Don Riggs feels he and his friends may be wearing out their welcome in Hawaii. For the second year in a row, the Bellevue resident and eight others have vacationed there during a tsunami.

“Although there’s no comparison to the devastation in Japan from the earthquake and tsunami, there was quite a bit of damage on the Kona coast in Hawaii,” Riggs said of the group’s vacation spot.

Last year the group was in Hawaii during the quake in Chile. While that event caused barely a ripple there, with water rising a matter of a few inches, this year was a different story, Riggs said.

“It was at night, and we all stayed up watching local coverage (of the Japan event),” Riggs said.

Local officials warned that the first wave from a tsunami isn’t necessarily the largest and predicted some damage in Hilo, with no mention of the Kona side. So much for experts, Riggs noted.

“It was Kona that got slammed. I had phoned in a report to KING TV at about 4:15 a.m. (Hawaii time), which was outdated in less than an hour,” he said

The biggest wave, sure enough, was not the first. The big one hit around 5 a.m., going over the seawalls and causing a lot of damage to shops in the tourist area, Riggs said.

“The venerable old King Kamehameha hotel, just opened after a $35 million renovation, was hardest hit,” Riggs said, adding that he heard it will be closed for three months.

Bubba Gump’s Shrimp Company, where some of the group had had dinner the night before, was damaged and closed. However, by Sunday, most of the other shops and many of the beaches had reopened.

“It is the tourist area, after all,” Riggs said.

However, the usual Saturday cruise ship stop was cancelled, mainly because the pier they use had been damaged and condemned. Farther south, in the Captain Cook area, two homes were washed away, several others destroyed or heavily damage, as were several vehicles. “The good side of all this is that nobody died or was seriously hurt,” Riggs said.

Early damages estimates were well into the millions of dollars.

“As for the nine of us (six from Bellevue, two from Mercer Island, and one from Sammamish), we’re hoping that when the tourist board people here realize we’re two for two on tsunamis, they’ll pay us something to stay away,” Riggs said.

He added that the group now has new respect – “or fear” – for one of the members of the group.

As four of the group sat at a waterfront bar sipping umbrella drinks, the man, with his back to the water, joked, “Let me know if a tsunami is sneaking up on me.” A few minutes later, he checked his smartphone for something, and noticed, “Hey, there’s been a tsunami advisory.”

“We may have to cut him from our travel list,” Riggs said.