SATURDAY
May 21
This much anticipated trip was planned for almost a year. Finally the time had come!
We got up Saturday morning and we were mostly packed for our trip. Our flight was to leave Boise at 2:17 pm. At 11:00 am we were ready and fidgeting so we decided to go ahead and leave for Darrell’s house. We got in the car and I prayed for a safe journey, asking God to be with us. I prayed for the people we were leaving behind and for protection of our homes and vehicles. When I pray, I often tear up or cry so after I prayed I took off my glasses to wipe my eyes and the lens fell out of my glasses. Since we had decided to leave early we had time to drive to Wal-Mart and I ran in and they fixed my glasses. Wasn’t God already watching out for us?
We were supposed to be at Darrell’s to meet the taxi at noon. We made it with fifteen minutes to spare. Roy had time to show Darrell how to do a slide show with a memory stick on his new Sony HDTV that is similar to ours, his is just bigger.
The taxi was a few minutes late but we got to the airport just fine. The bags were checked at the outdoor kiosk and they gave us our boarding passes there.
We went right through security, no line at all. Once through we ate lunch. Roy at McDonald’s and I at the Hyde Park Deli. Darrell had eaten earlier. We walked to the far end of the concourse to our gate. We waited there. Our plane arrived on time and the people on board deplaned. We saw our crew go aboard and we waited a while. A lady came to the gate and made an announcement that on the walk-around the pilot had spotted a nail in the tire and it would be thirty minutes before the mechanic could get there. Depending on the situation it was unknown how long it would take, especially if they had to change the tire. Darrell and I decided that if it was going to be thirty minutes we would take a bathroom break. Of course, the one nearest us was being remodeled so we had to walk quite a way back up the concourse. As we came out and started walking back toward the gate we noticed people moving in a line at our gate. We hurried back. They had checked more and found that it was only a rivet caught in the tread of the tire. We boarded the plane and took off for San Francisco. The trip was smooth and went relatively fast.
We landed in San Francisco and began the hike to our next gate. We found an area to sit in and Darrell and I sat while Roy walked around a bit. There was a man sitting a few seats away. He was sloppily dressed. He had his hands rolled up in his very dirty T-shirt. He looked unkempt and very out of place. One thing that made that so contrasting was a man sitting one seat from him who was dressed in a nice dark suit and tie. Standing nearby was another man dressed similarly. Turned out they were some type of police officers escorting their prisoner. When a flight was called for San Diego they stood up and we saw the handcuffs on the unkempt man. That was why he had his hands wrapped under his shirt.
Our plane arrived and we boarded. God blessed us again because even though they had announced the flight was full and they needed someone to give up their seat, it turned out that there were several empty seats and one of them was on the row we were in. We had room to enjoy the five-hour flight to Maui. They served dinner as soon as the plane reached its flying level. Darrell and Roy had a chicken and rice dish and I had a pasta dish. They were very tasty for airline food. Then they showed a movie, Coach Carter. I watched a bit but I was reading the last book of the Prairie River Series by my friend Kristiana Gregory, which I finished. I got up once and went to the bathroom but I tried to move my legs around and up and down a lot.
We landed in Maui, Hawaii. It was 9:30 pm, 1:30 am Boise time, and it was dark, so we could not see very much. It had only taken us a moment to realize that the humidity was very high and even though it was dark it was hot. The pilot had said the temperature was 82 degrees when we were landing. A breeze was a blessing. The airport surprised us because it is open-aired. Birds were flying around and I even saw a mouse running along a wall. It took a while to get our luggage and then we went outside and waited for a bus to take us to the rental car agency. We got our car, a Chevy Impala, and drove to the World Mark Trade Winds in Kehei, Maui, Hawaii. Darrell went to check-in. We decided to go eat before going to the room. There was a Denny’s near-by so we went there. We came back to the room. It was on the fourth floor. It was a nice place with two bedrooms, two baths, kitchen and living room area. We were tired; it was only 10:30 pm Hawaii time but 2:30 am on our body clock. We all slept well but woke up around 6:00am.
