EC 2015 - Earth Celebration on Sado island

Next stop after Hawaii was Sado Island. The earth Celebration is a festival, that is held every year by Kodo and the people of Sado. A lot of Taiko is involved. Lots of people are there and have a good time. The center piece (at least until this year) are the big concerts in the evening, that are held in the Shiroyama park of Ogi, a little port town. Besides that there are workshops held, where you can try out to play the drums yourself and other stuff. So called fringe events provide all kinds of music during the, again a lot of drums but also others. There are tents set up at the harbor, that provide food and all kinds of nic nac. And there are other activities to explore the island.

I arrived on Thursday afternoon, just in time for the Noh Theater, a pre event. I did not understand much but the atmosphere was great. In the last piece I liked especially the combination of old and new, Noh figures, classical dance and modern dance. 

On the next day I participated in the "let's play Taiko" workshop, held by Sammy chan. She is such a great person, full of energy and always smiling, I love her!

After teaching us some basics including watching at each other we were allowed to hit the big drums in the practice room. Real fun and so powerful.

In the afternoon I participated in the seminar about Bali music, that provided some background about the music, we would hear on the second evening. Very interesting, although everything was in Japanese (as announced) but luckily I met Sandra in the Bus and she explained the most important parts, so I got the idea. And the practical part I understood anyways. We could play these great instruments ourselves. 

The first evenings concert was all about Kodo. A great show, although it was raining a bit. But that did not stop the good vibrations. (No pictures, as pictures are not allowed of any concert or workshop performances)

We got to know the perfect Japanese organization in handling huge masses of people, that have to get into a park via a small steep path, that allows about 4 people side by side. We queued for entrance order cards in the morning. They define your spot in the queue in the evening. In the evening you get lined up in four rows in groups of 30 to 40 people and sorted. Then you are lead up the hill. On top you are sorted again (no passing on the way up!) and released in small groups to get on to the lawn. No running please! This is done in three batches and covers about 2000 people within one hour. The rest is done unsorted but never the less organized.

After the concert about 3000 (?) have to leave the area down that steep narrow path. This is done very organized and calm again. No pushing, no rushing, no running. The police channels the masses with a gate, where they only let through one or two at a time, so the path is never crowded. When everything goes smooth they open the gate a bit wider to let more people through and within 30 minutes max the lawn is empty. I was told, not only everybody left but also not a single piece of trash left (off course with separated trash).

On the second day I did the Miake Taiko workshop. This is a drumming style where you take a low stance and beat the drum from the side. It has a base rhythm, that is for example played on one side of the drum and the 'melody', that is played on the other side. We learned the rhythm first, than tha movement of the arms and last the ivements off legs and body. I struggled with the rhythm already and finally gave up with the arms. I preferred watching and feeling the drums.

The concert in the evening was great again, seeing the Balinesian group in action.

On Sunday after several good firing performances than the big final concert with all combined, what a great finale!

Some more pictures

On Monday I toured the island a bit. What a beautiful place! 

Making use of each little piece of flat land. 

And squeezing houses, wherever there is space. 

Hawaii 15 - last days on Kaua'i

On Saturday we flew from Maui to Kaua'i to spend some more days there. It's the oldest of the major islands with some great results of erosion, the Na Pali coast and the Waimea canyon. 

The coast can only be seen from a boat or a helicopter and also other features are best seen from the air. So I decided to go flying, my first ride with a helicopter. It was amazing and the pictures, I took, don't do it justice at all but they are a nice reminder. 

On the next day we were doing the canyon tour by car, which gives some good insight into the canyon and a different view on some of the features, I flew over the day before. Here one of the waterfalls out of the helicopter 

and in the left top corner as seen from the main out look (hmmm, I don't think, you can find it):

Some nice flowers all over

and other stuff coffee 

We stayed in the Plantation cottages in Waimea, a place, where the little houses from a former sugar plantation where transformed into very individual cottages for vacationers. A really nice environment with a reliable wake up call by feral chicken or better their roosters and some heavy thuds from the Mangos, falling on our roof. Lucky for us, that the coconut trees were a bit farther away

Delicious breakfast

All in all wonderful two weeks, a good start :-)

Looking back to Kaua'i on my way back home to Tokyo

Hawaii 15 - days 8&9 Hana

On our last two days of cycling we approached Hana, on the east side of Maui from two different sides. First we came from the south. I was riding alongside the Haleakalaa, passing the Maui winery. They also produce a pineapple wine but this is not my favorite. The whole road was a nice up and down but as I started a bit higher up and the road was kind of going down towards the ocean, it was a bit more down. The more I came around from south towards the east the more I could feel the wind. No wonder did they place the wind farm there. I finally gave up cycling, when I even had to tread downhill and got into the car to enjoy the view. On this day we drove back before the road got too narrow. The mountainside and coast was quite impressive. Some lava fields from more recent eruptions. Not many trees and plants survive that constant wind.

On the next day we approached Hana via the road to Hana, which is a scenic route along a steep coastline with lots of curves, waterfalls and rivers, as the north side is the rainy side. As the forecast promised rain towards Hana, I decided to ride until the rain starts or it is getting too steep and then do the rest in the car. We wanted to go around the loop this time. And so we did. What a contrast to the dry windy south side.

After 10 miles of nice up and down I joined in the car.

 

Hawaii 15 - day 6&7 next island Molokai and a lot of flowers

On the next day we took the morning ferry to Molokai. The bike riding was a bit more leveled here at least for the part we did. Along beautiful beaches

In the afternoon we did some sightseeing, trying to get a glimpse on the backside of the island

(Yes, if you know, where, you can see the beach)

and checking out the abandoned resort at the west side of the island. Beautiful beaches but the islanders wanted to stay out of the tourist hype. 

For the way back we took Mokulele air, which translates into island hopper. 

10 seats and a very direct feeling. 

The next day, a rest day, I checked out an ice botanical garden. Lots of beautiful flowers. 

Hawaii 15 - day 5 - island hopping - Lanai'i

For our second day of biking we had to get up early. The ferry to Lana'i was leaving at 6:45. So we got some breakfast and bagged lunch and went on the ferry. After a smooth ride Blaine met us at the pier. Lana'i is a tiny island with one town kind of on top and from there all roads go down like a spiderweb. The plan was to do the three main roads all downhill but we didn't want to do so much down. So we decided to try, going up the least steep of the three, from shipwreck beach. After going down to the beach, watching the ship wreck, that was 'planted' there to scare ships away from the reef, 

we started the climb in the heat. Good, that our support van followed closely again, so, when we had enough, we could hop in and drive the rest. On the island you find pine trees, that were planted by a guy from New Zealand. The trees are taking the moisture out of the air, dripping it to the ground an by this irrigating themselves. With this they even created their own clouds or better pulled down cloud base. 

After lunch in town and a short visit to the museum we went out to the next beach until the road got too steep down. Nice view!

Via a dirt road we made it to some place where king Kameamea would go fishing and even earlier people must have been, according to the petroglyphs.

Some pretty high cliffs there.

Back to Maui

and again a nice sunset and a great dinner