… really does not describe my latest business trip.

Bruce (my boss) and I landed in Kona at about noon the day before our meeting began. With a whole afternoon to kill, I somehow managed to talk him into his first attempt at snorkeling; we headed south of Kona to Kahalu’u, where I practically tripped over a turtle (which Bruce missed). There were lots of fish out and about, but all I had was a little disposable underwater camera that I haven’t had developer yet. (I mainly brought it for evidence that Bruce actually went snorkeling, but I probably won’t post those pictures, in the interest of keeping my job.)

I let Buce pick the next activity; we cruised on down to Captain Cook to visit Greenwell Farms coffee plantation. We skipped the full-on tour, but loitered for a while in the coffee-tasting shed, sampling different brews and petting the ancient dog that lounged there in the shade.

We finished off our “free day” with pizza at the Kona Brewery (Best. Pizza. Ever), and headed up into Waimea, joking that our vacation was over and it was all work from now on.

Thursday was, in fact, mostly work, aside from our evening jaunt into Kawaihae for dinner.

Friday, however, was practically a vacation day.

It started out like work in more ways than one: I got up extra early to go for a jog. I’ve blogged previously about jogging in Hawaii, and how it’s so much easier than exercising on the mainland! It’s just such beautiful scenery; you want to be out and about at 6am. On this particular day, the wind was whipping around Waimea something fierce, and had picked up to 30+ mph gusts by the time I walked/jogged to the small Waimea airport and back. Still, it was a gorgeous trip – aside from the extremely dead cat lying in someone’s driveway, well into the point of mummification. Yum.

Next we sat down to more of our business meeting – but to my delight, we ran out of things to work on around 11:30am, and no one seemed inclined to force the issue. So Bruce and I were left to our own devices for the entire afternoon!

Our first stop was Mahukona, a small boat harbor north of Kawaihae that I’d been told had decent snorkeling. The entry is a small metal ladder of the pier, into a channel that can get a wee bit surgey if the waves are going (which they were starting to do when we arrived). I stayed close to the harbor, since the wave action sucked me back and forth quite a bit, but still had a pleasant swim. Bruce got totally nailed by an enormous wave that splashed up onto the pier right after I exited the water.

Next up: Spencer Park, just south of Kawaihae. This was a great spot for surf wimps like myself: TOTALLY FLAT, sandy entry, and some halfway-decent snorkeling. There were tons of coral heads with juvenile fish, and I even spotted a little eel on my way back into shore.

Our final beach visit was near the Mauna Lani resort. We parked at the “beach access” lot, and started walking down the access road. We walked, and walked, and walked. We walked past lava fields, under trees, and by enormous lava tubes. We walked past a golf course, by some private residences, next to a lagoon, and finally out to the beach.

After all that walking, I was initially disappointed to discover that the visibility at this cove was totally crummy; I could only see about a foot, and there wasn’t any coral to be had. Of course, as soon as I dropped my camera back by my towel and hit the water for a camera-less swim, I landed on the world’s friendliest sea turtle.

Seriously, this guy wouldn’t leave us alone. I first bumped into him in about 5 feet of water, and he kept cruising right up to my mask. I had to dodge out of his way several times. Then he headed into shore, and amused himself for about half an hour bumping into kids and checking out those of us with masks and snorkels. At one point, I was basically lying down on my back in the sand and about 2 feet of water when he SWAM ACROSS MY LAP. Talk about not being shy.

We finished off the day with another trip into Kona to stuff ourselves with the delicious Kona Brewery pizza before we had to head back home the next day.

That’s what I call a good business trip.