SUNDAY
MAY 22
It was amazing; when we woke up and opened the curtain on the sliding balcony door we could see that we had a beautiful ocean view!
We relaxed and got dressed. We went down to the activities area of the resort and they helped us plan our activities for the week and they booked everything right there. We had some ideas of what we wanted to do because we had studied and read about them in a couple of books that Roy’s sister and brother-in-law had brought back with them when they were there a couple of years before.
We went out to breakfast at the Kehei Caffe on the waterfront street. Good food but you went inside to order and then found a table outside. They would come out and holler a name and when you waved they delivered the food to the table. Now you need to know that I am afraid of birds. There were birds all over, several roosters, hens and gangly ugly chicks and also some small doves, walking all around my feet. Needless to say I ate quickly and went into a nearby store while the guys finished eating.
After breakfast we went to the Safeway store and bought some food and drinks for the room. We drove back to the resort and put on some warm clothes and hiking shoes so we could drive up the Haleakala volcano and explore. They said it would be 30-50 degrees up on top. It was not cold but warm and windy. There was a storm and clouds, so on the way up we drove through a couple of showers. The altitude at the summit is 10,023 feet and it did bother my high blood pressure. I sat in the car at the top while the guys hiked around. I had gotten out at a lower Visitor’s Center at 7,000 feet and looked at maps and read about the volcano. The last eruption was in 1790. It was interesting, the contrast of vegetation from the lush bottom to the stark lava at the top. We saw a white ring neck pheasant. There were cows and horses in lush pastures at the lower elevations and lots of jacaranda trees covered in purple blossoms, so many flowers but the higher you go the more rocks. We made it to the top and I thought the drive back down was spectacular.
MONDAY
MAY 23, 2005
The Road to Hana
This morning Gigi, our driver and guide for a day trip to Hana picked us up at 7:40 am at the resort. We knew right away that she was going to be a lot of fun. An older couple was already on the small bus from ‘Ekahi Tours and we picked up a young man before we were taken to a café for a continental breakfast. We had our first taste of fresh pineapple and papaya here. Yummy!
The trip to Hana is a four-hour drive on a 52-mile narrow highway with 54 narrow or one-lane bridges most built between 1910 and 1912 and many many curves. Gigi gave us information as we went. One of the first things we learned was that Hawaii is made up of 132 islands from Midway Island to the island of Hawaii. Many of them are small and some are underwater but they all make up the state.
The next topic was sugar. We passed a sugar mill, which was built in 1901 by Mr. Speckles. We saw lots of sugar cane planted in fields as we drove. Sugar used to be the big money maker and is the main crop on Maui followed by pineapple and coffee. The sugar cane takes two years to mature. It is then dried and when the leaves are fully dry the field is burned. This helps to crystallize the sugar in the cane. Two hours later after the field has cooled the cane is harvested. It is taken to the mill where it is washed and squeezed. The juice goes into a cauldron where it is cooked down to crystals. It is then barged to Crockett, California where it is refined and sent back to the stores in Hawaii. The cane and coal are used to make the electricity for the island. The roots will grow two more crops, then the plants are torn out of the ground and eight-month old seedlings are planted and the process begins again.
Our first language lesson came as cars darted around us. The word “lolo” means stupid. One of the towns we passed through was Paia, which means noise. When sugar was king many immigrants from many different countries were brought into the country to work the fields and they lived in many of the villages we passed through on this trip. When they all talked it was a lot of noise thereby giving the town its name. There is a bar here called Charlie’s where Willie Nelson, the singer, likes to hang out. He has a home nearby in Sprecklesville. The windsurfing championships take place on Ho’okipa Beach near here.
