Tom and Barbara: Maui and Whale Watching

To finally continue the saga of our trip to Hawaii. The last entry ended with us having lunch at "Cool Cat's" in Lahaina. After lunch we went for a drive up the coast (what I considered north of the hotel, but I have no idea what direction we were going in). There were rugged beaches, and once in awhile we saw a bay where people were snorkeling. After awhile the road started making a lot of sharp turns, and we decided that maybe it would be good to turn around and head back to civilization. On the way back we stopped at several overlooks.

There was also a turn out at the bottom of a ravine that looked like a rain forest, so we stopped to take a look. The pictures don't show how dense it was.

We kept hearing the sound of a strange bird while we were there, calling to another bird a ways off. We finally spotted it--thinking it would be some kind of exotic parrot--and it was a rooster! I don't know if they have chickens and roosters living in the wild, but we often saw them along the road when there weren't homes near by.

We found a petty little public beach call D. T. Fleming Beach Park, where we stopped for a little while.

Close to our hotel was a place called "Whaler's Village," an outdoor shopping center. We went to a place called "Hula Grill" for dinner. The tables were in the sand, with thatch covered umbrellas overhead. Once again, we sat there looking at the ocean and the boats sailing by.

We had another great meal and terrific desert! While we were waiting for our bill, (they were incredibly slow with everything--but how could you complain because you were sitting there, in Maui, looking at the ocean!--although it was very windy that afternoon), I took some pictures looking up the beach at our hotel.

After dinner we were so full that we walked around the"Village," window shopping, and came across this "whale."

Sunday morning we got up early to be ready for Church at 9 am, and actually got to the breadfast buffet before the crowds, and got to eat at a table, outside. The Ward we went to was the Lahaina 1st Ward, and the people were wonderful. The Elder's Quorum Pres. greeted us and gave me a kiss on the cheek. Every meeting was started with "A-looo-ha," which the congregation answered back, "A-looo-ha." There were a lot of visitors, and everyone was so nice. After Church we found a Chinese restaurant not far from our hotel, and took the food back to eat on our balcony. After a Sunday nap, we decided to drive down the coast, going the other direction. There wasn't much to see--pretty much middle class town and homes, until you got near the end of the island. Then it became very posh and exclusive and expensive.

We saw this funny sign on one of the side roads--I guess the water can come inland when it storms.

We stopped at one beach, and there were signs about leaving the turtles alone, but we didn't see any.

Sunday night we were in a quandary as to where to eat dinner. Most of the restaurants have quite a "party" feel to them, with a bar and entertainment, and we just felt like that was not what we wanted. We ended up going back to "Whaler's Village" and got fast food at their food court. It was pretty lousy, but that's OK. When we got back to the hotel we went for a walk around the pools and beautiful grounds lit by tiki torches, then went to our room and started to get a head start on packing.

Monday morning we brought our breakfast back to the patio, and this time they gave us large glasses of orange juice--in coffee cups!

We took more pictures of the hotel, with Dad standing on our balcony,

and then we checked out at 10 am. We drove to Lahaina, and got in line to board the boat for our 2 hour whale watching cruise. We put patches behind our ear the night before, and we didn't have any problems with sea sickness, but several kids and a few adults were throwing up. It was relatively calm, but there were swells that made for a lot of ups and downs. We did see a lot of whales, but it's extremely difficult to get a picture of one, because you don't know where exactly one is going to surface, and by the time you get your camera aimed, it's usally gone! We saw lots of blows, lots of rolls, some tails up in the air, and a couple of breaches.

We saw a couple of whales, probably females, doing a dorsal fin slap over and over. They think it's a way for the females to draw the attention of the males.

But best of all was a mom and her baby, along with a large male escort. The person doing the tour said that she had never seen a baby that small, so it must not have been very old. The baby kept jumping out of the water. It was so cool! It was a great experience! Here are two postcard pictures that I scanned so you can see what it really looked like when a whale breached,

and when they would make a deep dive, their tail would come up in the air like this.

We never saw it from this close, but even farther away, it was spectacular!

After the cruise was over, we went back to "Cool Cat" for lunch, and then headed for the other side of the island, to where the airport is. On the way we stopped at a beautiful place called Iao Needle.

After we got to the other side of the island, we drove up the coast, but didn't see much. Back in the harbor we say this cruise ship.

We went back to town, and found a place to eat, "Ruby's Diner," which was OK. I spent most of the time on the cell phone with Delta, trying to change our flight to the non-stop flight that left an hour earlier than the one we were booked on. Finally, we got that acomplished, returned our rental car, and then went to the airport to wait for our flight home. We were not able to sit together, but we were close enough to look at each other! The flight left at 9 pm, and got into Salt Lake at 6 am our time. Neither one of us could sleep, so we were extremely tired when we got home. Daniel came to pick us up, and because it was snowing, he had left home at 4:30 am. It was not a fun drive home in the snow, expecially trying to get up our hill with the cars in front of us spinning wheels and going sideways. But thanks to Dan's excellent driving skills, we made it home! That day, Tuesday, February 17, we had about 18 inches of snow by the time the storm ended.