Hilo Adventure

Traveling is sometime a little tricky so I have learned to always be prepared and decided not to take a flight to Hawaii from San Francisco but to go out of LA because San Francisco can sometimes have fog early in the morning so, to be safe, let’s go out of L.A.   Well, do I have egg on my face?  Los Angles was fogged in the morning we needed to leave for Kona.  So, we made a detour to Ontario, CA to wait the fog out and we missed our flight.  Of course, Betty in row 9D is in a panic over the delay and can’t make her flight and we all have to hear her talk to all 14 family members - that’s 14 different calls on her cell, as we wait on the plane for a gate.  Oh, by the way, did I mention she was a LOUD talker?

Thank God I was flying in a day before I had to teach at Quilting on the Beach in Kona, Hawaii. When we finally arrived in LA we had to change our plans which meant standing in a line forever to get a new flight and now we are going to catch the next flight at 5pm to Hilo, which is also on the Big Island of Hawaii.  I ask the reservations girl on the phone how far Hilo is from Kona.  It’s an island can’t be that far, right?  She says it 65 miles away.  Well, she was wrong!  It takes 2 hours to get to Kona from Hilo and we were arriving at about 9 pm so our hosts ask one of their teachers if she could put us up in Hilo until tomorrow when Robert (our host in Kona) could come and get us.  Well, it was a nice surprise to an exhausting day to find our hostess was Phyllis Cullen, a fiber artist extraordinaire.   She and her husband, Mark, just moved to the island from Chico, CA 6 months ago and her house was to die for and I was in heaven.  Here are some wonderful pictures of her studio, house, and their gardens.  So the fog turned into a great surprise. Thank you, Mark and Phyllis!

The driveway to the house is a cave of palm trees with orchids out of every other one.  Amazing!

Phyllis's dreamy studio.

 Some of Phyllis's beautiful quilts.

Joe in front of Phyllis's quilt.

Mark and Joe

Mark went out and cut these bananas off their tree. They were so sweet.

The view.

Phyllis is making her way through the jungle to show us her waterfall.

The waterfall.

                                                                               

Their yard was like a botanical garden.  I think my next quilt idea is coming from the pictures I took there.

We eat the guavas right off the tree.

  Now we just have to figure out how to make a living in Hilo!