We learned about the hala trees. The fruit looked similar to a pineapple but they grow on trees not the low pineapple plants. The leaves are used for weaving baskets and when the fruit falls from the tree the segments are like small paintbrushes and were used for that purpose. We get a close up look at the hala tree at a short rest stop at Valley Isle Memorial Park. There is an old church there built out of lava rock where services are held once a month and weddings and other community celebrations happen. There is a small beach here and we are advised that if we would like some macadamia brittle this was a good place to buy some. We bought some and it was good.
We were told that almost every growing thing we saw was non-native and was brought to the island by people or bird droppings. All of the fresh water on Maui comes from rain. We were shown canoe wood trees that are very light weight near Kailua and hau bushes with yellow and orange flowers and beautiful pink impatiens. The yellow hibiscus is the state flower of Hawaii. All along the road are all sorts of wild flowers as well as cultivated gardens and there are flowers for sale at some houses along the way. In Hawaiian the word for flower is pua. Cook Island pines were brought to these shores and planted by sailors to be used to replace broken masts and spars. There were also Rainbow Eucalyptus trees that have varied hues of color on their smooth trunks. We also saw bamboo, which is a grass; the stalks were used for water pipes, building material, arts and crafts and weapons. There were African tulip trees also called Flame trees and many varieties of the Bird-of-Paradise plants. There are over one hundred different varieties. The ti plant has over six hundred varieties. They are colorful leaves growing on stalks.
We learned another new word “pacoloco”. Paco means tobacco and loco means stupid, this is the word for marijuana that hippies came in and grew in the 1960-70s.
We were shown a construction area where a new State Park is being built. It will be Mahina State Park. A new word mahina means moon. We went into the next area called Hono vonu, which means Bird Valley. This area used to be full of all sorts of colorful birds. The natives used to catch the birds and pull out two or three feathers and release the birds. The colorful feathers were used as decoration. You might have seen a picture depicting a Hawaiian king wearing a colorful cape and helmet these were made using feathers. It is estimated it would take 500,000 feathers for the helmet and three to five million for the cape. When some sailors saw the king in one of these costumes they liked it so they went and killed all the birds and now there are no colorful birds left here and only a few on the entire island. One of the plentiful birds on the island is the myna bird, which is dark with white on the open wing; it has a yellow bill and bright yellow feet.
We passed through Ke’anae, which means mullet, which is a kind of fish. This is an area where a lot of taro is grown. It is like a grayish purple potato. The purple sweet potato is also grown here. We stopped and Gigi talked to a man out farming the taro. We saw some mango trees and banana trees. The new leaves on the mango tree are a coppery, rust color. The next town was Wailua, which means fresh water where two rivers make one. Near here we saw a Chinese grapefruit tree loaded with fruit.
There used to be lots of sandalwood trees in Hawaii and Hawaii was called the Sandalwood Islands but foreigners came and chopped them down. Gigi said there are still a few up on Haleakala and school children have been given seedlings to grow so they can be planted on the island again. Here in the rain forest up to 300” of rain falls a year. That sounds like a lot but just a few years ago it was 500”. There were waterfalls along the way here in the rain forest, some we saw from the bus but some Gigi pulled over or just stopped on the road for us to see. They were quite beautiful. Being a West Texas desert girl I enjoy water in many of its forms.
We pulled over to look at a ditch project that was built about 1910. There are 75 miles of ditch that is four feet deep and it goes up and down three gorges which are over 500 feet deep. It is still being used to get water down to the sugar cane fields. We drove by the Happy Hula Hog Farm. Gigi says she doesn’t understand why they call it that, as these pigs or puaa will be dinner soon at one of the luaus. Luau means feast but be careful because lua means bathroom.
We saw guava trees here. Guavas are yellow on the outside and pink on the inside. We also saw an ohia, which is one of the few native trees on the island. It has red fluffy flowers on it. There was a green bush with huge white flowers, called trumpet flowers, which would be obvious when you looked at the shape of the flower.
