Favorite Maui Moments from 2008

Usually about this time of year, people start reflecting back on everything that has happened in the last 12 months. Actually, they probably started doing that a week ago and I'm just a little behind. :)

Anyway, it's been a pretty good year for us, and with all this hype and excitement about our upcoming Maui trip in February, I thought I'd take a moment to relive some of our favorite memories of our trip in April, 2008. From the looks of the last post of our '08 Trip Journal, I think I meant to do this months ago. Oh well, better late than never.

Our Favorite Maui '08 Moments

So here's the list of our favorites from 2008. I thought about putting then in order, but that's too hard to decide.  Honestly, they're all so memorable.

Meeting the Whales

We can't describe what an amazing experience it was to finally see the whales in Maui for the first time. We came into this trip knowing that April was the tail end (pardon the pun) of whale watching season, which I think made seeing quite a few still around that much more special.

Spending the morning whale watching on my birthday was pretty nice, but if I really had to choose, I'd have to say this view of the whales 3 days later was my favorite. Going back in February is going to be such a larger whale watching experience, these first encounters may seem pale in comparison. However, seeing the whales for the first time will always be special to us.

HAPA in Concert

Seeing one of our favorite Hawaiian music artists live in concert had to be one of our all-time favorite moments on Maui. The HAPA concert at the Maui Arts and Cultural Center on Maui in 2008 was such an amazing experience, and just like seeing the whales on our next trip, we're overjoyed to see HAPA again in February.

South Maui Beach Hopping

While the skies weren't cloudless the entire day, we had a blast beach hopping on South Maui during our second week. We make a point each trip to visit at least 3 new beaches, but not before this year did we decide to do it all in one day!!!

It felt like heaven for both Cindy and I, for different reasons. Cindy had yet another day in the sun, that is when she wasn't dodging the passing cloud cover. Me, well, I probably walked close to 3 miles of sandy beaches that day, including the aptly named Big Beach in Makena. In just one afternoon, I probably shot over 500 photos of all three beaches we visited, and had a blast doing it.

The Best Birthday Cake

Actually, it wasn't really a cake, it was much better. Having a nice slice of Hula Pie at Leilani's on my birthday was probably the best birthday celebration that I could have wished for. I mean, there was no candles to blow out, but when you're already on the beautiful island of Maui, do you really need to make a wish?

I think another part of my birthday celebration that made it extra special was the fact that I was sharing it with the two most important people in my life, my loving wife Cindy and my wonderful mom. Being able to take her along this trip and give her a first-hand look at why we love Maui as much as we do was very rewarding for us. She enjoyed it, too. :)

Our Return to Hana

It was nice to make it back to Hana this trip, and the tour we chose this time was so much better. Not only was lunch at the Hotel Hana Maui very nice, we had so much more time to spend seeing the sights and getting closer to everything than we did the first time.

Climbing down the rocks at Wailua Falls to get shots like this were fun, but I don't think much compared to my excitement shooting at the lava tubes Waianapanapa State Park this time. Actually going into the lava tubes was another thing we didn't do last time. I seriously felt like I was a kid again.  After going in first with my digital camera (and taking photos like the one of the left), I literally ran up the rock stairs to where Cindy was using the video camera and ran all the way back down to shoot video of it, too. What a great time!

Honorable Mention

While the above are the big moments from this year's trip, there were a few smaller ones that we'll always remember, too. One of the two that come to mind right away are the little baby kittens that we saw near the walkway at our building at the Sheraton. They were four of the cutest little black cats that we've ever seen, and while we'd seen the mother cat on the property for years now, we didn't know she was starting a family. It became a ritual near the end of the trip to stop and look for them whenever we walked past.

What do cats at a Maui resort eat, you might be thinking? That sort of leads to the second quick moment I wanted to share. Beside from other guests leaving leftover mahi mahi and various scraps, I had a run-in with the mother cat of my own. A friend of mine had just become a grandfather while we were away on Maui, and I decided to call and congratulate him (he and his wife are Maui fans, too).

I was standing in the open air lobby on the 8th floor of the Sheraton (here's the view, by the way) talking to him on my cell phone, when out of the blue, I see the mother black cat racing up the palm tree not 10 feet away from me. Now, the palm trees outside this view aren't the giant palms that you see along the coast, but smaller ones planted alongside the cliff at Black Rock. In any case, not sure what the cat was doing, I kept an eye on her while talking on the phone.

