A Taste of Happiness

          (Week one in Maui)

           It couldn’t have been later than 2 o’clock when we arrived at Wainapanapa State Park, but it looked like 6 p.m.  Which is like midnight on the Mainland.  We were in true jungle now.  We hadn’t moved a muscle in an hour and now the pain was everywhere.  Multiple fruit stands lined our path to the national park.  One had three dogs guarding it.  Those damn Hawaiian dogs seemed to follow us everywhere.  None of them bark, they just shadow.  It was cute at first, but when every dog did it, it was just a pain in the ass.

          We needed a permit to camp at Wainapanapa, and a sign said there were absolutely no exceptions.  The only place to get permits for campgrounds is in Wailuku, 60 miles in the direction we came from.  It was too small of an area to squat.  In another life I probably would have lost my head in fiery rage and paid a homeless man to take a shit on the front door step of the camping coordinators office, but I had some odd concept of life after my little rebirth.

          So we ate some dry ramen and then headed back the way we came.  Dark clouds filled the sky, and rain I have never experienced began to fall.  Forrest Gump came to mind, the scene where he was in Vietnam and became accustomed to all the different types of rain.  Sky falling, sideways and ground springing rain hit us all at once.  We were drenched and car after car passed us.  It was pitch black, so our youth and boyish good looks didn’t hold ground.  Eventually the rain stopped and a car with it.  Casey and Brian drove us a short distance to a better hitchhiking location.  They were either related, had been dating for several years, or Brian was locked in the friendship zone.  Either case, the guy seemed to have no balls whatsoever.

          Two seconds after getting out of their car, an old couple with a truck asked us if we needed a ride.  Like our first few hitchhikes no names were exchanged.  Thankfully they happened to be heading past Kahului.  Right next to our spot at Kanaha Beach.  Two days of travel went by in an hour and a half. 

          We laid back and watched the eastern half of Maui unfold.  The waterfalls were in plain sight over our shoulders.  The gorgeous wooded bluffs, cash only fruit stands, and sight seeing tourists were a blur as we drove past them.  Eventually the truck shot out of the winding road and the forest began to thin out.

            We were dried in a moderate amount of time.  Occasionally the old couple would pull over and let people pass.  Just before we cleared the forest, a familiar rain covered us again.  It was ice cold now; the winds that picked up in the back of the truck chilled us.  We looked at each other and laughed.  It was a hearty laugh that lasted longer than it should have, but all of it was genuine. 

          Eventually we were back in farmland.  We passed the free stuff sign that earlier housed a couch that we sat on for a long time.  Next it was the avocado stand we came across, at which point the clouds parted and the sun beat down.  We looked at eachother and smiled, it was a best friends smile, the kind that only two similar people can share when they’ve been close for so many years.  It made me wonder how many people have seen and experienced the things we have, and then I smiled harder.

          They dropped us off near the airport, which was 3 miles from a safe camping spot.  A friendly man saw us walking and drove us the rest of the distance.  A woman I met on the plane told me I would remember this trip for the rest of my life.  At the time I thought it a little over dramatic, but now I believed it.  I smiled once again, as I realized it had been less than a week.