Home The Moai Lani and The LewOw Landing

[Johnny Tsunami]

Seasons greetings from The Rapa Nui Ranch. Before we get started, Id like to thank everyone for following along with us, as we begin to put the finishing touches on our 5 year, tikification project.
Its been a long slow process, but the results have been amazing. It feels more like living at a tropical resort every day, and as time goes by, and the constant addition of items and decor continue to transform the property even further into a tiki dream, the reality is, I wake every day thinking, whats next?
They always used to ask me what I wanted to do, when I grow up. Over 50 years later, I finally have an answer. Your lookin at it.

May the holidays find each and every one of you, blessed with the riches of family and friends, as we navigate the rocky coast of reality, while setting a course for the rum soaked islands of our imagination.
Aloha to all.....


If been a crazy year here in The Bal Hinch. With all the covid supply issues, what was supposed to be done by July, is now finally wrapping up in December.
This isint a very tiki post, because we are actually building and adding spaces to tikify. But its hard to see the end, if you dont know what the beginning looks like, so think of this as an artist building and stretching a huge canvas, so he can begin a painting. This is my canvas, and this is what I will have to work with, when tikification time arrives. Its a summers worth, but Ill make it as brief as possible.

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful Tiki Deck, located in The Bal Hinch. It hosted lots of parties and many people consumed adult beverages while enjoying the sunny days and peaceful nights, at the PO-KA-HO valley nightspot.


As time went by, the Tiki Deck grew old and weathered. Then on that fateful day, the storms came, and turned the Tiki Deck, into a tattered, storm battered mess. The Tiki Deck was very sad.


Doctor Decktor came by and gave us the bad news. The Tiki Deck would require many hours of reconstructive surgery, if it was to ever regain its usefulness and natural beauty. He said that the Tiki Deck could only be properly restored, by using the basic, rudimentary tools of my ancestors. With that he rose his hands to the sky, mumbled some alcohol fueled gibberish, and handed me a 1960s Craftsman 100, saber saw, and told me that with a little skill, a wee bit o Kirk and Sweeney 18yr old Dominican rum, and an ample amount of foresight and safety, I could help the Tiki Deck reclaim its proud stature and regain its historic relevance, here in the Hoosier Riviera.

 

[Johnny Tsunami]

After procuring all the needed tools and indulging in an extensive round of Special, High, Intensity, Training, we were ready to cut out the diseased carcass, that once provided us with so many of the wonderful times, we were unable to remember the next day.


We are adding a fire pit, so half of the old wood deck, is now going to become a pea gravel patio. We start by replacing the block walkway next to the house. We then did some digging and leveling, before laying down weed block and pea gravel, stabilizer grid.


We then reframe, and screw down the surface boards on the replacement deck, while installing a french drain for the pea gravel fire pit area.

 

[Johnny Tsunami]

The Tiki Deck, was once a deck, barely alive. But yes gentlemen, we can rebuild it, we have the technology. We have the capability, to create The Bal Hinch;s first indoor/outdoor tiki deck. LouOw Landing, will be that deck. Better than it was before, better, stronger, tikier.
So we slapped on some walls, tucked it all under the roof, then added a nifty little lookout area, on one end, outside of the Moai Lanai, but still under cover of the roof.


In front of the lookout area, we created a built in grilling zone, with a carved out nest for a Big Green Egg and a countertop with electric and gas to set up for a table top griddle, for making breakfast outdoors.


We then moved into the house, and replaced the original French door on the back, added a slider on the other wall, and 2 windows on the corner point of the house. This room will be getting a new floor that looks like an old beach shack, and then the full bamboo treatment for the walls. Not sure yet, if I want to cover the ceiling, that may cause too much damage to whats already there, so I may paint it a matching color of whatever bamboo I decide to use on the walls. The answer always comes with time.


Anyway, the added windows caused the outside area to change from this, to this.


and thats where we currently stand. Hopefully, we will soon have screens in place and the interior wall taken care of, as delivery delays slow things down for the holidays.
While we wait, we move inside to finish up the interior, where we have 2 rooms and a hallway left. First up, cover the bottom half of the hallway walls with tigerwood flooring and a carved chair rail.
Sounds easy, probably not. Til next time..................

 

[Dr. Johnny Fever]

holy cow! outstanding work, thank you for sharing. Looks amazing!

 

[Johnny Tsunami]

Well, its update time, and it looks like we dodged a bullet, here at The Rapa Nui Ranch. We had a burst of delayed deliveries come through, along with available workers due to the cold snap, all wedged between the holidays and the current global turmoil. In those 5 or 6 weeks, we managed to get everything needed to finish up the contractor phase of the transformation.
The outdoor deck area, screen room, and adjacent sun room, are all now finished and ready for full tikification. Here is where we stand at the present moment.

First off, all of the windows and exterior vinyl came in, so this wrapped up the outside areas, then all we needed was to add new guttering to finish off all of the major construction work.


We then moved into the sun room area, that opens out on to both the screen room and the deck area. Once we filled the corner with windows, I decided, I wanted something different for the ceiling. I just wasnt sure how much I wanted to tear up the ceiling, to install bamboo, so for now, I had the ceiling painted along with the top 16 inches of the wall, to give the appearance of a canopy over the room. I can always pull the trigger on something more elaborate in the future if inspiration strikes.
We then replaced all of the window,door trim, and base boards with burned 1x4s, then added a burned wall rail, around the room, where the paint ends, and finished with a vinyl plank flooring, made to look like the floor of a beach shack.
Right now, the plan is to fill all of the wall areas that are white, with Bac Bac matting, cover the seams with split, black bamboo pole halves, and maybe add a series of tiki masks, around the top of the room, in the painted area.


Finally, that hallway I was talking about? yeah, here is what I started with, then added vinyl tigerwood flooring to the walls to change the look and feel completely. The cedar chair rail will be burned, before being replaced.


Once we finish the sun room, and the hallway, we are down to our final 2 rooms of our 5 year project.
First off, a small bedroom will be transformed into feline fantasuite for our cat Wayne. With stair steps on the walls, a couple of bridges, a window lounging area, and virtual kitty city, built up into one of the corners, this room will be known as, "The Waynoasis"
Then our final room, the living room/media room, currently known as The Testosterone Theater, will get the full tiki treatment, with a large bamboo feature wall, window dressings, and indirect lighting, to punch up the island vibe to 10, while watching reruns of The Don Ho show, and Hawaiian eye.
After that, we move into our final decoration stage, where our attention turns to artwork, pictures, carvings, and a final, more detailed, tikification process, to tie up all the loose ends.
Stay tuned as we hurtle like turtles, towards the finish line of our 5 year tikitransmorgafication project. Aloha

 

[Lagoon of Mystery]

That's impressive. Wow. Can't wait to see the rest of the build-out!