Just a few moments later, the cat came back down the tree with, of all things, a green gecko in her mouth! Of all the times not to have my camera. Needless to say, I had a hard time keeping a straight face when replaying the story for Cindy. It was too funny.

Such Great Memories

While it isn't possible to say that one of our trips was the best out of all of them, our visit to Maui in '08 definitely created some of the most wonderful memories we've had. There were a few rough moments at the end when the thought of having to leave started to settle in, but that's expected on these trips that are so amazing.

Did you get a chance to visit Maui in '08?  Tell us some of your favorite moments this year.

New Maui Beaches Added

This week's site updates feature new additions to our Beaches section, bringing the total of beaches we've been to and have covered to nine.

Our trip this year was the first time we headed down to the beaches down in South Maui, as we wrote about in our beach hopping post. We also added more details from the places we stopped at along the Road to Hana, including more coverage of the black sand beach at Waianapanapa State Park and our first encounter with the red sand variety, Koki Beach near Hana.

Each beach includes an overview and highlights, photos we've taken of each beach, a few links here and there, and aerial satellite views courtesy of Google Maps. We're always finding great new links and articles about these beaches, so we try to keep them current. We also have a few videos of some of these beaches that we hope to have added soon.

So check out the Beaches section and see if your favorite beach is listed. If it is, let us know about it and tell us why you love it. If you don't see your favorite, let us know!!! We're always looking for ideas and places to visit on our future trips.

Mahalo.

Next Round of Updates

Aloha,

Yesterday I finally completed the first major update from our most recent trip, which were the Trip 3 Itineraries pages. While that took quite a bit of time to put together, we still have a lot more to add here.

The next planned set of updates we're working on are the videos from this trip and maybe even reviving a few from last year, too. I spent about 4 hours yesterday trying out different apps and settings for uploading to YouTube, yet I still wasn't happy with the results. I even tried uploading a view to Flickr, which faired a little better quality-wise, but I still need to find the sweet spot. Either way, we're hoping to have something added soon.

After we're finished with the videos, there are still more to update. We went to a good number of new beaches, restaurants and sights and tours that we will be adding here, and there's still the Road to Hana Photo Tour that I'll be putting together to match (nay, better) the one we did for the Ka'anapali Beachwalk. And then still, after all that, we'll be finishing our Books and Music pages in the Reviews section, as well as adding new pages for our favorite websites and blogs.

It's starting to look like a long summer of updates, so it might not be a bad idea to subscribe to our feed here at the blog to receive all the updates. With so much left to do, February (our next trip) is going to be here before we know it. :)

Mahalo.

Progress Report on Site Updates

Well, for better or for worse, we're back in the full swing of things. Which means, my full time job is taking the most of my week while my full time love (of Maui) takes a back seat, at least as far as work on the website goes.

It's not all bad, though. I was able to put in a good amount of time this weekend on the new Itineraries pages for our '08 Trip. It's not quite ready yet, but when it's finished, there will be tons of detail from each day, and leveraging the Maui Twitter archives from our trip, too. It's a pretty fun format that I'm using for those pages (you'll see when it's ready) and I'm thinking about adapting for the previous trips, too.

We finally printed our photos this weekend so Cindy can stuff them in an album and bring them to work, show them to all her friends, etc. I, on the other hand, had to spend sometime with the Flickr API yesterday and hammer out an interesting bit of code on my laptop that would update the Date Taken value for all of our geotagged photos, especially the ones from our Road to Hana tour. I've always used JetPhoto Studio to merge my GPS logs into my photos and upload them to Flickr, all relatively easily (as described here).

Well, it turns out there's a little glitch with JetPhoto that overwrites the Date Taken value on Flickr with the date you actually upload the photos. Not good. Took me about a day to programmatically clean that up, which it probably would have taken three to change it for each photo manually.

Anyway, I'm hoping to have something new go live in the next week or so, and there's still much more work ahead after these itineraries pages. Other than putting together the Road to Hana photo tour, all the other new pages will be far less of an effort.

Mahalo.

Sunday Photo: Honomanu Bay

Honomanu Bay
Originally uploaded by webnelly

There's a good chance you've seen photos of Honomanu Bay in books and on postcards from Maui. It is one of the most recognized images that people often take when on the Road to Hana. In fact, try this search on Flickr and you'll see over a hundred just like it. It's still a nice view, though.

Adding in a little piece of trivia, Honomanu Valley means "Valley of the Bird".

