Hawaii Update #2
Our first two nights in Maui were spent at Mana Kai in Kihei in what is called South Beach, which actually faces west. Go figure. We spent those first two days lounging on the beach and swimming in clear, blue water. We kept the windows open and fell asleep to the sound of the surf - completely relaxing.
From our window we could see the Molokini Crater, where we would snorkel in a few days & barely visible in this photo, and the uninhabited island, Kaho'olawe, the large island on the horizon. The small stretch of beach in front of our condo is called Keawakapu Beach, which is made of powder-soft orange sand and which was eroded by about 2.5 feet thanks to a small tsunami during our second night there. Strange stuff.
Hawaii Update #1
On January 11th, we started our journey to Hawaii. We were lucky to actually finish the trip in the same day. I was scheduled to travel from Seattle and meet Handsome in LA to share the flight to Maui with him. His morning went according to plan; mine, not so much.
Five inches of snow had ground Puget Sound to a halt - it took nearly an hour to make the journey to the airport. After cutting in line for the check-in counter, cutting in line at security, and hijacking the golf cart, I made my flight with 2 minutes to spare. Then, we sat on the tarmack for an hour.
As my flight finally landed in LAX, my connection to OGG (Kahului, HI) was taking off. Handsome had us rebooked on a later flight...BUT the later flight was 8 hours later. 8 hours in LAX with nothing to do. Joy. I called the hotel for a late check-in, and contacted the rental car company to alert them to our late arrival. They might be able to stay open 15 minutes late to make sure we had transportation.
Our flight left LAX 20 minutes late and arrived in OGG at approximately the same time that the rental company closed up for the day - a little before quitting time, as it turns out. I called. The line rang and rang. Nice, helpful people. (Insert sarcasm here) Now, we needed to find Handsome's bag, which had arrived on schedule - 8 hours earlier.
We found the bag and gave our business to a different rental car company. We checked into our condo around 10pm. Starving and fatigued, we trudged into Kihea far enough to find a Denny's. Imagine that...flying to Maui to eat dinner at Denny's. The perfect end to a lousy day.
The moral of the story: avoid American Airlines and LAX - at all costs.
This week, I'm visiting customers in Oregon. And, yesterday, I spent several hours driving Hwy 101 down the southern Oregon coast. This caught me by surprise:
Not sure what to think about that.
Finally home from Maui. It is amazingly beautiful there, the weather is perfect - even when it rains, and I discovered that I don't have allergies there! I did NOT want to leave.
In other news, we had a red-eye flight at 10:15pm yesterday (that's about 2:15am CDT), so neither Handsome nor I have slept much in the past 24 hours. We're a little trippy.
I can't wait to tell you all about it, but I need some sleep in a serious way. Over the next week or so, I'll post pictures, details, and thoughts from our trip.
I've got a flight to Maui at stupid o'clock tomorrow morning. I do this every time - scheduling flights and not allowing enough time for sleeping. You want to hear the good news? Of course you do.
When we arrive in Maui, it will be around 2:00 PM, which equates to 6:00 PM central. We'll have acquired an additional 4 hours of daylight. It's like time travel!!!!
Did you know about this? Me either. I'll commit to delurk on one site every day this week (two today, since I missed Monday) if you will. Wanna join me?
Happy New Year, ya'll!
Seven years ago, Handsome and I celebrated the new year (and the new millennium) in Paris at the Eiffel Tower. There were personal fireworks in addition to the spectacular, professional variety, voices speaking a dozen languages, champagne and beer shared freely between strangers on the street, kisses shared freely between strangers on the street. It was glorious, unforgettable.
Tonight, we celebrated the new year by dining at a French establishment in downtown Austin and attending the fireworks display on Town Lake. What the pyrotechnics lacked in choreography, they made up for in duration. But perhaps the most interesting weird events of the evening were the psychadelic drum-circle countdown and the video projection of an enormous eyeball upon a water tower adjacent to the lake. Or maybe it was the 10-foot tall bicycle-powered praying mantis. No celebration is complete without a giant carnivorous insect.
