Last Week In Maui

I really like Maui Sunset Resort. It’s a super functional complex with a gym, tennis courts, BBQs, shuffle board, book exchange, and of course the pool. The grounds are impeccably maintained to the point that the lawn looks fake. One review online even complained that for such a nice place, the least they could do is put in real grass! The housekeeping staff is lovely. The only downside is the office staff. Both ladies we met were abrupt and dismissive… they clearly did not hire them for their public relations skills.

A lot of the owners are here on extensive vacations or they live here permanently. One lady moved here forty years ago with her husband. She just moved out recently after her 100^th birthday. She had a room on the ground floor with doors that opened to the lawn. As she became disabled, the groundskeepers would open her sliding glass doors every morning to allow visitors and at night they’d come by and close everything up for her. I wish we could’ve met her.

In case you didn’t know it, chickens have taken over Maui. Not just your average chickens either. These are big, little, lean, fluffy, black, brown, and bright multi-colored. There’s one particular family of a mom and three teenage chicks who come running as soon as they see Izzy. It’s adorable how much it seems as though they want to greet her.

Joe and Izzy took surfing lessons. I took so many pictures it was hard to decide which one to show here, but for some reason I liked this crosswalk pic the best. They were out there on the little baby waves for a couple of hours.

While they were surfing, Bill and I went to an outdoor market called Kihei Kalama Village. The little shops were pretty basic, but the grounds were gorgeous. I loved all the trees integrated into the mall. They also have plenty of restaurants there and a cat named Tommy Kalama.

At the top of the list of cool things we did was wine tasting. Maui Wine, formerly Tedeschi Winery, is up-country on HWY 37. It’s across the road from the Ulupalakua Ranch. Ulupalakua has a little general store with western-wear and gifts, plus a deli and a BBQ outside where they cook up burgers. The wine was very good. Surprisingly, I liked the pineapple wine enough to buy a bottle. I also liked the Syrah and the Malbec. I’m sitting here now sipping from a glass of the Syrah Joe bought us. The drive was beautiful and very high up the mountainside, so you can get some great views out to sea.

We went snorkeling this morning near our place and it wasn’t a good sight for snorkelers. It was a good place for turtles though. The entire time we were out there (maybe half an hour) we never went deeper than a couple of feet. With choppy water and a surf, it was always a concern to stay off the reef. It was also murky, so it was a surprise when suddenly you’d be literally on top of a giant turtle. I was so worried about hitting one or cutting up my knees on the reef that I got out of the water.

We’re on our fifth puzzle now. I brought two and we did those way too fast. Then we found one down at the book exchange. We finished that one and found one here in one of the cupboards. Out of desperate addiction we went to Ross and bought another puzzle of a turtle in the sea. 

Speaking of turtles, we returned to the VFW Beach to watch the turtles come out for the night. This time there was a large group of people there watching… mostly volunteers from a church from the mainland. They had Lahaina-relief shirts on.

Izzy and I have tried to get a few days of writing in. One day we decided to go to Kalama Park. It’s a large park with all kinds of sports areas and a massive tented play-structure. We found a picnic table under a giant tree and settled in for some peaceful writing. Before the guys took off Joe had to try out the swing-set.

The first event to make us realize that we’d made a poor choice of parks was the guy in a wheelchair trying to maneuver across the grass while singing “I shot the sheriff” at the top of his lungs. That sort of drowned out the family singing and playing the ukulele. Next came the group of guys and their ice chests of food and baggies of weed. We were beginning to be concerned about getting a serious contact high. Then another guy showed up with a dog who barked like it wanted to kill the dog with the stoners. Surprisingly the stoners let their dog run free. It came straight to the aggressive barking dog. I hate that feeling of impending doom at the prospect of a dog fight. But shockingly the barker cowered and whined when the stoner’s dog reached him… it turns out that it was a mother and son who were meeting for the first time since being weened.

Then a sweet dad loaded up his two daughters onto the swings and commenced pushing them to shouts of “higher!” He obeyed until the younger one went flying through the air and landed on her back. There was a moment of tense silence until she breathed and then cried. Dad scooped her up and they went home. Then came the digging chickens. These little guys dig like a dog—dirt was flying as they worked to get that elusive worm. Finally came the guy who laid out a towel on the grass and proceeded to lay in every possible way like a contortionist… seriously, he looked like a living pretzel. We didn’t get much writing done.