We stopped at Wainapanapa State Park for our lunch. There was a black beach there. It was a beautiful relaxing place for our lunch. The driver had picked up our lunches at the place we had eaten our breakfast. Inside our lunch box was a small purple orchid and we ladies learned that if you want to put a flower in your hair and you are married you put it on the left side of your head and if you are single you put it on the right side. It was a short drive into Hana. In the big days of sugar, with big plantations this town was home to over 16,000 people but today there are about 2400 in the area. I saw a philodendron plant and the leaves were the size of dinner trays, at home they are about four inches across. These were about 18 inches across. There were ironwood trees, they will not float but will sink straight to the bottom of the ocean. Jim Nabors and Kris Kristofferson live in this area. Someone recently paid $20 million dollars for 100 acres nearby. Ted Turner has a place on the Hana road and Oprah Winfrey recently brought property there.
Our next stop is not far away. It is commonly called The Seven Pools. This is part of the Haleakala National Park at Kipahulu, also known as The Pools at Ohe’o Gulch. There are seven pools coming down from the mountain into the sea. Old tales say if you wash in each of the seven pools you will be eternally young. It is quite a walk down and an even harder walk up we are told so I stayed in the parking area while Roy and Darrell went down. I had seen the lower pools from the bridge on the road that passed over them. It was a beautiful area. Gigi had us take a bathroom break and gave us a bottle of water and said to drink sparingly as it was a long rough road before there was another stop.
Another new word we learn is tutu, which means grandparent.
Soon after leaving there we hit a seven-mile stretch of road that was unpaved and there were several spots where you had low clearance because rocks stuck up in the road. After this there were eighteen miles of potholes. Gigi was right, it was rough but Roy thought it was equivalent to some Idaho roads he’d been on. The thing that really struck me in this area was that it was desert. I would never have thought of a desert on an island. I always thought tropical paradise. Here it was dry and the grass was brown and there were cacti like I had seen in Texas. We also saw mesquite trees instead of the mesquite bushes we had in Texas. You could look out and see the ocean on one side and desert on the other. There is a 5000 acre ranch here with 2000 head of cattle and as Gigi said 75 happy bulls.
Some more new words we learn are pipi, which means cow, and pupu, which means appetizers. Sure different from our use of the words. Another new word momona means pleasingly plump.
Along the way we saw an area of altars. They were built with rock about three or four feet tall and square. A pig’s head was sacrificed to the forest god as a thank you for good crops.
As we drove along it began getting greener. We saw rick-rack cactus and some bromeliads, and mimosa trees. We also saw a mongoose going across the road and I saw one of the wild black goats that live in this area.
We came to our last stop on the tour, The Tedeschi Winery. It was a beautiful place and had lots of Lilies of the Nile flowers, which were big purple balls on a tall stem. There were lots of other flowers, plants and trees also. It was pouring rain. Several people on the bus made a run for it. They needed the bathroom break and or they wanted to buy wine. Gigi had recommended the Pineapple Splash wine. Most of us waited on the bus.
As we took this trip we went from sea level to 3000 feet. This road is said by many people to be the most beautiful drive in the world. I agree that it was beautiful.
From here we drove back to the resort and our okoles, meaning rear ends, were sore from sitting and riding all day because it was now after 7 pm.
I read an interesting fact that the Hawaiian language only uses twelve letters, the five vowels a,e,i,o, and u and seven consonants h,k,l,m,n,p, and w. In almost every case you pronounce all the vowels.
We drove over to the Outback Steakhouse, near the resort, for dinner. It was expensive but very good. The guys ate fish and I had steak. Back at the resort Darrell went for a swim and Roy and I went to bed. It had been another beautiful day in paradise.
TUESDAY
MAY 24, 2005
This morning we got up a little later and kind of took it easy. We ate breakfast in the condominium and lazed around a bit. Our activities for today are afternoon and evening. We ate lunch at a small local café that the natives like. Someone at the resort had recommended it. We drove over and ordered. The guys tried the shredded pork and I had a hamburger. It was fair fare. Then we drove over to Lahaina, on the southwest side of the island. It was a pretty drive along the ocean. It took us about an hour to get there. We had been directed where to park by the activities director and drove right to it. As we walked the main downtown street the old town feel of it struck me. In some ways it reminded me of Juarez, Mexico. A narrow street filled with little stores all hawking their wares to the tourists. We went into several shops and I bought a small crystal figurine for my collection. It had a palm tree, a pineapple and a clam with a pearl on it, and I figured that said Hawaii.
