Maui Day 5 - Sunrise

Our 5th day started out SUPER early. We left our hotel at 3 AM (yes, by choice) to head to the top of Haleakala, the volcano, to see the sunrise. It was a 2 hour trip to the top of the 10,000 ft volcano, for which Max slept the entire time. The forecast called for a clear morning - perfect for the sunrise! When we reached the top, it was freezing (just like for the sunset) and there were a lot of people gathered for show God was about to put on for us. And what a show it was. Amazing, gorgeous, beautiful.........The sun peeked up over the top of the volcano with a burst of colors from burnt orange to gold and slowly began illuminating the earth and warming our frozen faces. So worth waking up at such an early hour! Once the sun was shining we were able to see the crater of the once-active volcano, which is home to many unique volcanic rock formations, and not much else. We also hiked out to an overview for a closer look which made us feel like we were walking in the clouds. What a great morning. After our drive down, it was time for Mom and Ash to risk their lives zip-lining, something they were very excited about and had a blast doing! There are fun pics of their excursion below. Very cool stuff! Click here to visit the zip-lining website to get more of a feel for what they did. After we picked them up, we went to one of my favorite places, The Sunrise Country Market, to hang out for a little while. We admired their beautiful flowers and enjoyed a snack. Jeff and I stocked up on our favorite coconut candy! We made it back to our condo about 12 hours after we left it, exhausted but happy! Max took a LONG nap! That night Jeff, Ash, Ricky and I went out to dinner while Max stayed with Mom and Dad. It was a VERY full, fun day and I think we all slept HARD that night. Vacations are the best.

Maui Day 4 - Marathon!!

Day four started early for Jeff, Ash and Dad. It was marathon day!! The day that was really the inspiration for the whole trip. For those of you who may not know, Jeff is an avid runner and a year or so ago, he found that the Maui marathon fell 3 days before his 30th birthday. He decided that would be the perfect way to celebrate the big 3-0, we all agreed, and it was "Maui, here we come!" So, it was finally Marathon Day. Jeff was running the whole (26.2 miles), Ash was doing the half (13.1 miles) and they both started at 5:30 AM at different locations on the island. So, they were up early and so was Dad, aka The Chauffeur. They both did awesome and had a great time, despite the fact that it was VERY hot, since the tradewinds were still not blowing. Jeff ran a lot of the marathon with our local NBC 13 news anchor, Brooke Smith Weaver, who, a marathoner herself, is aiming to run a marathon in every state. Very cool. We all had fun waiting for them at the finish line, despite being very hot ourselves, and Max got a kick out of clapping for all the runners. He is a supporitve and encouraging baby!! :) We were so proud of Jeff and Ash for achieving their goals! Later, after everyone got some rest, we went to The Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. The boys wore their Hawaiian shirts and looked so cute! We were all ready for bed by the time we got back to the condo. What a fun day!

Day 3 - Where are those darn Olivine Pools?

Our third day in Maui was, as I am sure you can guess by now, gorgeous and wonderful! We started the day by driving to West Maui and doing some exploring. We tried to find a place the Olivine Pools, which, in our guide book, looks like an awesome place to swim. I say "tried" because this is the second trip we looked for them and the second trip we never found them! In some of the pics below you can see Jeff scouting the area looking for them, but it was to no avail. I think the water was a little to rough to see them. Maybe next time! :) Now we have a reason to go back! We did see some beautiful scenery, though. The ocean was SO blue that day, and it was amazing to watch it crash against the rocks. After that we stopped at a blowhole, which is a where a hole has formed in the rocks and allows water to spew up from it when the waves hit it. There are quite a few of them on the island. Such a cool thing to see. From our last trip we knew the hike down to the blowhole was pretty steep and slippery, so, since Max was with us this time, we opted to view it from above. It is still awesome even from far away. We got some good pictures of us with it "blowing" behind us. We then the headed to another favorite beach, Slaughterhouse Beach. I know - not the most inviting name ( a slaughterhouse used to be located there a LONG time ago), but a VERY inviting beach. Great waves, sand and scenery. Jeff and Ricky spent most of the time running and diving in and then body surfing back to shore. They called it "David Hasselhoff-ing". Sorry, David. These guys definitely outdid you! Isn't it fun to watch grown men play at the beach. I love it. It is going to be awesome when Max joins in! Speaking of Max, he tolerated the beach a little better today. He was okay sitting on the beach towel and chewing on his bucket and shovel. He never ONCE tried to crawl or move off of that towel. He was like a little statue. If he accidentally touched the sand he would hold his little hand up to you so you could immediately wipe it off. No sand, no thank you. Too cute. After wearing ourselves out at the beach we went back to the condo for Max's nap. We did pool time that afternoon, followed by another picture-perfect sunset. Do you see why it is so hard to come back home??

PS - Thanks to Ricky for a lot of these pictures! I think, between the two of us, we photographed every moment of the trip! :)