We got up as intended today and left the condo at the time designated for our horseback ride, but other than that the day did not go as planned.
Shortly before the alarm was set to go off, the phone started ringing in our room. No one has the number where we’re staying – people just use cell phones – so I figured it was a wrong number and stayed in bed. Besides, they could leave a message that I’d check in 20 minutes when I got up. Well, there was no message, but shortly after getting up we turned on the news and saw there was a tsunami warning for Hawaii. Minutes later, a condo representative came knocking on the door to be sure we knew what was going on. It was about 7:30 and the tsunami, if there was going to be one, was due to hit around 11:00. So we had time to pack up all of our stuff, including food, water, and a blanket, before heading to the evacuation center. We were out of the condo by 8:15.
The evacuation center was a very nice middle school campus. All things considered, it was not a bad way to have to evacuate. There was a cool mountain/ocean breeze, plenty of shaded lawn areas to sit on, a book to read, and even free wi-fi. Even though FB, Twitter, and all other social networking sites, including my webmail, were blocked by the Department of Education, I could still get caught up on my RSS feeds. Of course, the fact that there wasn’t a major tsunami event contributed to the goodness. There were a few tvs set up and tuned to a local news station, and people gathered to watch the surge begin in Hilo, but the wave action was pretty minor.
The warning was called off just after 1:00 and we were back at the condo shortly thereafter. Not much else to report on the day. We had lunch, did a little shopping, and sat by the pool. Our horseback ride has been re-scheduled for Monday morning, so we have rearranged our schedule a bit to accommodate everything. Fortunately, we had one free day built in, which we will just have to call today. Tomorrow, we head out on a hike I’ve been trying to convince Steve to do for years!