We walked through a park here in the center of the old town. It was a block long and was between the narrow street and the dock. A huge banyan tree grows there. It is a strange tree. Root strings hang down from the tree and when they get long enough to hit the ground they start another trunk. It was interesting to see. There was a canoe festival going on in the park that week and there were teams of people with long logs up on sawhorses carving out the canoes and also carving decorative patterns onto them.
We went out on the dock and reported in for our afternoon adventure, a submarine ride to the reef. We boarded a boat that ferried us out to the submarine. Not very far from the dock we stopped and the guide told us where to watch and suddenly up popped the submarine, Atlantis.
They have it timed well and as we moved to exit at one end of the ferry the passengers from the submarine boarded the other end of the ferry. I was a little afraid because we had to change to the other boat across a moving and heaving small platform, but I made it fine. The next check was that I am claustrophobic so I had to talk myself into this ride. We climbed down a ladder and walked down beside a bench to the far end and we sat on the bench. There were two benches and as you sat you looked out big round windows into the water. I was fascinated by it and not at all claustrophobic. Once everyone was on board and they had shut the hatch we began our descent. They passed around a section of the window material we were looking through. It was a clear plastic about four inches thick. The ride down to the bottom did not take very long. We went down to around 120 feet. It is amazing what you can see. We visited two small reef areas and saw tropical fish, rays, eels and different creatures that live on the reef. We saw and learned about the underwater ecosystem and the variety of sea life that abounds on the reef. We went down to a depth of 151 feet. So, on this trip to Hawaii, I went from 151 feet below sea level to 10023 feet above. The ride took about an hour and we all enjoyed learning about life on the reef.
Afterwards, we went back to the car and drove down a few miles where our evening entertainment was to be held. We decided we wanted to eat supper that night at Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. From where we had parked in a shopping center mall, we walked back down to the dock area and found the restaurant. It was a fun place to eat, especially if you have watched the movie, Forrest Gump. The food was very good and the atmosphere fun. We wrote a few post cards and mailed them at the post office as we walked back toward the shopping center where we were going for our evening entertainment. At the Maui Theatre they presented a stage play entitled ‘Ulalena. The production is universal and intimate and depicts a mythical interpretation of the early history of the islands in music and dance. It was beautifully breathtaking as the natives dressed in their colorful costumes told this ancient story. We were all impressed by the play and the music.
We got back to the resort and were tired but what a day and more adventures tomorrow.
WEDNESDAY
MAY 25, 2005
This was a different kind of day. At 5:00 am Roy was picked up at the resort by Polynesian Tours. He had decided that he would not feel like he had been to Hawaii if he did not get to see Pearl Harbor on the island of Oahu. Darrell and I were not so inclined and the trip was a bit pricy so we decided to let him go and enjoy his experience. It was an all day tour.
Darrell and I had breakfast in the room and after a while we got ready for our day. Our first stop was the Maui Tropical Plantation. It is located near Wailuku, Maui. There is a country store there with produce from the plantation and a lot of souvenirs. We wandered through the store and then walked up for a ride thru the plantation. We boarded their little train and headed out for a tour to learn about Hawaii’s rich agricultural history. We went through sixty acres of the plantation that showed us different crops. Sugar cane is the first crop and the driver tells us the history of sugar cane on the island. Then we went through areas of pineapples, apple bananas that are a small variety of bananas grown on the islands. At the coconut area we got off the train and our guide let us wander around through the area, where coffee, ti, orchids, bird-of-paradise and a wall of bougainvillea were growing. Before we got back on the train she demonstrated and talked about coconut. She opened one and we tasted the water and then some of the meat. We went on through other crops like avocados, mangos, papayas, guavas, and we ended in a grove of macadamia nut trees, which surprisingly originated in Australia, but Hawaii has made them popular.
