Vacation Day 5: Kihei, Maui
Saturday was another early wake-up! This was the day of our snorkeling excursion. We had to be at the dock by 7:45am. Good thing we were used to waking up early!
On our way to the boat dock, we noticed a lot of smoke in the sky. As we drove a long we soon saw the reason. Apparently every year the farmers burn down the sugar cane fields, and we happened to be there for the burning of one of them. I wish I would of had my camera out, but at one point we drove right past the field, with the flames just inches from the road! The heat was amazingly hot, even form the car, but is was a cool thing to see. While we were on the boat ash started to fall from the sky onto the boat and everyone sitting on it. The captain said they call it “Maui snow”.
Our excursion included a light breakfast, lunch, and all you can drink sodas and juice. The food was actually quite good, included breads, fruits, enormous sandwiches and pasta salad. On a side note: I was extremely disappointed in my soda options on the island. Everyone mostly had coke, diet coke or root beer. I am not a coke person… and if I do have coke I want cherry or something in it! Even in the grocery store the variety was limited. I am not an every day soda drinker, but I I was on vacation and I wanted to indulge… too bad.
Our excursion took us to the tiny island of Molokini, population: 0. It is used as a bird and animal habitat, so no one is even aloud to step onto the island. The snorkeling here was pretty cool, I wouldn’t know though because of the baby and Nadia (who obviously cannot snorkel). Trent and I tried to take turns, but between him helping Tanner and Natalya and going out and coming back, there was about 3 minutes for me to get into the water, then come back out! But I was able to get some cool pictures, see some fish from the side of the boat, and watch Nadia make friends with another nice old lady.
After every one came in we headed to the next destination: Turtle town! This time I went out first with Tanner and Natalya. Tanner lasted about 3 minute. Tanner said a giant sea turtle started chasing him, and followed him back to the boat! He was too scared to go back after that. I luckily was able to see a turtle down on the ocean floor, it was pretty cool.
After turtle town we headed back to the dock. This is a great example of what it was like to bring 4 kids to Hawaii… okay, maybe it wasn’t like the the whole time, but the kids were pretty tired by day 4! And poor Alexandra, the majority of her naps were taken on Trent’s lap. I do not know how she survived the trip! She was the least grumpy of the kids, and was pretty hang loose the entire time!
When we returned to the condo Tanner and Trent took off to a good boogie boarding beach, while the girls and I stayed behind and did laundry, took a nap, and swam in the pool. After the boys returned Trent told me to go take off on my own for a bit ( he did this A LOT during our trip, so it really was a vacation for me too). I went to the beach in front of our condo and just swam for an hour. I love swimming in the ocean! For dinner that night Trent and Tanner picked up food from a awesome Fish and Chips place and we ate outside on the Lanai. Seriously, all of the seafood we had while in Maui was amazing, and this place was pretty good! After the kids were in bed that night I went out to my favorite destination: Foodland. Okay, not really my favorite destination… but my favorite grocery store in Maui! Everything there was reasonably priced (plus we got a discount with our condo key). This is the place I bought my reusable cold storage grocery bag. It was a lifesaver on the trip. It kept our drinks and food cold that we would take to the beach, and it zippered closed so it would also save our electronics from getting sand in them on the beach. Oh, and they had a redbox:) My purchase that night was several single serve slices of bakery fresh cake. They were like 2 dollars each and soo good and my favorite was the passion fruit cake. What was the most expensive food item in Hawaii? Oreos. Over 5 dollars for a pack of Oreos… who knew!


























