Down below in this valley, is a small black sand beach which is a little tricky to get down to. Most that are able to think of driving to access it are driving Jeeps and other vehicles with 4-wheel drive. There is also a very limited amount of space down there, so if you're not one of the early ones, might as well keep on driving.



If you do happen to make it down there or have been there already, please share your thoughts with us.

Mahalo.

Road to Hana '08 Photos Added

New Flickr Set added - Road to Hana '08


Wailua Falls
Originally uploaded by webnelly

Catching up on photos from our last trip, I uploaded the new set of photos from our Road to Hana tour, all geotagged with the GPS data from the tour. Right now, you can use the Map feature on Flickr when viewing each photo to see where it was taken, but going forward, I will be putting together a photo tour like I did for the Ka'anapali Beachwalk here.

For now, there are still a lot of photos in the set, which I will likely end up trimming down some more. There are almost no titles or descriptions yet, and many will still need to be edited and cleaned up. It will probably take days if not weeks, but I will slowly be making progress.

Stay tuned for more updates.

Mahalo.

Our Return to Hana

After two years, we decided to go back on the Road to Hana, this time bringing my mom along as part of your introduction to the island. Call it a right of passage for a newcomer to Maui.



We decided to go with a different tour company this time than in the past. We choose to go with Discover Hawaii Tours, and we were more than pleased. Our shuttle picked us up at the hotel just before 7am and took us back out to Kahului. It was still a little early for us, but it wasn't that bad. Once in Kahului, we stopped at the small meet-up center where the shuttles from the other parts of the islands all gathered before heading out. They had a small gift shop and a little breakfast spread with fruit, breakfast burritos and all different types of juice. Knowing that the Road to Hana was going to be a little twisty and turny, we opted to just snack.

Our driver was Jonathon "The Professor" and was absolutely amazing. Not only did he know all about the road and sights themselves, he had all sorts of facts and historical references that really added to the experience. He also seemed to know everyone along the tour, from the girl at the fruit stand to the hostess at the Hana Hotel where we had lunch. You could tell he really enjoys his work.

The last tour we did to Hana was before the earthquake in 2006. Back then, you could go all around the island, going past Hana to the Seven Sacred Pools to the Tedeschi Winery and back to Kahului in one direction. Well, with one of the bridges between the pools and the winery damaged and about 9 months left of repairs, we ended up doing the Road to Hana twice, once there and once back. It might make it seem longer, but it made for an even better tour.

Our driver was used to driving both ways to and from Hana, and he had an interesting plan for how to avoid the crowds. What we did on the way to Hana was stop at a few of the lesser known spots, yet ones that still were worth seeing. We hit the Halfway to Hana stand and scoped out a few others along the way. He gave us advice about stands that were flying the Hawaiian flag upside down and how some of the stands only open up when they feel like it.

We made a few stops along the way, and I'll have more details when I get to work on putting my photo tour together. I haven't checked my GPS logs yet from my travel recorder, so I'm hoping I gathered enough data to work with. The first major highlight of the trip was when we stopped at Wailua falls. We were there last time, too, however, this time the tour guide took us down to the rocks and the pool right at the bottom of the falls. It was incredible. I did my best to take some good photos and hopefully enough to piece together a nice panorama shot.

That was our turning around spot. After that, we stopped out at a red sand beach in the area, which was another first for us. I remember driving past it last year and the guide pointing it out on the fly, but now we can add the color red to our collection of beach photographs. After the red sand beach, it was time for lunch, which was a stop at the Hana Hotel. For a driving tour, having a sit down lunch in the Hana Hotel restaurant with a good sized menu and drinks was a welcomed change. Lunch was included with the price of the tour, but cocktails and soda was extra. I think it was a nice touch and a lot better than a cold sandwich and a cookie from our last tour.

The last major thrill on the trip was the stop back at the black sand beach at Waianapanapa State Park. Since we saved it for the way back, there was about half the people that were there last time we saw it, which was earlier in the day. Not only were there less people, we stayed there for an entire hour, which was awesome. I took a few more photos of the black sand itself, to add to the ones I took last time. This time, however I also brought down the video camera and shot footage going through the lava tube, which I didn't do before. That was really neat, and while it probably didn't do the actual lava tube justice, it's a nice reminder of what I actually saw.

After the lava tube at Waianapanapa, I hiked on over to the blow hole to take some photos and video. While it was an amazing sight to witness, it wasn't as friendly to my digital camera and my video camera. I think I got the hang of it after about 15 minutes and might have something worth sharing, so we'll see.