After the train ride we walked through some of the garden area and then we went back into the store where we bought souvenirs. We also bought a pineapple to enjoy that evening as our pupu (appetizer).
We left that area and drove down to the Maui Ocean Center. We decided it was time for lunch and we found one of several cafes there and had lunch. I ate a fancy turkey sandwich and Darrell had mahi mahi with a mango salsa on top. They were tasty.
We walked over to the aquarium and began our walk through there. It is a walk that explores Hawaii’s underwater world. They had part of it set up as if you were touring different depths of the reef. The fish were beautiful and brightly colored. There was an exhibit outside about sea turtles and a display with several hammerhead sharks. Then we entered another building with more exhibits of ocean life ending in a room with a huge aquarium filled with big fish such as sharks and rays and other big fish. Part of it goes over your head so it is like being surrounded by the sea. It was feeding time and divers came down into the area and fed the fish.
After this we drove back to Kehei and stopped at Hilo Hattie’s, which is a chain of souvenir shops in the islands.
It was a lot of walking for one day so we headed back to the resort to wait for Roy to return. We cut up the pineapple for our appetizer, and enjoyed eating it.
Roy did not get back until late. Then we went to dinner at a restaurant called Stella Blues and we shared what we had all done while we ate dinner. This was my favorite place that we ate.
Roy had had a wonderful time. And was very animated about the day. He flew on Island Air over to Oahu and was met there by a tour bus. Their first stop was the Arizona Memorial. There was a block long line waiting to enter. A boat took them out to the memorial and he paid for an audio tour and walked around the memorial and took some pictures. They then boarded the bus and went for a ride on the island. He saw Diamondhead and ate lunch on the famous Waikiki Beach. They drove on the only Interstate Highway that is not interstate and then later went to the USS Missouri and toured the ship, standing over the spot where Japan and the United States signed the peace treaty. It was a special day for him and he expressed that Pearl Harbor was something he had heard about all his life. It happened when he was only one year old, December 7, 1941.
Another day of our adventure is now over.
THURSDAY
MAY 26, 2005
This morning we got up and after breakfast we headed to the beach. I am overwhelmed when I am on a beach. I love the feel of the water breaking over my feet and the sand running back from under my toes. We started out walking along the Kamaole Beach. The water was cool but I soon got used to it. Roy and Darrell walked a lot farther than I could. When they got back to where I was Darrell decided to go into the water and Roy soon followed. I got in thigh high but I was holding the cameras and my purse. I walked and watched them for a bit and then I walked back up toward the car where there was a picnic table and I just watched them and the ocean and relaxed in the shade of the palms while the breeze blew around me. It was a delightfully relaxing morning. In the afternoon we drove south from Kehei toward Wailea and Makena and out to La Perouse Bay. This was the end of the road in this area. This bay is where the first known white men came to the island in the late 1700. They mapped some of the area and then three years later they returned and there was a new lava flow that had not been there before. So by that it is known that the last lava flow on Maui was around 1790. There was black lava rock flowing right out into the ocean there. The road crosses the lava and it is not the flowing lava I have seen on TV but is like granulated rocks that flowed and when it built up it was pushed up into sheets and cooled in place. It was a very interesting drive. We even saw the hill where the lava had flowed out. It was not at the top of the mountain like I would have thought but out of a small hill on the side of the big volcano. There is almost no vegetation in the lava area and the country was desert like.
We drove back to the resort and got cleaned up and then drove the other direction to Lahaina and back to the docks where we checked in for our next adventure, a sunset dinner cruise on the Maui Princess. This was the second time we were ferried out to another ship. We had preordered our dinner and had all chosen prime rib. The dinner was good and it was nice to see the sunset as we cruised along the shoreline but we all thought this was our least favorite activity of the trip.
We are all feeling that time is slipping away quickly but we are ready for tomorrow’s adventures.
