T feel like writing, and it takes a long time for the plane to get ready, and ever-late Aloha Airlines finally starts its 9:30 flight at 9:50. It's cloudy and rainy, but we take off with a good roar and into the sky smoothly, mounting over Hilo and the coast we'd seen before, but the clouds were too low to see Akaka Falls, and I tried looking for Lapohoehoe Point, but we jounced into the clouds just then, and when we broke through, there was the shadow of the plane at our side, neatly surrounded by a rainbow, and John and I exclaimed afterwards about seeing, finally, the Specter of the Brocken. See the snowy top of Mauna Kea and the hazy distance of Mauna Loa, and also some little tips of the Kohala range above the thick clouds. Level off neatly and I feel comfortable flying now, and almost immediately Maui comes into view, and again there's a great sight of Haleakela (first time for John, who's enthusiastic about it) and her two cauldron-craters joined at the top, and we go low over the surfy coast and jounce through the clouds and make a wide, low, slow, looping curve over the flat midland to land at Kahalui. I feel good about 1/4 the flight done, read more of the book, and we're off in about half an hour, again rising smoothly, banking through the clouds past glimpses of Kanaapali coast, then over Lanai and dirt-streaked south coast of Molokai and an INCREDIBLE canyon that seems more enormous than Waimea with dirt roads along its ridge, and jungles and green patches in the turbulent waters. Swimming and surfing would be muddy, but the jungle landscape would be great! Don't see much of Honolulu until we bank sharply to land, and the beaches are all down there and the gloomy clouded mountains, and we're down next to a yellow two-engine job that gets called off his landing as we come down near it, and the 747s and Air Force planes are around in force. Taxi to terminal and 1/2 the flights are done! Out quickly and meet John at the door. Locate baggage after a bit and catch shuttle bus over to JAL, where we're checked for passports for the first time and our luggage taken for Japan. Over to Pan Am and find to my dismay that since our ONLY Pan Am flight is over, our whole itinerary has been erased from the computer! Fuss, but there's nothing to be done, and I'm annoyed at John's joy at "finally being lost to the world." Scout out a post office and mail John's cards and my first envelope for $1.35 4th class postage, and get to flight room after a snack in the huge terminal space of a chili dog and a pineapple juice. Nervous about flight at 11:45, but news that the Grand Funk Railroad is on our flight for a concert (two) in Japan is great, and we see a VERY tall curly-topped fellow in white trousers (percussion) with a zipper, a guy in a Superman sweatshirt who turns out to be a vocalist, and a BEAUTIFUL dark fellow in sunglasses and broad-shouldered blue and white-striped shirt over a huge hairy chest, and nice arms, and nicely worn, though loose blue jeans, and a couple other dolls into the bargain. Walk to waiting room and enjoy looking at guys sitting on floor, snapping snapshots, grinning at John, and we're into bus for JAL 71 and Pan Am 1, and get to our 747 waiting room, like an ENORMOUS streetcar with a balcony with Mexican-brass chandeliers, and a lot of Japanese businessmen contrasting with Grand Funk and us! Onto plane at 12:30, when we should take off, and we get on in FRONT and walk ALL 50 ROWS to back, longer than most THEATERS, and nine seats wide most of the way. It DOES look more like a long room than a plane, and men below look quite tiny. Upper racks for junk are nice, and I sit and read, starting to sweat. Wait and wait and wait, and finally move at 1PM. I'm MORE nervous as we take off at 1:10, fearing the 7 1/2 hour flight, in at 3:30, and it's now 8:30AM. Off slowly, back end fishtailing, and it banks VERY sharply over to right as directed. More sharply than ANY other plane I've been in, and it's VERY uncomfortable in waggling, jumping tail. Don't know how it is up further, but it's AWFUL in back. I look out over receding Oahu, the FABULOUS full-view of cloudy Kauai in half hour, and a rock of Necker Island, or something, a half hour after that. Lunch in an hour and a half, not bad, but I HATE the flight. Look at sexy guys nearby but THAT doesn't help. Finish "Orphans of the Sky," and time drags on and on. Movie starts at 11, and I don't pay $2.50 for earphones for "The Blind Swordsman and Chess Expert" but watch it anyway. Over at 12:30 and agonize through first part of "Waldo." Pass International Date line, losing a day, at 12:45.

