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Our first excursion in Hawaii was to the Polynesian Cultural Center. It is described as a unique cultural theme park that provides visitors with an introduction to the people and cultures of Polynesia. The Cultural Center was highly recommended by all our family and friends who had been to Hawaii, and we can certainly understand why.

Sue stops to pose with a tiki at the entrance to the park. For an extra ten bucks a person, we could have toured the park with a guide, but we decided to save the money and head out with a map and our new friends Bill and Jan.

As we started exploring, we just so happened to come across the Rainbows of Paradise show. It starts with a young Polynesian woman throwing flowers into the lagoon. According to tradition, each blossom represents a memory of visits to Hawaii; and if the blossoms returned to shore, then so would the visitors.

Then, representatives from each of the seven main islands of polynesia come out in canoes to demonstrate their native dances. The Hawaiians dress in blue to honor Wakea, the "Sky Father" of ancient traditions.

The Tongans dress in red to represent the beautiful red morning skies of the Friendly Islands.

The Samoans dress in traditional lavalava (men) and puletasi (women) that are magenta and pink to honor the beautiful sunsets of their South Pacific islands. The men really got their boat rocking and tried to knock off the poor guy who was steering the boat.

The show was good, but I was ready to move on and get the the next village before the crowd broke up.

On the way to the next village, we passed an exhibit for Rapa Nui (Easter Island). I've always been facinated about the Moai or giant stone statues. Four respected stone carvers came from Rapa Nui to create the seven authentic moai on exhibit.

The Hare Vaka (literally, "canoe house") is the type of house built by the natives of Rapa Nui. The aerodynamic shape of the hare vaka helps counter island winds.

The next village, and by far my favorite, was Samoa. One Samoan gave a demonstration on starting fire and milking a coconut.

Here he is rubbing two sticks together to make fire. His whole presentation was very funny, and it was very easy to see why they are called "The Happy People".

Next, he adds embers from the sticks to dried coconut husks.

And there you have fire. Funny, it never looks that easy in Survivor. It took him maybe 30 seconds.

Next, he showed us how to open a coconut.

Using only a stone, he cracks the coconut in two perfect halves. I remember when I was a kid, my Dad had to use power tools to accomplish the same feat.

He joked that opening coconuts was a national sport in Samoa. The world record for men is 2 seconds. The record for women is 2 weeks. And that's why the men do all the cooking in Samoa.

Next, he used a sharpened pole to shave the meat out of the coconut. Then he put the meat in the husks and squeezed out the coconut milk.

After his demonstration, he had another Samoan show how they climb trees to harvest the coconuts.

He said they used to have 12 climbers in the village lately, but it's been really windy lately, and this was the last guy left.

The next village we visited was the Island of Fiji. I'm guessing by the shape of this hut, they don't have the same wind problem as Rapa Nui.

Jan and Sue stop to pose for a picture with a native Fijian.

Bill and I were going to demonstrate for the girls how it really isn't hard to climb a coconut tree, but we decided it was best not to show off too much.

Most of my family are die-hard Survivor fans, so we thought they'd get a kick out of us visiting Marquesas. Survivor Season 4 was filmed there, and is probably most famous for "Boston" Rob.

We'd never seen a banana tree before, so I thought this was pretty cool. That's a whole lot of bananas.

Here are some other members of our tour. I guess the extra $10 got them the change to throw spears in addition to the guide.

Here is Shirley throwing a spear.

After dinner, we went to the Horixons evening show. It was really beautiful, but after a long day in the sun, jeg lag finally started to set in and I could barely keep my eyes open. I did perk up a bit when the Samoans demonstrated their traditional fire dances.

After the Samoans, I'm afraid it was beddy-bye time for Scott again, and I really didn't catch a whole lot of the hour and thirty minute show. At least I know Sue doesn't regret marrying me, because she could have easily left me behind, sleeping in the auditorium.