Westworld Alberta
Issue link: http://westworldmagazine.ama.ab.ca/i/402160
20 w e s t w o r l d A l b e r t A | w i n t e r 2 0 1 4 seafood section, with its heaps of local poached shrimp and red snow crab legs, while Dan downs the roasted prime rib with garlic- herb Hawaiian salt. is afternoon, though, we set up camp at the new Ka Maka landing, home to a beachfront infi nity pool and café, and Keiki Cove, a water play area with spouting jets and a blue octopus mosaic underfoot. Peering out from their foliage-fringed hiding spots, a couple of Menehune grin at the landing's comings and goings. the pool itself pays homage to the legend of Māui, the demigod who brought the Hawaiian Islands to the surface of the ocean with his giant fishhook. Starfish and sand dollars (man- made, of course) adorn the pool's coral-like grotto, where tiny white lights twinkle in the form of Manaiakalani, or Māui's fi sh- hook constellation, come nightfall. But there are real stars to ogle after sundown, too. Beneath a pink-grey tropical sky, we settle into lounge chairs around a crack- ling fi re overlooking the beach, for the Fireside Mo'olelo Storytell- ing. A bearded, straw-hat-topped Hawaiian elder called Uncle regales us, gesticulating wildly and strumming a ukulele, with a love story about a fi sherman and a fetching Hawaiian princess. After- ward, we sleepily saunter back to our room. "In HIgH SCHOOl, we went to a taro patch, we camped out in tents and actually had to wash our hair with this . . . it works," says our guide, Uluwehipuanani, on a tour of Aulani's nature and wildlife attractions the next morning. Pointing to plants along the Waikolohe Valley's pathways, she explains how early Hawaiians would squeeze liquid from the torch ginger's thick red petals for shampoo, and how the women would pound bark from the paper mulberry tree to form a fabric called kapa for the men's loincloths. We wrap up the 45-minute tour at rainbow reef. As we gaze through the large viewing windows at some of the 1,300 fi sh and 43 varieties that live in this man-made lagoon, our long-named guide aptly points out the reef 's longest-named inhabitant – the lauwiliwilinukunuku'oi'oi, or longnose butterfl yfi sh. An hour later, we're snorkelling among said butterfl yfi sh and their colourful buddies. At fi rst, omas, a snorkelling newbie, stays close to Cooling off on a tube fl oat along the meandering Waikolohe Stream, where some 1.5 million litres of water winds past lava rocks and through dark, misty caverns; (right) gentle morning light sweeps across the still-quiet beach, where guests can rent boards, kayaks and snorkel sets from Makiki Joe's.