THURSDAY, JULY 15, now officially. Snack is awful and fishy and give some to John. To john many times. Flying at 35,000 feet IS in high clouds, and THREE times that damned recorded voice about "a little turbulence" comes on and I sweat for an hour each time. French Frigate Shoals green atolls out left at 1PM, maybe bits of land. Cloudier and cloudier. Feel awful, but it's almost over. 2PM, 3PM, we start down, I put book away, tell John NOT to take day away from Taiwan, and we're down and down, finally over land, and lots of little junk in hills and NOTHING of Tokyo as we land on time at 3:30. THANK GOD THAT'S OVER. Limp but happy to see tiny curved first-class lounge, then claim luggage, brave photographers and kids to get to hotel desk to see we have to wait to Osaka to check hotel, get bus to smaller terminal for JAL flight to Osaka, waiting only a little bit to 5PM, and onto jammed plane above wing, and steeply off into clouds for the 4TH time this awful day. But above clouds to colorful sky and perfect cone of Mt. Fuji with ice cream, and land at 6PM, vastly relieved. Check bus, grab luggage at 6:20, get Tawaraya address in Japanese and reconfirm for 7/22 to Taipei, and JUST catch 6:50 bus to Kyoto. MARVELOUS orange and green sunset over blue-glazed-tile roofs and rice paddies and Expo 70 site of Japan and I'm HAPPY to be here, though at 7:30 it's 12:30 old time and I'm DRUNK with fatigue. Out at first stop, taxi impossible, students talk us AWFUL way to Station taxi stand, finger peeling off, and into cab for Tawaraya. HURRAY: room with bath tonight, room for next 4 nights. IT'S A SUCCESS! Decide at 8 to dine in room, and LOVELY MENU: Tempura with eggplant and green beans and onion and mushroom, sunomono with four kinds of pickles and relishes, amazing assortment of fish (John's raw, mine cooked), marvelous little noodles in ice with beans and mushrooms and cherries, sauces and soups and teas and juices, five or six assorted dishes of ABSOLUTE goodness, and the luxury of watermelon for dessert. Into our private tank for a soak, into kimonos and we feel tepidly tipsy with sake, but in all, ABSOLUTELY GREAT. Bed at 10.

FRIDAY 7/16. [[[now 12:30AM 7/20, and I'm DEAD with cramped fingers, stop!!]]] [[[11PM, 7/20]]] Wake at 2:10, figuring it's 7:10, and late already, and up again at 4, not knowing what else to do. Out at 5:30 to walk empty streets and hear temple chanting. Sex at 7 and breakfast is in at 7:30, and we eat and decide to start our sightseeing by renting a car and drive for four hours. Hotel says they can get a medium size cab for 1100 yen/hour, and it'll be here at 9. Stand outside at 9 watching everyone being bowed away from the hotel, and he drives up at 9:15, apologetic. In and tell him what we want to see, and he decides to start us with Heian Shrine. We really don't SEE the entering Torii gate, and the buildings struck me as they did before, very large and stark, but with nothing really to RECOMMEND them to the eye. "English-speaking" guide does rather poorly, not answering about half our questions, and we look at new-looking orange-red buildings and pay extra fees for garden. Weeping cherries held up by bamboo framework, sounds of violins from the music school next door, and dozens of tourists taking pictures: I'm tired of touring castles and shrines already. Over bridge and woman asks our guide's help for the Imperial Palace, and we decide to go there at 10:15 for permission for the Gosho and Katsura. John laughs at all the stamps they use, and we're set for the 11AM Imperial Palace tour and it's 10:30. Back to hot car and look at map and there's Sokokuji, so we drive there in five minutes, buy entry and brochures, and there's a huge dimly-delineated dragon ceiling in an enormous temple room, and a lived-in look to the monk's quarters and gardens and grounds. We want to go back, but must rush back to Imperial Palace. Start with a group of 6 at 11, and as we wander around only the OUTSIDE of the Imperial residence---most of which has been burned down 17 times---I get a very strong feeling of the "deadened quality of Japanese architecture": the Chinese had taken a certain form of building and developed it to a certain style, THEN began striping away details until it had been reduced to its most simplistic natural, functional form. But once it's there, where do you go? You don't add anything, there's nothing superfluous to take away, and you don't change it because of the enormous weight of tradition behind it. So it's frozen solid, never to change, preserved, not living, a monument only. [[[4PM, 7/23, ONE WEEK BEHIND---this has