We stopped a few times on the way back, getting photos of Honomanu Bay and the rainbow trees before heading out to Kahului. All in all, I think we were on the bus for about 8 of the 10 hours of the tour, so it was pretty exhausting. I still recommend it for anyone interested in learning about the magic of Hawaii and the beauty of Maui by seeing the untouched and unchanged portions of it via the Road to Hana. For anyone coming to Maui for their first time and staying for a decent amount of time (5+ days), it would be worth it. Especially if you don't think you're going to be returning to Maui in the future.

As I've stated before, the Road to Hana is not really about driving all day just to see a small fishing village, it's about seeing the beauty of the island as the Hawaiians did centuries ago. It's about going back in time and about seeing the true magic of Maui that doesn't play to commercial tourism and giant resort towns. And if you're fortunate enough to find a tour guide like Jonathon from Discover Hawaii Tours, it's about learning the history of Hawaii to some degree. Probably more than a $20 guide book or a drive along CD could teach you.

If you think it's just a silly road and a boring drive, please take a pass and let everyone else enjoy it.

Let us know what you think, or if you've had better or worse experiences with other tour companies or making the drive yourself. In the end, there's no right or wrong choice for everyone (drive vs. tour), so it's good to ask around, get some input from others and do a little research before making your own choice.

Mahalo.

Sunday Photo: Wailua Falls

Wailua Falls
Originally uploaded by webnelly

I'll admit, this isn't the best photo on the web of Wailua Falls along the Road to Hana, but that's going to change soon. We're going back to Hana in two weeks while we're in Maui, so in addition to better photos of these falls, there's going to be many opportunities to capture many new Sunday Photos for weeks to come.

Maui '08 Trip Update - Tour Bookings

Well, we're under the two week mark for our upcoming trip, so I thought I'd post a few notes on what we've booked so far.

Boats and Cruises
This is our second year as members of the Pacific Whale Foundation and we are certainly taking advantage of the discounts. We have 3 tours booked with PWF this trip.

4/16/08 - Our first cruise will be a whale watch excursion our of Lahaina. We're well aware that it's almost the end of the whale season, and we don't have too high of hopes of being blown away by an up close encounter, but it will still be fun. After all, that's what telephoto lenses are for.

For the full whale experience, we're going back in Feb '09, right at the height of whale season in Maui.

4/20/08 - Sunday nights in Maui for us mean a dinner cruise, so that's what we have in store this time. This was the same dinner cruise that we booked last year, but because the ship went in for maintenance, we missed out. We hope to have better luck this year.

4/24/08 - Perhaps the saddest of our Maui trip traditions (only because of the timing) is our final night on the island. We reserve that for one last spectacular Maui sunset aboard a sunset cocktail cruise. As much as we don't want to leave, it is perhaps the closest things to a perfect end of a perfect vacation.

Back to Hana
4/15/08 - Since we are bringing along my mother for this trip, we figured it was time to go back to Hana and give her the total island experience. It is also another chance for me to fill up my memory cards with the stunning views of this magical journey. In fact, with the fun that I had creating this photo tour for the Ka'anapali Beachwalk, using my handy GPS travel recorder, doing the same for the magnificent Road to Hana should be even better.

Unfortunately, its no real secret that gas prices on Maui are hurting folks just like the rest of the country (the highest in the country by some reports). On that note, it appears that Roberts Hawaii had to pass some of that onto their guests. When doing the price comparisons for the trip, Roberts was almost twice as much this year for the same tour we did with them two years ago. Its a shame, because we really like them.

This time, we decided to go with Discover Hawaii Tours. It appears to be a bigger tour with more riders than Roberts, which is probably what helps to keep the price down. There are a few nice perks with this tour, but I'll save those specifics until after the tour.

Stars at Night
4/16/08 - After we were blown away by the stars over Maui last year, we couldn't help but to get closer. This year, we booked a Tour of the Stars at the Hyatt Maui Regency. It's a chance to tour the skies with the help of a professional astronomer and their powerful rooftop telescope. In fact, I couldn't wait, and bought myself a pair of Celestron binoculars for the trip.

Live Music
4/19/08 - Now, for the crown jewel of our trip, if there could ever be one. Reserved back in January, we were overjoyed to hear that HAPA was performing at the Maui Arts and Cultural Center while we were going to be on the island. Its going to be incredible.


As if all of this wasn't enough, we still have quite a few more things planned. We'll save that for another post, and we're certainly going to have quite a bit to blog about once we get back.

Mahalo.