Henry brought his mom and dad by late Sunday afternoon for some gumbo. Well, Henry wasn't too hungry but the rest of us sure got into that pot.
After dinner, we went outside to battle the mosquitoes (Something wrong with having to fight mosquitoes this late in the year) and try on a Harley. In another couple of decades, I wouldn't be surprised if Henry wasn't riding one with regularity. Let's see....I'll be......hmm....a VERY old man then.
Miss Hadley dropped by early Sunday afternoon to pay Nannie and me a visit. Nothing cuter than a one year old just now getting comfortable on the legs. She doesn't talk much other than the "Dadda" and "Mama" words but has a decent vocabulary in American Sign Language. She's quite capable of expressing "more" of anything, complimenting it with the sign for "please."
She's definitely not deaf but her mom and dad read that teaching them sign language at an early age reduces frustration in her own attempt to communicate.
After getting home and barely unpacked, I remembered a promise to a pair of 11 year olds regarding a weekend camping trip. "Camping" as defined as going to Lake D'Arbonne State Park and living in a tent overnight.
Friday afternoon, I picked up Susan's son, Nick and we headed up to Monroe to meet up with my grandson, Devin and to spend the 
night there.
It was promising a light rain but perhaps the new tent would keep us dry. Reasonably early, Saturday morning, we drove up to the lake, picked out a sight and through up a tent in the piney woods of north 
Louisiana. There was the occasional light drip or rain but it came nowhere close to dampening the spirits of the little boys. At one point, I was confident that I had a pair of pyromaniacs in training. However, much to my relief and I'm sure the park rangers, we 
managed to not set the woods on fire.
It was only one night but we came back after a great time, bringing with us lots of smokey smelling clothes, dirt on jeans and a desire for a decent night's sleep.
Click here for the pictures (evidence).
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Although, we enjoyed ourselves to the fullest, we're back from Maui. I can't promise I won't grumble when I have to drag my suitcase through some place in an Outer Mongolian style location this winter for sure.
Darlene and I stayed at our friends, Don and Rachel's place feeding the cats and thwarting would be burglars
while they were on their own adventure in Miami and Belize.
There's too many pictures to post and some are pretty much redundant, so click here to check out the slide show. The pics are in no particular order.
there are unwritten rules regarding riding etiquette if you will. It's well known that certain types of riders consider themselves as the real bikers and the rest are squids or newbies or just not cool. I've never quite subscribed to that notion but maybe it's because I ride a do Harley which garners a few more chips on the table than other bikes.Yesterday, I was riding my friend's 650cc Yamaha in Kihei, HI. Ninety-nine % of the time, I ride with jeans, boots and some kind of jacket and gloves but I had brought absolutely none of that with me so here I was riding a motorcycle with a pair of flowery swim trunks, t-shirt, baseball cap and sneakers. 
Although I am familiar with the controls, buttons and functions of the bike, it isn't perfect second nature compared to my own. So, just as I was coming out of a parking lot, a pair of real bikers were riding by on a pair of Low Rider Harleys stopped at the light. My left hand instinctively thumbed what would have been the left turn signal on my bike but on the smaller Yamaha, it was the horn button.
When I accidentally blew the horn, the Sons of Hawaii bikers turned to the sound of the "Beeeeeeeeep", stared a second or two then looked back at the road. You could just see the eye roll through their dark glasses. Grateful that they didn't give me one of those one percenter salutes, I rode off in another direction, realizing I had actually been snubbed by what appeared to be a couple of members of the Sons of Hawaii Motorcyle Club.
After fueling up, I rode off through the lush landscaped golf courses and resorts of Wailea toward Makena Landing. Just a few years ago, the development was contained to a tight cluster of hotels and a few high dollar developments but recently, lots of bulldozers have cleared the scrub brush
and cleaned off the countryside. This is the area that normally attracts locals and returning visitors who have a respect for the island and are more comfortable enjoying Maui in an unimproved state. They fish, dive, surf and occasionally have a small fire where they cook and eat. Over the past couple of years, there has been somewhat of a battle between recreational service 
providers and the County of Maui. The county has placed what some would describe as draconian rules and regulations on companies providing surf and diving lessons and equipment which would all but put them
out of business. As I rode into Makena Landing, I saw a lot of money being spent on improvements to the area. An owner of the property all around the beach access had cleared the hillside and had million dollar lots for sale all 
over the place. Makena is being transformed, lot by lot, from a wild natural place to a slick commercial and residential area. Now, I understand why the county had taken the position it has. Developed areas do not need 4 wheel drive trucks, campfires, 
cheap weddings on the beach and people not spending money there. I've been told, the developer actually owns most of the access to Makena Landing. Just follow the money.
I rode to the end of the road, near La Perouse Bay and as I stopped to take a few pictures, a 
couple on a Harley and Suzuki stopped and chatted with me for a while. They were the heads of
a motorcycle political action group (Street Bikers United of Maui) that united everything from the Sons of Hawaii to the Christian Motorcycle Association. We talked travel and motorcycles for a while, then shook hands and acknowledged the goodness of meeting other riders. I rode back to the house to check on Darlene.
Wooooohooooo........... Ms Darlene and myself are packing 
the ride headed fo' Nawlins, headed out for Maui and we'll be back in 3 weeks. We'll be staying in Kihei.
If you look at the map of Maui as being a person.....the roundish part on the left being a head...then Kihei is near the Adam's Apple near the 'neck' on the map. Maui is the second largest island in the chain and 
and older than the big island of Hawaii. If you're really old, you might have also heard of them as the Sandwich Islands. I'll take a shrimp po-boy, please.
If you're nice, we might bring you back a cup of Shave Ice. No, that's not a typo. "Shaved Ice" is a mainlander thing while "shave ice" is the Hawaiian thing and I suppose, Oahu in particular.
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