FRIDAY
MAY 27, 2002
This was a morning the guys had been looking forward to. They were going to take a ride on a Sunshine Helicopter. They drove over to the airport. The tour they took was over West Maui and then they flew across the Pailolo channel to Moloka’i and saw the tall sea cliffs and discovered some of Hawaii’s tallest waterfalls. They also saw the famous leper colony at Kalaupapa run by Father Damien. They heard his story and told me later that leprosy is now curable but that some of the lepers that lived there before the cure was found were allowed to live out their days at the colony.
I was not into helicopter rides so I decided that I would go poolside to a small cabana and take advantage of the Malulani, which means heavenly calm, Massage and Spa. I had a luxurious one-hour massage. I did not think an hour could go past so quickly. It was a real treat.
Soon after I got back to the room the guys returned from their helicopter ride and we decided to go for lunch and a ride. We took the road to Lahaina again but this time we drove past and continued on past there through Kaanapali and Honokowai to Kapalua. Then we turned around and drove back to the resort.
In the evening our treat was a luau at the Maui Marriott at Wailea. Our first choice had been at the Old Plantation but it is booked out months in advance so this worked for us. The luau was outdoors overlooking the ocean. There were white tables and chairs all over the grassy expanse of lawn and long serving tables. All the tables had teal blue tablecloths on them with their edges blowing in the breeze. The centerpiece was a pineapple. It looked lovely. We found a place and sat down. I had bought myself a real lei for this evening and it smelled so good. We had drinks and watched the people come in. The announcer called for attention and a young man came out in native costume and blew into a conch shell. The noise calls that the luau pig is ready to be lifted from the pit. The guys went to look and I sat, rather than going to stare at what I was about to eat. Of course, I was not that lucky as they came around past me with the pig in a big container. Dinner was ready and it was served buffet style. We got in line and filled our plates. We even got some poi. We come back to the table and we tried the poi, it was not good. Yuk! The rest of the meal was very good and about the time we finished eating the entertainment began. There was a trio and they sang songs and announced birthdays and honeymooners and anniversaries. We even got announced as celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary and it brought a round of applause. Of course, our anniversary is not until July 30th but this was our celebration trip. Then as it began to darken we had hula dancers that came out to do several dances. The highlight of the evening was a fire-sword dancer. It was pretty to watch the burning sword make circles in the air. It was exciting to watch. What a nice way to spend our last evening.
It has been another full day.
SATURDAY
MAY 28, 2002
Our last day! We got up and dressed to go to the beach. Early in the morning was the best time to go before the sun made it too hot. We all went in and played in the water for over an hour. I think I could do this everyday; it is so relaxing and peaceful. This has been a wonderful trip. We had to check out of the resort by noon and we were ready early so we packed up the car and set out for a little bit more of Hawaii before we leave. We went out for lunch and then we drove back over to the Maui Tropical Plantation. We wanted to bring home some of those wonderful fresh ripe pineapples to eat and to share. Darrell and we each bought a box of eight. They had them boxed and sealed and ready to go through the agriculture inspection area at the airport. Roy went in and walked around in the garden area for a little while. He had not gone when Darrell and I went on Wednesday. He got to see pineapple growing and bananas and some of the flowers and plants.
Then we took a drive up into the Io valley. There was a beautiful park there. If a person hiked this would be a great place to go. It is tropical and the park itself is very pretty. There is a formation there called the Io needle that is interesting. We drove around up in this area and then after a while we drove to Kahului which is where the airport is located. We drove through and went up to a town named Pukalani, which was where our niece, Maria, lived while she worked at the Haggai Institute. We wanted to see what it looked like. Then we headed back toward the airport, stopping at a Denny’s Restaurant for dinner. We ate slowly and took our time and then it was time to return the rental car and go to the airport for our flight back to Boise, Idaho. It was sad to leave but we were all beginning to yearn for home.
So. Aloha to Hawaii, this has been an adventure we will not forget.