bikesbeetsbread: the rains have arrived...

this is what today was like in a nut shell

sun hemp sprout forest!

joey planing MORE sun hemp

lettuce, yum

hoein in some rye seeds

joe and his sprouts

our cover crop seeds! mustard, rye, alfalfa, clover and sun hemp

chard!

me spreading some cover crop seeds in the never-ending rain

forgive us followers, it has been two weeks since our last blog post. OOPS. so, we got to the island and it was sunny and there were a few rains here and there, but basically no rain. sometimes a few sprinkles at night. and we were warned of the rains. and finally, they have arrived. today we spent the ENTIRE day working in the rain. it never stopped! it went from a sprinkle, to pouring, to misting, to pouring, sprinkling, regular rain, sprinkling, cats and dogs...etc. it was ridiculous. we were FREEEEEZIIIINg good thing we have a hot tub we can sit in for an hour and get our body temperature back to normal.

one of the most exciting things that has happened in the last two weeks is that we MOVED INTO A ROOM!!!! finally. just before the rains started. it's not just rain, it is the wind as well. SO WINDY here. i guess we are on an island in the middle of the ocean, not much for windbreaks out there. we even have a bathroom in our room! no midnight bathroom searching excursions alone in the dark, scared, almost falling into the pool. terrifying.

last week we had a "spa night" where a lady that works on the farm, Mohini, brought a bunch of crazy shit (clay salts, fennel, basil, ginger, hawaiian clay, cocoa, tons of other spices, flours and vegetables...) and we mixed up some body and face scrubs! it was awesome (the picture with all the bowls on the table...)

farm work has been going well. a few weeks ago we learned that all of the soil on the farm is shit (or lackthereof...ha!) and we pretty much have to start over. the managers ordered 40 tons of compost to try to enrich the soil and kill some of the billions of pests we have that have gone crazy over the last two years. we have also been mulching and planting a lot of cover crops (sun hemp, clover, rye, alfalfa and mustard). they grow so fast! it is exciting to see them all sprout. we have pictures! harvests have dwindled significantly but this makes it much more manageable and less chaotic every friday. we still feel like killing each other after friday harvest. it wears off in a few hours. we still have carrots, beets, okra, eggplant, basil, parlsey, cilantro, taro, chard and some kale. we should be starting to harvest the turmeric and ginger soon!

last weekend we traveled to the western part of the island. we drove around the north shoreline first and made our way around the entire side of the island. it was the craziest road we have ever been on, makes the hana highway look like cake. we stopped at a few lookouts, the nakalele blowhole, a cute valley town, saw a mushroom rock, a sweet beach (DT Fleming beach) with good waves for surfing if we surfed, and ended with a six pack of maui brewing co. beer on the beach for frisbee and a sunset. we pretended we were real tourists instead of having to go back to the rainy, superass windy other side of the island with lots of bugs and mud and farmwork. we were with a new guy at the farm, thackary (who also had the rental car!!), sarah and jared. the day was incredible. as if it wasn't good enough, we also got half way home, decided we didn't want to cook and turned around to eat at flatbread (a pizza place in town, doesn't beat pizza luce though, no way)! it was great. the only negative was that when we got back we watched apocalypto which is a horrible movie. mel gibson blows worse than the blowhole we saw on the northwest shore today. quote of the day by thackary: the nakalele blowhole is nature's bidet.