Post #538248 by TikiG on 06/22/2010

Aloha! Tiki peeps take a look-

Made it back to Cali intact following a two week getaway to Florida to attend the Hukilau party and visit friends.

I had a great time as you can imagine. Thanks to my bros TikiMango and TikiHana, I was introduced to several awesome new poly-pop friends. Florida peeps are just fantastic. Just one example of Florida hospitality I experienced concerned my sketchbook that I brought along during my trip. I actually lost it three times over the course of a very boozy evening and can you dig it? My sketchbook was returned to me three times personally by those that had found it!

My Cali friends knew I was taking Amtrak across America from Los Angeles to Chicago to Washington DC and then down to Orlando. A freakin' awesome experience over four days to reach my destination.

Because of requests to view them, here is a selected group of pics extracted from the 500+ pics I snapped...enjoy.

Waiting for my grand tour to start at the Van Nuys, California Amtrak station

Somewhere in New Mexico

Coming into Chicago by train

Standing under the Washington Monument

Cocoa Beach, Florida's legendary Wayne Coombs meets California's TikiG

Ron Jon surf shop in Cocoa Beach with omnipresent tikis

TikiMango at his workbench

Bahia Mar Hotel in Ft. Lauderdale

TikiMango's sales table at Hukilau receives much fanfare

Randy Wong of Waitiki7 is interviewed for the camera

TikiMango and Crazy Al w/ TikiMango's hand carved guitar to be raffled

TikiMango begins the guitar raffle

TikiMango and guitar raffle ticket winner phinz

TikiHana hand carved wooden pendant with wonderful handcut eyes

A crowd favorite and my pick for "most desirable" item, a vintage 1966 tiki. Price? $2000

Marina the Mermaid, TikiG and Otto share a photo op

Mai Kai sign taken from the gardens

TikiMango, Crazy Al and TikiG enjoying their Mai Kai Rum Barrels

Randy, Helen and TikiG share a giggle in Mai Kai's Molokai bar

TikiG with Mai Kai's cocktails menu

TikiG sits at the Molokai Bar inside the Mai Kai

Beautiful sunrise at the beach in Ft. Lauderdale

Yachts at Ft. Lauderdale

TikiG, Shag and TikiHana at a Hukilau room crawl

Ben Davis (Benzart) shows TikiG his scrapbooks of an amazing tiki carving career

Ben and tiki

TikiG sits within inches of legendary tiki carver Benzart

Benzart working on an awesome tiki pendant

TikiG at TikiHana's living room

TikiG wooden bowl painting done for TikiHana's collection

This Tang is mine! Carved by TikiHana. This beautiful carving will be in Cali soon.

TikiG collects shells at Satellite Beach, Florida

TikiG at I Dream of Jeannie Lane!

Sebastian Inlet- my last day in beautiful Florida

Thanks TikiMango, TikiHana, Benzart, Wayne Coombs, the organizers of Hukilau and all the many new friends I made while in Florida. This was a trip of a lifetime but not my last to the land of sunshine! See you all next year!
Take Care, Aloha! G

TikiG

tiki since '67!

[ Edited by: TikiG 2010-06-22 13:39 ]

[ Edited by: TikiG 2010-06-25 23:06 ]