“Purple haze all in my brain Lately things just don’t seem the same Actin’ funny, but I don’t know why ‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky” Jimi Hendrix may have immortalized “Purple Haze” on our airwaves, but it was
“Purple haze all in my brain
Lately things just don’t seem the same
Actin’ funny, but I don’t know why
‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky”
Jimi Hendrix may have immortalized “Purple Haze” on our airwaves, but it was Kintaro Japanese Restaurant in Wailua that has forever embedded it in our taste buds — and in our blood-alcohol content.
Kintaro’s most famous drink, the “Purple Haze” is an alluring mix of warm Japanese sake with Chambord black raspberry liqueur. The result is … well, go taste it if you haven’t yet. And please, bring a designated driver, it’s that good.
Swiss sweethearts Juls Walterspiel and Marco Staubes came to Hawai‘i to surf, relax, and eat loads of sushi, something quite cost-prohibitive in land-locked Switzerland.
Marco, a civil engineer, lives part-time in Australia and part-time in Switzerland. He divides his free time between snowboarding, surfing and Foster-ing (Australian for beer).
Juls was born in Germany, but grew up in Zurich, Switzerland. She earned some fancy science master’s degree four years ago at University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. While living on O‘ahu, between laser measurements and teaching hip-hop classes, Juls picked up surfing pretty fast, given her daredevil skills on a snowboard.
But after graduating, Juls moved back home and eventually found a job in London, U.K., insuring rockets and satellites. On weekends she flies back home to be with her lovebird Marco.
There may be no ocean in Switzerland, but Juls and Marco get wet quite a bit. Whenever there’s some free time, they drive to France for some world-class beachbreaks or fly to Portugal for some serious pointbreaks. Occasionally, they book a trip to Morocco to surf some of the best uncrowded waves in the planet.
This was Juls’ third visit to Kaua‘i and Marco’s second. Both have made friends for life on the islands, and plan to return here as long as they can still surf.
Kintaro is open Monday through Saturday, from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.
9/10 warm Japanese sake
1/10 Chambord liqueur
Soul surfing
You don’t need one of those fancy sake-warming machines. Just do itold style, like back-in-the-day in Japan. Warm up the sake in apot, gently pour it in a ceramic bottle and add the Chambord. It’smuch better to do it old style anyway, just like in soulsurfing.
