Mangos or Mangoes?

Well, that is a question, isn't it? I've seen it spelled both ways around here and they both look silly to me, so which one is correct? No matter how it's spelled, mango season is upon us and mango trees all over Puna are loaded with this lusciously sweet and juicy fruit. And for the most part, they go unpicked! The smell of rotting and fermenting fruit hits us suddenly as we drive along the beach road or through the jungle. I'm amazed that more folks aren't out there taking advantage of this free food source. What a waste! The cost in the grocery stores ranges from $2-4 a pound!! In Hawaii!!

Needless to say, Mike and I go out and glean these wonderful fruits as much as we can. There's a tree down the road that we've been picking from, so sweet and yummy. Mike went and bought a long pole picker, the kind with a wire basket and little grab-hooks on the end. Now our evening walks include fruit collecting. Yesterday evening while we were swatting mosquitoes and picking mangos, we met some more of our neighbors who were delighted that the tree next door to their place was being picked. They told us this was a 'piri mango', one of the local Hawaiian types; good for eating fresh or for pickling if the fruit is picked green. We go for the ripes fruits and cut the flesh into cubes to eat. And I've been stashing some bags of cubed mango in the freezer for later. (The neighbors also told us where there were some more good trees just waiting to be picked.) yummmmm....

All our media mail boxes have now arrived and, amazingly, all the books fit in the one bookcase we have! Just. Okay, there are a few on the bedside table (of course). And all my cookbooks take up a shelf in the kitchen - that's normal, right? (I didn't even bring all my cookbooks yet.)

We had a lovely long bike ride today, down the main street in our neighborhood a ways, and then out on the old railroad grade that runs towards Hilo. This is one of our favorite bike rides. It's a dirt and rock road now that stretches on a fairly even grade through what looks like African savanna: wide open grasslands with lovely big shade trees here and there. I keep expecting to see a herd of giraffes strolling off in the distance! Instead, we see the blue, blue ocean on one side (makai) and the distant volcanoes on the other (mauka). Today we could see the smoke, ash & steam plumes from all three vents: Halema'uma'u up at Kilauea Crater, Pu'u O'o Crater further down the rift, and finally the huge plume down at the ocean entry near the Kaimu-Kalapana area. What an awesome sight!

Love and aloha,
Liz