Puff the Magic Dragon

By ShellJune 23, 2018

So last night I landed in Kauai via Ohua and my lovely cousin Chris (some of you may remember her from other adventures such as “Kiki in the Greek Islands” and “You can take the girl out of Gero”) was waiting for me at baggage claim with a lei at the ready. She had arrived in Hawaii a week earlier and had explored Maui and a bit of Ohua and arrived in Kauai this morning.

I got in quite late, so after a bit of chatter and catching up, we were lights out and eyes shut. We don’t have aircon in our room, but it was lovely sleeping with the door open and listening to the waves and the rain.We’re staying on the east coast at a place called Kapaà and though this would be central to explore the rest of the island. The rain still hadn’t moved on, so this morning we had this view one minute…

Then this about 2.5 seconds later… The women doing yoga had scattered.

Our mission on the leg of the journey is to scour the beaches for all the sea glass we can find. With a small break in the rain we took the opportunity to get down to the beach in front of our hotel to do a spot of searching….

We were happily doing a bit of collecting when the rain hit again…. we sought shelter under these waterproof trees, but it was still a little chilly.

Time to hit the road and today we’re heading north to the land of Hanalei. Some of you might recognise the name from the song made popular by Peter, Paul and Mary in the early 60s…

Some people thought that it was a song was about smoking the marijuana…. all the signs were there – the word “paper’ (as in Jackie Paper) was said to be a reference to rolling papers; the words ‘puff’ and ‘dragon’ was interpreted as ‘taking a puff’ or ‘draggin’ – meaning to inhale smoke. Both authors of the song said, “No it’s not!” and that case was quickly closed.

I don’t know…. you tell me.

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee,
Little Jackie paper loved that rascal puff,
And brought him strings and sealing wax and other fancy stuff. Oh

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee,
Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honah Lee.

Together they would travel on a boat with billowed sail
Jackie kept a lookout perched on puffs gigantic tail,
Noble kings and princes would bow whene’are they came,
Pirate ships would lower their flag when puff roared out his name. Oh!

Dragons live forever but not so little boys
Painted wings and giant’s rings make way for other toys.
One grey night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more
And Puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain,
Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane.
Without his life-long friend, puff could not be brave,
So puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave. Oh!

Written by: Leonard Lipton & Peter Yarrow
Performed by: Peter, Paul & Mary

For some reason Kauai is overrun with chooks. They are everywhere – all different types. They seem to just run free in the wilderness… and in the supermarket car park. We pulled into a scene lookout today and were witness to this scene – three chooks were standing, evenly spaced, staring at the wall while the two chooks at either end looked to be keeping guard over them while this little light brown one was pacing, probably giving some sort of speech about his political beliefs and how all chooks need to fall in line if they are to continue to roam free on the island. It was quite surreal.

We drove down some lovely roads trying to get off the main road whenever we could…

One such road lead us to this beach…

It was covered with coconuts and driftwood…

There was a massive storm here in April and a lot of the roads were washed away – this was probably one of them. It’s down to one lane.

A bit further north was the Kilauea Lighthouse and wildlife refuge.

We stopped off at every little beach we could along the way…

In search of lovely sea glass…

No sea glass here…

We finally made it to Hanalei and found out that the road beyond the town was also washed away in the storms. Only local traffic are allowed through there – which meant, not us… so we hung around town for some lunch and some retail therapy.

We did manage to find our way down to Hanalei Bay, but the overcast day didn’t make it look as gorgeous as it really is.

Looking back in the other direction was a little better. It’s amazing what a bit of sunshine can do…

One the way back we stopped off at some lookout points…. apparently Jurassic Park was filmed here in the islands – I bet one of the scenes was here. Here’s a website with all the movies that have been filmed here: Avatar… Tropic Thunder… The Thorn Birds!
https://filmkauai.com/movies-television-shows-filmed-kauai/

This is looking back down Hanalei Bay

And I guess if you quint a little bit, the mountains do look a little bit like a dragon… sort of.

With all the driftwood here you’d never have to fear being stranded on the island…. a makeshift boat is only a tube of glue and a ball of string away.