This trip will be split up into each days experience to avoid a 50 page long post. While there will be stories to explain videos and photos, the majority of these posts will likely be photos and videos with context provided.
Read what you want and re-vacation with us on the Blog, or simply ignore us for the next week or so as we post tons of photos and videos of our most recent adventure.
We look at it this way, its better to put the photos and videos up here so you can ignore us or watch as you choose rather than us plop down in your living room and tell you how amazing our trip was when you really don’t care.
So with those disclaimers…we landed in Oahu.
We literally got on a plane at 9am in Houston and thanks to that ever spinning globe we call Earth, we landed 8 hours later in Honolulu, Hawaii on the Island of Oahu at around 12:30pm and promptly got in our “transfer” vehicle. We were thinking beat up van, old taxi, whatever…nope. We got the luck of the draw, and our draw was a limo. Good start so far!
This Limo took us straight to our cruise ship, the Norwegian Cruise Lines “Pride of America”. We got checked in and promptly left the boat to go meet family for lunch before the boat departed.
Travel Day 1 – Wake up in Houston, Go to sleep on cruise boat in Hawaiian waters…so far so good.
Thanks to that lovely time change, we woke up the next morning at like 4 am or something ridiculous. For those keeping track at home that would be like 9 am Houston time. The advantage of that was we got to start off our trip to Maui by watching the sunrise through small ocean rain storms.
Good Morning Maui!
You would think that would be a good day in itself! Nope. We were just getting started…
First up on our list…Mama’s Fish House.
You think, a fish house, who cares? This is not your normal Fish House despite the hole in the wall name it goes by. This was considered by many at the table the best meal they have ever had, or at least right up there. The Menu literally listed the fish by the location of where the Fish was caught that morning and the Fisherman who caught the Fish. Courtney and I both had Some Hawaiian fish called the Unu (I think) that was caught that morning by Greg Lind somewhere near Maui.
I have no idea who Greg Lind is, but I am pretty sure I have never been to a restaurant that tells me who caught the animal I was going to eat. Ever been to a steak house that said Jorge Sanchez butchered Bessie this morning in the Fields outback. Nope, didn’t think so. So the food was fresh…but I haven’t even mentioned the view yet…
Then there is this fun tradition that you are supposed to do when you are in Hawaii. Try poi. Try what? Poi.
Wikipedia says this:
Poi is a Hawaiian word for the primary Polynesian staple food made from the corm of the taro plant (known in Hawaiian as kalo). Poi is produced by mashing the cooked corm (baked or steamed) until it is a highly viscous fluid. Water is added during mashing and again just before eating, to achieve a desired consistency, which can range from liquid to dough-like (poi can be known as two-finger or three-finger, alluding to how many fingers you would have to use to eat it, depending on its consistency).
They then provide this appetizing photo…
We describe in both texture and taste as “Wallpaper paste with a purple hue”
So …Courtney and my Uncle Sean got to try this delightful little delicacy…
Looks Yummy!
While that little diddy was going on at one side of the table, My Mom was trying raw oysters courtesy of my Chef Brother for the first time. I had to capture this paparazzi style. Rapid clicking of camera while trying raw oysters can only enhance the experience I am sure. The result was something like this, with a few edited out, but you get the point…
And just some Bonus photos from the beach at Mama’s Fish House…
So what do you do when you eat a huge meal and are this close to being in a Food Coma? Go drive for 3+ hours on a road famous for how twisty it is of course! We took off in our 3 rental car caravan on the Road to Hana. Something like 60 bridges and 200 turns in 36 miles...or something...
We only had one casualty from this little drive…One person didn’t quite make it the whole trek without bringing back lunch for a second go around…Nothing some serious Febreeze couldn’t handle! Probably sucks for the next person to rent that car after the Febreeze wears off…
But oh the views we discovered!
Then just when we were about to turn back to make the trek through the vomit comet road, we came across a sign that said “Hana Lava Tube”. So of course we had to go check it out! This was a little gem. The more famous Lava tubes are on the big Island as a apart of the Volcano National Park. This one wasn’t nearly as populated and at one point we turned our flashlights out and we could not see our finger poking our eyes. It was quite literally void of all light. What a Lava Tube is, is essentially an underground tube that formed when the volcano erupted and had solidified on the surface but continued to have molten lava flowing underground and essentially traveled through these tubes that later remained. Sometimes collapses would occur that would allow discovery and skylights. This particular tube was about a quarter mile to the point where we were no longer allowed to go. Everything you see in the pictures are rocks. Even the ones that look like we took brownie batter and tossed it on the ceiling…
And so we concluded our Improvised Day 1 of the cruise, and Day 1 on Maui. Yes. We didn’t plan any of this. Tomorrow, the planning begins, and what a plan it turned out to be!
Jon
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