got to stop]]]. There are many tour groups looking about, and everyone's getting in everyone's way when they're taking pictures. Our guide may know English, but his spiel has such a memorized and rote quality it's hard to understand what he's saying half the time. Then people keep joining and wandering off and asking the same questions he just answered twice before. Also, it's getting extremely hot and humid, and everyone's a bit hot under the collar. He calmly tells about all the fires and assures an English girl that only the pails of water sitting around would prevent it burning to the ground again. One building is swathed in the white robes of some construction company, for the cypress shingle roofs have to be replaced every 20 years. While all the others dash to their busses at the end, our fellow sees us coming and hops into the car and meets us halfway. Then there's along twisting ride (past, I think, a closer parking lot for the immediate pavilion) to a parking lot at the bottom of a shopping street leading to the Silver Pavilion. Coming down the steps are two cute Japanese with tight crotches and watchful eyes, and John and I smile at each other as they pass. The hornet-nest-infested Mt. Fuji image seems to me to be too steep and too big at the top, so that it looks like a puu more than the famous graceful profile, and the gravel lake is also aswarm with hornets and hasn't been raked in days, so it's rather a mess. Again, the sticky heat may have made things look worse than they were. The first Japanese tea-house had blue water-filled buckets and the old-wooded Ginkakuji had red water-filled buckets, but we passed in a daze through the rose-stippled ponds, the lovely stretches of moss under the old trees, and the tiny waterfall into a carp-filled pool. Looked and looked and could really find not much of interest. Buy a book for 100 yen and back down the pennant, float, plastic temple filled street to the car, and go through even more narrow winding streets, past the Heian shrine again, to Maruyama Park, which looked to be filled with temples and private homes, with nothing much to distinguish one from the other. Out of the car and walk around a long way through the woods to the huge bell, sorry not to be able to ring it, and then back around another long way by car to the front of it, where we leave our shoes at the bottom of the steep black stairs and climb to the top, where a priest takes money from a mourning family and proceeds to let them pray and burn punk before an inner altar. Buy a book from a shaved-headed monk who's either gay or a girl, and around the side (no, this was in Sohohuji) to see the immense hall with the Dragon swirling on the golden ceiling. Go around to a few side temples, notable more for their size than for their beauty, and it's getting on to 1PM, and we figure we've had enough temples for today, since everything's running into a fatigued mist, and we tell the driver we just want to look at the floats. He seems not to understand, and we drive up and down and around Shijo Street before he FINALLY lets us off. Streets are jammed with Japanese tourists with cameras, and John is having another hunger fit, so we see one of those plastic sweet-displays and go downstairs to have the menu translated and we have large tasty salads and horrible fluorescent green and red sodas. Pay and out to roam streets looking at elaborate floats, jostled by all the smiling people, and finally pay 200 yen each to mount #3 and look down over the crowd and relax in seats. Girl mumbles to her mother about my fan's "Do you speak English?" and she's been living in Hawaii, about to be married, and answers lots of questions about everything, a very pleasant encounter. She tells us about Rashomon, so when we go back and get to the hotel at 4 to find our new room and take a long soak in the larger family bathroom, we ask them to reserve for us at that restaurant for the tonkatsu. Out and walk down incredibly busy Kawaramachi Street, under the marquees and arcades with our rainsuits on, which we finally take off, much to the amusement of passersby. Rashomon is elegant on the outside and loud family on the inside, and prices are only 900 yen, surprisingly good. Food is tasty but not exceptional, and we get our first huge bottles of Asahi beer. Done at 8:30 and out to join the throngs in the middle of Shijo Street. As we walk it begins to POUR rain, and our suits and shower clogs work VERY well, and we even hold hands to avoid being separated, and bolder Japanese say hello to us and smile and wave. Feels absolutely great! Rain and lightning in torrents, to