Category: Maui 2022

Woke up early to go to a zoom meeting at my home group and then make a little breakfast.

I made rolls from scratch. They were just ok. The oven in the condo is very different from our home oven. The rest is eggs, bacon and Maui Gold pineapple Mike chopped up for us.

We hung out on the Lanai (Hawaiian for balcony) and whale watched for several hours. Mike got some great pictures with his nice camera. I took a turn and got these shots of a whale’s tail.

It was ridiculously fun trying to predict when the whale would show it’s tail. Mike got some great shots of the tail with water cascading off of it.

And above is some video Mike shot on his iPhone from our Lanai. And speaking of, here’s the view of Lanai (the island, not our balcony) from our Lanai (our balcony, not the island.)

And to the right, the island of Molokai.

It’s lovely to watch the light and clouds change these views throughout the day. Mike caught this rainbow in front of Molokai this morning.

After breakfast and whale watching we took a long walk on the beach. We fantasized about owning one of the beautiful Villas we passed on Kaanapali. “Oh Mike, it’s a little smokey is Sacramento. Let’s head over to our Villa for a few weeks.”

Lunch was fish tacos from one of our regular haunts. We brought it back to the condo to eat. They weren’t the best we’ve ever had but they were good enough.

After a long nap we watched the whales for a while again. We had one smaller whale breech (jump halfway out of the water) right in front of our condo. We’d seen plenty of this out in the distance but it was really cool to see it up close.

Tonight’s sunset was less that spectacular but the whales put on another nice show. And the company was just perfect.

We were both still pretty full from lunch so we split some yummy fish and chips from the food truck village just down the road from us.

I have my first of two scuba diving days tomorrow so we went over to the ABC Store to grab a couple of snacks for the boat ride. Usually they provide sandwiches but since COVID they just do granola bars.

Tomorrow’s dive site is just off of Lanai (again, the Island, not…you know) and it is known as The Cathedrals because the lava formations look a little like the windows of a cathedral. Supposedly. Its not my favorite dive site but it’s a good place to get my feet wet before tomorrow’s more adventurous dive. It’s also a good place to try out my new waterproof case for my 360 camera. I should hopefully come back with some fun footage.

To end the evening we somehow found ourselves back at the gelato shop.

Not bad for just another day in paradise.

Thanks for following along…

I had to get up early for a Zoom Meeting Service commitment. I woke up to an amazing full moon reflecting off the ocean. Beautiful.

We were already packed except for toiletries. We cleaned up the condo a bit and then hit the road to the airport.

It’s been our tradition to listen to radio station KPOA when driving around the island. It is all Hawaiian music all the time. We listened to a song in the Hawaiian language and we were sure they were singing about “Cow Pie”.

It’s a fun mix of classic Hawaiian music to the latest. It’s not something I would listen to regularly but it sure does set the mood when in Maui.

Plane nerds, we are flying in a Boeing 717 from Maui to Honolulu. Why? Because we found a deal on lie Flat seats from Honolulu to SFO on this Boeing 777-300er.

We had a little sandwich and some snacks in the United Lounge. enough to hold us over until the meal on the flight.

Final thoughts.

1. I’ve been coming to Hawaii now for nearly 30 years which means I’ve been here around twenty times. I never had a desire to come here before I came here. My low impression of Hawaii was completely based on the Brady Bunch Hawaiian episode. An ex of mine really wanted to go so I reluctantly went along. I fell in love with the place the moment I stepped off the plane. I love adventurous vacations but I also love our retreats to Maui where we just chill out in a very familiar and relaxing tropical paradise. We keep saying we are going to try the Big Island one of these days. We will see.

2. I didn’t get to swim with a green sea turtle this trip. It may be one of the first times that this didn’t happen. We did see several from our lanai.

3. I’m so glad we got to try several different food places as well and returning to a few favorites. I am in love with Lava Lava Shrimp. Here’s the video that steered us to the great eateries.

4. I am so happy I finally did the hammerhead scuba dive. It feels great to be in good enough shape to do an adventurous and strenuous dive like that with confidence and relative ease.

