big island week 1

so it's now been about one week since arriving at the farm on the big island we now call home. and an interesting week it has been. after a five hour delay at the portland airport, we had great flights all the way to the kona region of the big island. we got to the farm in the dark so waking up in the morning to the beautiful farm was a fascinating experience. bonnie, the main farmer, gave us a walking tour of the 8 acre farm the first morning to get us oriented. i was mostly just in awe at that point...i'm not sure much information was really absorbed and bonnie had, and always has, a lot to say about her farm :) she is extremely knowledgeable and loves to share information about the way the farm operates. the main crops are kona coffee and macadamia nuts, but the farm is full of other wonderful produce including avocados, papaya, pineapple, breadfruit, persimmons, five kinds of bananas, and lots of oranges. we've really enjoyed having fresh squeezed orange juice every morning.

so a typical day on the farm involves getting up around 6:15am for some breakfast, juice, and sometimes coffee (which we still need to perfect). we work for two hours 7-9am doing various things--sometimes raking mulch and scattering it under trees, weeding the gardens, picking up fallen fruit, etc. then almost every morning so far (after a half hour break) we pick up macadamia nuts. this involves strapping on some fairly awkward knee pad things, covering up almost every inch of ones body to avoid mosquitoes, and crawling on our hands and knees on the ground gathering mac nuts. my back has had to adjust to this hunched over position--it's still not very fond of the activity. so that's three hours of picking nuts, which can get long but is much improved by the use of an iPod, which the hosts strongly encourage us to use. then we have the afternoons free--12:30 on. we've checked out some beaches, some stores, bummed around on the farm figuring out what to make for dinner (this is a constant topic of conversation and we've come up with some very creative, though not always tasty, concoctions!)

so internet access is not what one might call convenient (or cheap in these parts it turns out). we have to hitch rides most of the time to get anywhere so we're never sure how long it will take to make a trip anywhere. so i may not be posting all that often, but i'll try to at least update the blog once a week.

hope all is well!! much love--jill