One of the most exciting things to rattle our nerves was on Sunday when our waitress wrote the date on our left-overs container—the 5^th. That sparked a discussion. We all thought it was the 4^th, because we were leaving on Wednesday the 7^th. All of our cell phones came out at once to confirm that she was right and we were leaving on Tuesday the 7^th not Wednesday the 7^th. I can just picture us all lounging around the pool watching the plane fly over and saying, “Those poor saps are going home now, but not us… we don’t have to leave until Wednesday.” What a mess that would’ve been :)

We went to Chang’s Beach again for some snorkeling yesterday. It was pretty rough, but we did it anyway. It was kinda cute when a turtle swam up to me and watched me put my fins on. It was maybe six inches away from my legs. It even came up to look at me with those ancient eyes.

Last night we went out to dinner one last time to the Maui Brewing Company. That’s a really fun place. It started out with a vicious game of foosball. Izzy and Joe tied 7/7, which led to a heated discussion of who would’ve won if they hadn’t called us to our table.

They usually have a one-man band there, which is nice. I have to say, it’s a little humiliating to order food there because their ordering system is all done through your phone. We didn’t even try the first time, but we decided to try it last night. What a fiasco! No matter what any of us tried we couldn’t get our orders on the same bill. Our sweet waitress, Emily, took pity on us and got our order the old-fashioned way. It really kind-of puts a damper on the mood when everyone is looking at their phones and then getting frustrated. Of course, no one else seemed to be struggling with it.

Well, thanks for going on vacation with us (Izzy's doodles chronicling our vacation). I need to finish packing now.

First Week in Maui

We had an uneventful arrival to Maui. Several of our friends have had airport disasters lately, so I was a little worried. I mean I don’t usually borrow trouble from others, but it was still in the back of my mind. Our only hiccup was waiting forever for the long-term-parking shuttle to swing by and give us a ride to the terminal (it turns out they are short-staffed). But we made the flight. Hawaiian Air’s version of a meal left much to be desired… a box of vending-machine food. As you know, I travel with food because I prefer to eat whole food, but Izzy appreciated the gluten free cookies. Joe and Bill will eat anything.

We had a car rental set up where the owner met us at the airport with a Toyota Highlander and turned the keys over to us. Unfortunately, we had a five hour wait for check in to the condo (Maui Sunset). Not a problem. Right by Costco in Kahului is a lot full of food trucks. We ate at the Mexican truck and it was beyond delicious. Then we walked next door to the Marriott to partake of adult beverages by the pool. Then we headed over to Costco to get set up for the two weeks, and then to Safeway in Kihei for the smaller stuff. And then a little miracle occurred. The condo texted me to say our room was ready two hours early… Yes!

Miracle number two is they upgraded us to possibly the nicest condo in the complex. Seriously, we’re on the fourth-floor overlooking the massive lawn, pool and more importantly, the ocean. It has two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Joe and I got the king en-suite, Bill got the queen bedroom, and Izzy got the Murphy bed in the front room (sucks to be the youngest, right).

Today started off on the wrong foot. Joe snuck past Izzy and made a pot of coffee in the fancy machine that made lots of noise, but no coffee. All of us took turns trouble-shooting it to no avail. I had given up right away and pulled out our pour-over and made Joe a cup of coffee to tame the beast. All of this woke up Izzy, so she put all her years of higher-education to good use and searched all the cupboards and found a second coffee maker. This one makes coffee not noise… Izzy is currently our hero and may usurp Bill for the queen-sized bed.

Bill and Joe are at the gym now and Izzy went for a run. The designated lap-swimming in the pool opens from 8:00-9:00, so I will head down there now… Okay, I went to swim laps, sort-of. It was the busiest I’ve seen the pool! Mostly dog-paddlers, but I managed to carve out an imaginary lane and got in a few laps. Kind of a bummer that they don’t allow fins—those work as a floaty for me when I’m just working arms and they give me a great leg work-out. Oh well… I got a 30-minute swim in. (post-script; I saw someone swimming laps with fins, so I tried it and no one kicked me out of the pool.)

Izzy discovered the herb garden. That meant she made a gourmet breakfast for us. A win-win. I’m thinking it will elevate one of our dinners soon.

Now I’m sitting in one of those funky cafes that sell expensive pastries and coffee. We, Izzy and I, chose it for its atmosphere, but this is a pretty good cup of iced coffee. We walked from Maui Sunset down a back street and discovered a flea-market. Of course we had to wander through it. We stressed Bill and Joe with our divide and conquer technique. Joe assigned Izzy to Bill and followed me. The guys dropped us here and went in search of beer.