5. I never need to dive the Cathedrals off Lanai again. I get why people like it. Neat lava formations and all but I want to see sharks and turtles and big stuff. I’ve never seen any of that at the Cathedrals. Glad I did it to refresh my diving skills before the hammerhead dive.

6. Sitting on the lanai with Mike watching whales and watching the sunset is a very special time for me. He is such a great guy to be with and laugh with. He made me laugh and smile so many times on the trip. I am fortunate.

7. Time on the beach under the rental umbrella is so relaxing. I just love it.

8. I worked a little too much on this trip. There were a ton of emails that were coming in for the puppet business. The plus of running your own business is that you can do to admin. work from anywhere. The minus is you can don the admin. work from anywhere. Rachel was busy at home watching our dog and doing lots of shows. Yay Rachel!! I so appreciate her taking such good care of Lainey while we’re gone.

9. I miss our dog.

Here’s our timelapse takeoff and landing from OGG to HNL.

We have middle seats so I won’t be able to video our takeoff and landing from HNL to SFO. We do have comfy lie flats so hopefully I’ll get a nap since I didn’t sleep nearly enough last night.

Just landed in SFO. Watched Jungle Cruise with Mike on the plane. Sooo many dad jokes. Right in my wheelhouse.

Here’s our last plane coming in from Reno. It’s an Embraer ERJ-175. She’ll take us home with a 57 minute flight.

And home.❤️♥️❤️

I really missed her.

Thanks for coming along on our trip. Aloha.🌺

The morning started with a beautiful full moon on the horizon. The picture above doesn’t really do it justice. Still, nice way to start the day. After breakfast we packed up the cabana chairs and umbrella and headed out the door to drop them off on our way to our 10am whale watching cruise.

The two hour cruise was incredible. We saw a baby and mother humpback swimming together. The baby must have jumped out of the water 16 times while we watched. The baby was somewhere between 15-30 days old. We also saw a group of 9-10 males fighting for the attention of a female. Here’s a video Mike shot and put together.

After the cruise we went back to Down The Hatch for another round of lava Lava Shrimp, Brussels Spouts, and a Crab and Lobster Grill cheese. It was nap inducing.

Before the nap I cranked out another batch of rolls. These came out much better.

After a nearly 3 hour nap it was time to pack since we have an early morning.

Dinner was leftovers, fresh rolls and some salami and cheese.

This has been an amazing trip. I am looking forward to seeing the dog tomorrow.

Thanks for following along!

Breakfast on the lanai with this view is how we started our day. It’s the first (and last) day where we had nothing planned. That was a great plan.

We spent around 3 hours just sitting on the beach watching whales and relaxing. It was perfect.

Here’s several minutes of whales. We were convinced two of them were mating. They were all over each other.

On advice of the YouTube guy who’s sent us to several great restaurants, and one of Mike’s colleagues, we visited Leoda’s Pie Shop. Mike saved us some time by ordering lunch and a little pie online while we were driving there.

Thank god he did because the line was looooong. (Look closely and you can see Mike at the “pick up online orders” window with no line.) We’ve driven by this place every time we’ve been on the island and never stopped. I can’t imagine we’ll ever not stop again.

There’s always chickens hanging around at Leoda’s. This rooster said hi to me.

https://youtube.com/shorts/yW-kmysRYBI?feature=share

We came back to the condo and took a lovely nap, then went down to the pool and played Corn Hole (Mike kicked my butt), darts and ping pong. We are clearly triathletes.

Sunset had some potential but didn’t really pop tonight.

We kept dinner simple at the food truck village and split broccoli beef with some crispy spring rolls. It was just enough.

Tomorrow is our last full day on the island. I’m looking forward to it but I miss the dog.

Thanks for following along!

It was really nice to have nothing scheduled to do this morning. Mike and I got up and made some breakfast which we ate on the lanai while whale watching. We then headed out to the beach and sat in the rented lounge chairs under our rented umbrella. That little cabana set up has been a game changer. Neither of us are looking to get tan (I just burn) so going to the beach meant slathering down in sunblock and wearing hats and long sleeves. Now we sit under an umbrella, relax and people watch.

