ALOHA Maui!!! A little dream come true!!! Sept. 17th - 20th

Wow! MAUI!!! What a cool place!! This is a huge lava field in Makena, near Kihei, Maui -where we stayed!

This is Hana and I at the Makena lava beach. The little drive there was a skinny road surrounded on both sides with an enormous lava field - amazing - with the old volcano in the back ground (the above top picture).

Well - we finally did it!!! We went to Maui!!! What a beautiful, fun, relaxing, little dream of a vacation!! About a 1 1/2 weeks before we left, Scott found a condo, thru his buddy's timeshare. Scott had time off anyway for this week and we were trying to find somewhere to fly. So what better place than Maui!! We were so excited when it all worked out!!!

Conrad and I over looking the pier, with all the whaling and some tourist boats! Near the Maui Ocean Center. Cute kid!

We arrived on Monday night. Then stayed until Thursday night. On Thursday we went to the Maui Ocean Center! The most amazing, extremely large aquarium we have ever seen. It was a very fun place for the kids. We learned a lot about all the animals in the ocean. In their huge Open Ocean section of the aquarium we saw five different types of sharks, two kinds of sting rays, and tons of huge and colorful fish, all swimming together. The kids loved it - Scott and I loved it! Then there was a tunnel where all those sea animals would swim over us! It was amazing!

We took the great advice of my uncle Brian Neff and went to the Cheeseburger in Paradise restaurant, in Lahaina, on Wednesday night. It was a very cool place. Good burgers! Great atmosphere! We all loved the great live music. We also sat upstairs next to the balcony as you can see and it was additional, perfect entertainment for the kids to look over and see all the people, cars, and bikes. As Brian said - Lahaina definitely is like the Park City of Maui. We did a little souvenir shopping. It had a great time! But the restaurant was the highlight that night!

Chaka! Scott and Hana hangin out, playin around in the ocean. On Tuesday we went to the beach right across the street from our condo. It was a great one for the kids. The waves were not too big and they loved the water and the sand. Fun fun day - light sunburns, but not too bad. It was pretty funny - there was a smaller wave that took Hana out. She tumbled as we watched with surprise, as all we saw was her little bum and legs do a summersault in the wave. She popped up and just stared at us - no tears :). All we could do was laugh and give her high fives for how awesome she handled the wave. She laughed and thought it was pretty funny. She was pretty proud of herself too. Feeewww! (wipe the brow) She handled it a lot better than we thought! (Although this was not the last time this happened -read further)

The kids with the "tootas" - sea turtles - at the Maui Ocean Center - they were so cool to see. The kids loved them.

We had a fabulous time! We realized that activities with the kids were limited, also because it was such a short trip - so we spent most of our time different beaches.

The story of Big Beach . . . This was a cool beach - maybe for older kids :) ! Tuesday afternoon we went to Big Beach - and upon arriving, we realized why it was called Big Beach! It was a pretty big beach, but also the waves, as they curled, were about 10 feet high and every once in a while there was one about 15 or so feet high. Wow! It was a little scary for the kids - so Scott and I did a little body surfing on and off while the kids played on the beach. Conrad came in with me for a few minutes - it took some persuasion to get Hana to come out with us. Finally she came in with Scott - holding on very tight. We were enjoying the large waves - out just past the point where they were breaking. Suddenly Scott looked at me and pointed out to the ocean and said "Um, Amy!" I looked out and saw a huge wave suddenly upon us with no way of avoiding it. I said "Wo! Okay, hold on!" I embraced Conrad with his head a little above my head (mean while Scott was just a couple feet more toward the shore- and he said all he was thinking was "Please don't break on us!") So the wave came and I did my best to keep our head above water. We made it - it splashed our faces quite a bit. But it did curl right on Hana and Scott. I turned and they were gone. A half second later Scott pops up without Hana. He looked at me and scrambled for only a few seconds to find her as the wave went back out. Suddenly Hana stands up on the sand, popping her head out of the water. With a very disoriented, surprised look on her face. I instantly grabbed her and was holding her and Conrad. Scott came up quick and grabbed her from me. By that time the waves had pushed us more onto the shore. Hana's hair was tossled - again no tears. We just went for the positive approach again. "Wo! Hana that was awesome! You did great! You just popped right up! You okay? (double checking) You did exactly what you were supposed to! Good job!" She again was shocked, but proud of herself. For the rest of the trip she talked about how awesome her tumble in the ocean was, and also added that she never wanted to do that again. :) We then continued to just look for seashells on the shore at that beach. ;)

We also rented snorkle gear and went to a very cool beach with great reefs right off the shore. Scott and I took turns all day, snorkeling. We also rented a boogie board with a window in it and took Conrad out on it. He was able to see a couple fish too. Unfortunately, do to the experience that day before, Hana did not join us in the ocean for the rest of the trip. But that is okay. We all had a great time though.

After an incredible vacation and great memories, it was time to go - took the red eye flight- last night (Thurs night). The kids slept the entire flight home! It was great! Yet Scott and I didn't sleep too well! So we are tired and now going to bed - so that is our great Maui vacation in a nut shell!! Love you all!