Following tradition, Izzy made chocolate chip cookies for Joe's birthday. She brought the ingredients from home, so we didn't have to buy a bag of flour. The guys really enjoyed that! Her and I have been indulging in wine as our treat, so we're all happy.

Yesterday was an adventure. We found Chang’s Beach, which is famous for its turtles. We geared up with our snorkel stuff and headed to the south end of the beach. The day before we’d attempted to snorkel in front of Sugar Beach resort, but it was too rough and silty. Yesterday was great. Within ten minutes we found turtles. There’s something incredibly ancient and wise about a turtle… they’re up there with elephants. Unfortunately we got too close to the shore and the coral. It was an extremely tense moment for us as we fought our way out of the trap—it felt like being in the agitator cycle in a washer (which is probably why they call it “being Maytagged”). I got out unscathed, but Bill got a little cut on his hand and Izzy scrapped her legs. Joe watched from safety. It was honestly an every-man-for-himself situation. After that, looking at the reef and fish seemed so tame in comparison.

We came back to the condo and vegged for the rest of the day. Izzy and I finished a puzzle. Then we walked to the Fourth-Friday street fair in Kihei. That was a blast. They had a band, tons of tables of crafts, and food trucks. Dogs are a big thing here, but one dog really stood out. It was a robot dog. I tried to get a picture but it didn’t turn out good.

It’s a full moon right now. The sunsets here are amazing, but even more magical was the sunrise this morning with the full moon on the opposite horizon over the ocean. You may be wondering how Heidi could possibly see a sunrise, but you forget Hawaii is three hours ahead of California. Sleeping in until 5:30 is 8:30 at home.

This resort has a great hot tub by the pool. Last night, after wandering around the street fair, we went down to soak our sore muscles from our near-death experience on the reef. A pleasant man struck up a conversation. He’s here on contract with the Coast Guard. They are working to clear the harbor of all of the boats destroyed by the recent hurricane and fire. I never thought of that. He said the close-up boats completely burned, but the ones further out were destroyed by the hurricane—apparently their ties were burnt and that set them free. They caught fire also but being tossed at sea the fires were put out. Anyway, there’s a lot of sunken boats out there. The most surprising problem to me was a tour-submarine. It was moored and its battery compartment was exposed because they were charging the batteries over night. The submarine was torn free and rolled out over the reef and now it sits at the bottom with those batteries flooded by sea water. The guy was saying that it was going to be tricky getting it out because of the toxic battery-acid. He’s thinking they’ll suction the water in that compartment out to a container, and then they’ll chemically neutralize it. Isn’t that interesting? He said we could drive through Lahaina, but I don’t want to… I think it would break my heart.

We ended up driving around Lahaina… past a sign that says “Lahaina is not for sale.” Not sure what that’s all about, but I can imagine there’s a lot of raw emotions in Lahaina. I thought the flags at half-mast was heart-wrenching. We went to a snorkel beach, Kahekili Beach. Really worth it to snorkel there. It’s a huge flat coral reef with hundreds of different species of fish and turtles.

Then we went to Round Table Pizza in Kaanapali. The reason we went there is because after the fire, the owners—Christiane and David Mello, started giving out free pizza to the fire victims… and they still do. While we were in there ordering there was a separate line for ‘Fire Victims’. A man and his wife were holding a pizza and trying to understand why they didn’t have to pay. It was endearing to say the least.

Bill struck up a conversation with some lady about turtle sightings. She gave him directions to a nocturnal resting beach for the Arribada (arrival by sea of turtles). So right before sunset we walked five minutes from our place to the beach by the VFW in Kihei and settled in to wait. It turns out there’s a serious etiquette regarding the arribada. First of all, I think you’re supposed to be quiet. Secondly, do NOT go closer than 15 fifteen feet to the turtle. Apparently it’s against the law to get closer. I know all this because one of the regulars sitting in her lawn chair in anticipation of the blessed event came unglued when an elderly lady, who happened to be walking by, stopped to take a few photos. The regular was clearly not a humanitarian along with being a turtle lover because she humiliated this little old lady. I think it would’ve been simple enough to have gently told the lady—such inexcusable behavior! But, we got to see about twenty turtles come in for the night.

Joe and I had a lunch date today. He took me back to Kaanapali to the Duke’s Beach House Maui. Duke is a famous Hawaiian swimmer and surfer from the late 1800’s to early 1900’s. He won four Olympic gold medals in swimming and essentially made surfing popular in California.

So we’ve been here one week today. We’ll see what next week brings.