Mike spotted a beach kitty and said, “do you know how they say hi to the tourists? They say, ‘Welcome to Meowi!” 🤦‍♂️

We headed back to the room to freshen up before having lunch with Mike’s colleague Brian and his wife Brandy. We are at Hula Grill and had a yummy Caesar salad with fresh fish and crab wontons. I was so hungry I forgot to take pictures. We also stopped by the ABC Store and grabbed a few things to bring home.

Before I get to tonight’s sunset let me catch up on some of my diving from yesterday. First, this is what our dive master called fish rain.

Here’s a hammerhead shark. (It’s pretty grainy on video but it was cool to see!)

And here’s a coral head.

I have more video of the dive but less is more…?

Ok, a couple more. This one is a bait ball of sardines. If you watch closely you can see a larger fish hunting within the ball.

Sunset was a bit of a bust but the whale action was spectacular. Mike caught a couple of whales breaching after two big whales jumped out of the water. here’s his video. (And that’s me squealing in the background.)

Here’s the view from the other side of our condo.

For dinner we headed to the food truck parking lot behind our condo. Mike had fish and chips and I had a delicious shrimp and Opakapaka fish plate from the Vietnamese food truck. It was yummy!

Mike brought our Apple TV so we are watching West Side Story before bed. A great day on the island.

Thanks for following along!

I am exhausted in the very best way. Today was the big adventure dive day. Hammerhead Dive!

The bumpy hour long boat ride brought us here. These two rocks are just off the coast of Molokai, the island to the right in our view from our lanai. This dive is only for advanced divers since it’s a drift dive. On many boat dives the boat anchors in place and you jump in the water, scuba around and return to the boat. On a drift dive a group of divers jump into the water simultaneously and then the current takes them on a bit of a ride underwater. The boat follows the divers’ bubbles and the current and picks the divers up when they surface. The synchronous diving in is more tricky than it sounds. Getting out onto the boat is even more challenging since the swells are 5-6’. Climbing up a ladder with 50 pounds of scuba gear on your back while the boat is going up and down 5-6’ at a time is tricky. Fortunately, I did well and the crew was very efficient and helpful.

The dive itself was beautiful. We saw 8-10 scalloped hammerhead sharks, a grey reef shark, barracuda and lots and lots of fish. There was even a bait ball of sardines with a couple of larger fish hunting in it. I’ve never seen that before. (I’ll edit some of the video I took and post it in tomorrow’s blog. It’s too late and I’m too tired to do it tonight.)

We spotted a few whales on the ride back to Lahaina and Mike took some video of our dive boat as it passed the condo as I was taking video of the condo. Very meta.

While I was diving Mike was on the beach under an umbrella relaxing. We met back up at the condo and watched a baby sea turtle and a large sea turtle ride the waves in front of the condo.

Nap time. I’ve been up at 5am the last 3 days and that, along with the nitrogen in my blood from two days of diving caught up with me. We slept for nearly 2 hours.

The sunset looked promising but the clouds weren’t just right for the big boom of color that sometimes happens. Still, not too bad.

By this time we were hungry. We decided to head into Lahaina for dinner and went to Down The Hatch.

This was quite possibly the best meal we’ve ever had on Maui. Each and every bite was a flavor explosion in our mouths. I hope we eat here again before we leave.

Now I am way past my bedtime. I’m really glad I don’t have any reason to get up early tomorrow. I’m looking forward to sleeping in until 7? 7:30? We’ll see.

Thanks for following along.

This was a good one. I woke at 5am to have a quick bite of breakfast and get ready for my first day of scuba diving.

After a 45 minute boat ride we arrived at our first dive site, Cathedrals 2, named for the lava formations that look really cool from inside. This site is on the south side of Lanai, we see the northeast side of Lanai from our…lanai.

Here’s some video. (I’m still getting used to editing with the 360 camera.)

The second dive was at “Nob Hill,” a lava nob that’s fun to swim around and explore. I’ve done these dives before and they aren’t my favorite. It seems like most dive guides love to look for the little tiny sea creatures. I’d rather sea big sea turtles and sharks and lobster. This is one of those little things dives but it was still fun and it prepped me for tomorrow’s more adventurous trip.

On the boat ride back to Lahaina we spotted a couple of humpback whales.