a lovely effect, and the Chinese bands are clanging away in the upper reaches of the larger floats. Walk down side streets to see the beetle, eel, fish, toy, balloon, bamboo leaf, food, roast corn, bean curd cake, flags, pennants, and all the other sellers in the festival streets, and also the fireworks are going off around us, too. Stand and watch the crowds going back and forth, see the tag end of some Buddhist ceremony in a humid temple, and crotch watch. Tired at 10:30, and we walk back up Shinyyozoku Shopping Arcade, looking at all the shops and movie houses and tacky restaurants, and my left second toe is beginning to hurt at the top where my shower clog rubs it. It gets sorer tomorrow, a small band aid doesn't work on Sunday, and the rest of the week I wear a big bandage, which is a nuisance but it helps ease the hurt. Back to the hotel completely exhausted, and John's managed to buy some sake from a store, so we break open the two-quart bottle and have a couple of cold nips before falling exhausted into bed about 11PM.

SATURDAY, JULY 17. [[[7/23: 4:30PM]]] I wake about 4:10, still time-confused and then again at 6. I write two lines at 7AM, then stop, John awake. We have elaborate sex until 7:30, when breakfast comes, so we're not out to the empty streets as we'd planned yesterday. Japanese breakfast this morning, which deals heavily on fish, and I give a couple of things to John, but not the tiny clams in the tasty miso soup, nor the excellent smoked fish in a large dish. There's a good variety of food, but everything's on the rice-pastry side, and I begin to get bound up a bit with constipation. We'd been told, to our delight, that we'd gotten seats for the festival today, and we got out at 8:30 to find they were the two closest possible seats to the Tawaraya. Also told them that we wanted to go to the Noh plays at 2PM today, since we planned to see the further festivities at Yaskak Shrine at 5 or 5:30. Everyone wanted us to wear kimonos yesterday, so we decided to wear them to the festival, and everyone fluttered around us, adjusting and retying and tucking us in, and laughing and waving us out the door. All the activity was on the street, so we didn't bother going to our seats. Soon two Japanese girls flanked us and their two boyfriends took our pictures. They didn't ask us BEFORE, but at least they knew the words "Thank you" afterwards. Then it happened a second time with a group of three giggling schoolgirls and an American woman (our whole section seemed disgustingly American) came over to say that SHE wanted to take the NEXT tableau with HER camera. She got her chance quickly, then we had a series of Americans taking their pictures with us. 9:30 came and went, as did 10:30, and still no parade, but we were the center of attraction. Chatted with an old couple down from Tokyo for the festival, and the girls from the hotel found us in the middle of attention and were delighted. Back at 11 for a drink, and they gave us a small thermos of cold water. Such LOVELY service! At 11 the first float rounded the corner and we took our seats in front of a lovely Azak-build with hairily-muscled legs under yellow short shorts. Cute as anything, but though he was aware of our looking at him, he never seemed really interested. American tour director disgusts John by picking up a lovely Japanese baby and shouting "Look what I just found in the gutter." Women ooh and aah and talk VERY loudly and are very unpleasant, and all the Japanese push around behind us to get a good camera angle. Finally the parade starts past, and the HEIGHT of the lumbering temples is truly enormous, up to the swaying lance with tree boughs tied to it. With a shout, the bearers of some of the smaller floats lift them off their wheels and, in peril to their clogged feet, whirl them around in a sweating circle for applauding crowd. Two sexily-dressed guys across from us get some goodies thrown from the floats, including a large blue headpiece. Everyone scrambles for the bamboo souvenirs tossed out, and when one lands right in John's lap he has one too. I stand on the chair seat with my binoculars to watch the elaborate fan dances by the two on the front, holding onto ropes to steady themselves on the swaying towers, and some of the rope pullers are open-shirted and heavy-legged, and only a few are cute enough to look at a second time. During one of the longer stops, smart float priests got out folding chairs and sat down in the middle of the street, regally fanning themselves. The standard bearers were elegant in white shogun suits and black hats, the priests usually older in