Greetings from beautiful and dry, (well, for today at least) Hilo! It's another wonderful day in Hawai'i Nei...Leialoha is working on her crafts and music, I have a livestream of Buffett on Baritone in a few hours, and Kekoa, (our new handy dandy guy) is doing repairs and such around the house. This is in preparation for next month when our house will be going up for sale and we begin our re-location to Las Vegas. I know many of you know, but if you didn't before, now you do.
For many, living and owning a home in Hawai'i is one for the bucket list...and rightfully so. It is a wonderful, beautiful and deeply enriching place to live. The people are welcoming and warm, the food is delicious and plentiful, and most of the time, the weather is ideal. This has not been an easy decision, as we have come to love our little home, and have had more wonderful experiences than we can count. So, why are we going? Let me explain our decision.
Many of you know that Leialoha and I have made our living for the last sixteen years performing on the cruise ships. In a given year, this can take us away from our home anywhere from five months, to, on one occasion ten months out of a year. We love our job, and are grateful for it...but as we all know, the last year and a half has had us parked at home waiting or the restart of the industry. In that year and a half, we have come to realize that to fulfill our needs, needs...personal, financial, work-related, health-related...we need to go away.
While it is a beautiful place to be, on our island, (the Big Island) quality, and accessible healthcare is not what it should be. And as I like to say, you don't go to the doctor LESS as you get older. Need an MRI or a CT scan? Well, we have this past year, and we have had to fly to another island to do it. Appointments can be difficult to come by, and we only just got a cardiac care unit at our hospital last year. Before that, if you had to have cardiac care, you had to be airlifted...enough said.
Work-wise, while we will be on ships as long as we can, we recognize that eventually, we will not be working on ships...and the prospects of non-entertainment work here on the BI is slim. County and state jobs are the gold standard, and they only come up once in a blue moon. Leialoha wants to start expanding her craft and lifestyle business, and for there to be any hope to do so, we need to be in a place where she can obtain her supplies at a reasonable cost, and within a reasonable amount of time. Postage and shipping alone can be quite expensive here...never-mind when you need something to complete a project, and it hasn't come in on the barge this month. When we took our reconnaisance trip out to Las Vegas a few months ago, there were Joanne's and Michael's on almost every corner, (well, not really...it just seemed like it) and that's what we need for her business.
As for me, I have some projects that I have been wanting to get off the ground musically for a while now, but it just can't be done here. I want to bring my Tiki Dave and The Wave band to people and spread the gospel of trop rock and island music, and there is just not the market for it here. I also need to be able to get in the car, and drive to ukulele groups for instruction and play-alongs...and I just can't do it here. I have met so many wonderful people and groups over the last year and a half, and would love to visit each and every one of them...and that is much more doable living on the mainland.
So, there it is. Hawai'i will always be in our hearts, as Leialoha was born and raised here, and I have come to love the islands and culture as much as she does...but sometimes in life, difficult decisions need to be made. Las Vegas is our next stop, and we hope to be there by February of next year, when we get off the Grand Princess. In the meantime...anyone want to buy a house?