This made me really want to experience a whale watching sail with Mike so I booked us one when I returned to the condo for Wednesday. I hope we get to see lots of whales up close!

Lunch was just a few little snacks and pineapple followed by a little whale watching from the lanai and then a nap.

I woke up in time to host the 7pm (PDT) Zoom meeting and then Mike and I headed to a new place for dinner.

Mahi mahi (which I learned today from our boat captain, who has a marine biology degree, is a very sustainable fish), coconut shrimp and stirfry veggies. Outstanding!

Then, to work off some of that food, we sat and watched the sunset.

Enjoy.

All and all a full and lovely day.

Thanks for following along!

We were just in Maui nine months ago and we had a lovely trip. It was our first opportunity to travel together since the beginning of the pandemic and it was a perfect place to be. Lots of outdoor dining, strict mask mandates and a real sense of taking COVID seriously.

The run up to departure has been a lot easier this time. Last trip we ran into some difficulties getting a COVID test within 72 hours of our departure due to the 4th of July holiday. This time no testing was required, just proof of vaccination. We’ll have to grab a bracelet in San Francisco before we depart but Mike got us a quick solution that should expedite that process. Which is good since we have a quick turnaround there.

I began pre-missing the dog a few days ago. It really hit Mike yesterday and this morning. She and I have spent so much time together and since we had a little scare with her back (she had a bulging disc, a common problem with short legged, long spined dogs) she’s received a bunch of extra attention. (Mike and I camped on the floor downstairs with her for nearly three weeks.)

She’s doing much better now and we have all sorts of ramps and gates around the house to help keep her spine healthy. Still, the extra worry and attention make it all the more difficult to leave her for a bit. Fortunately, Rachel stays with her while we’re gone and Lainey loves Rachel!

Our TSA Pre allowed us to pass by a really long security line. Yay! We tried out the Escape Lounge in Sacramento. It was underwhelming but nice to be away from the crowded airport.

We had a smooth flight to SFO. For my plane geek friends we were on an ERJ-175. The skies are super clear today.

The 777-200 above will take us to Maui. They have the newer Polaris Class lie flat seats that will make the flight incredibly comfortable for us.

I follow several travel gadget gurus on YouTube and one of them recommended this little thing.

It’s a Bluetooth device called AirFly that allows me to use my wireless headphones to listen to the in-flight entertainment. I usually just plug my headphones in but at least 4-5 times a flight I accidentally yank it out. With this device I’m cord free. It works great!

I slept for an hour or so after they served us breakfast. The flight was uneventful except for when we hit a pretty big turbulence bump and the captain came on an demanded the flight crew take there seats NOW. That freaked me out for a few seconds but things quickly smoothed out.

I watched a YouTube video of a Maui local who listed his top ten places to eat on Maui without a reservation. Some on the list are our favorites so we assume the guy has good taste. I made a google maps list (thanks Tom!) of the eateries that looked interesting to us so we could hit a few of his recommendations we haven’t yet tried.

As is our way, I went to the rental car place while Mike grabbed our luggage. By the time I picked Mike and the bags up we were both ready for lunch so we went to our first new recommended food place, Tin Roof.

Mike got the Mochiko Chicken over garlic noodles and I got Garlic Shrimp, also over garlic noodles. Both were spectacular. The sauce on the chicken was magical. YouTube guy for the win.

Hertz allows us to choose a car from their “5-Star” section and I think someone parked this in the wrong section so, woohoo! Comfy ride on Maui.

After lunch and a nice needed nap at the condo (we are staying in the exact same condo we stayed in 9 months ago, Maui Kai, #803) we got up and watched the sunset. It wasn’t anything special and it was eclipsed by a baby whale leaping out of the water. It must have jumped out more than a dozen times in 20 minutes. Mike got some good shots.

Still stuffed from lunch we decided to head over to the grocery store to grab some snacks and stuff to make breakfast. Our biggest issue was, “do we have gelato before we shop or after?” We chose before.

Groceries put away, suitcases unpacked, we are all set for a lovely trip. Expect lots of sunset pictures, whale pictures, sea turtle pictures and food pictures. Thanks for joining us on our little getaway.