gray, and the best specimens were usually the two who followed the standard bearer dragging the long bamboo poles. Some misaligned wheels had to be pried back into place each rotation by sweating wedge-operators with a loud jolting thump. The smaller floats were sometimes tawdry and frowzy, and the heat increased, as did the complaints and moans of the red-faced Americans. Many left to have their seats taken by grateful Japanese women. I got tired about halfway through, but got cheered by the desk clerk taking and refilling our thermos. By 12 noon we'd been photographed and interviewed by some Kyoto Japanese newspaper, our names taken and opinions transcribed and hotel recorded, but we never got a copy of the article, so I assume they never used it. When there are only two or three floats to go at 12:30, and there seems to be a long stop for no reason, all the passed floats lined up impressively down Oike Street, we go back to the hotel to be met by Butterfly, who suggests we have a cold shower, and we do, and then she brings up a lunch of rice cakes and fish and soup and tea, and we ask for fruit, and she says there's none, but at the end comes in with two lovely dishes of peeled peaches. What a place! Out at 1:30 for a cab to the Kanze Kaikan for the Noh plays, but there just ISN'T any passing, and we keep getting bumped by the busy sweepers making the street just as clean as it was BEFORE the parade, so we get there just after 2, and it's all crowded and we don't know where to sit, so I'm in the first row and John's back further. The first is rather like Benkei in a boat, with the woman-mask, the boat, and the philosopher-mask, but it ends up with a monster-mask of great power, and the music is crashingly loud with the not-heard biggest drum, and the chanters are going away and the flutes are playing and it's quite a show. No intermission and there are three short interludes that we're not prepared for until I buy the English explanation afterward, and then we settle into the long one, with the woman-mask again, this time with an adorable little girl who has incredible stamina, a good steady voice for the intricacies of the chant, and a remarkable endurance when she has to crouch for a long time, hold her hands raised, and she doesn't even flinch when the audience jumps at a couple loud claps of thunder during the hard rain that can be heard above the orchestra. My feet keep falling asleep, I'm dreadfully tired of sitting and terribly impatient for it to be over, and at 5:15 when it ends, I'm up and gone before the final chorus-chant that marks the end. There were more props, more spectacular changes (woman into emperor, then into monster), and louder and better music than at Carnegie Hall, but I was SO tired. Yesterday John pooped out early, tonight it was MY time. Wait long time for a taxi in the rain, but finally get back and I take an hour's nap, and we're out at 8:15 for Suehiro, but it's full, so we make reservations for the next night at 7:30 and try to find another place. I have it in mind that there's another restaurant close by, but we wander through a subway, go down back streets, and we don't find anything but darkness and fireworks, so I call Tawaraya and they say everything's closed at 9 and they can't remember the name of Junidanya from my description of its location. Back to the Shinyyozohu area and decide to try [[[11PM, 7/23]]] our luck with anything we find, and there's a place that looks pretty junky on the outside, but inside it's almost as nice as the Rashomon yesterday, and by coincidence there's a "gai" tea room match box on the table, which I take in case it might be true. Order strictly by price, the most expensive thing on the menu for 600 yen, but point under glass, forgetting about parallax, and get the next item up, which is a greasy lamb with breaded grease for 480. Also get a large beer. The bill coming less than we expected is just ANOTHER case of things seeming to be a bargain for us. Try afterwards to find some gay area, even to following some gay-looking guys around for a bit, but though they look at us with their bright eyes because we're tourists, they look at our crotches ONLY out of a sign of general interest, rather than for any sexual reasons. See lovely muscle builders once or twice from cabs, but they're not around in the streets when we want to meet them. Back to the hotel for the evening ritual of bath and sake, and I tell myself I should write, but the combination of heavy sightseeing and sake just knocks me out, so the only thing I feel like at 11PM is getting into bed on the floor and falling asleep.