Oahu to Maui

by chris cunningham

Today’s a bit of a travel day as we make our way from Oahu to Maui. Our flight isn’t that early so we can sleep in a bit and head to the airport at our leisure. We have the car too but I kinda forgot where the car rental place was. Somewhere over there, by the freeway thingie, but NOT by the other rental thingies. Approximately. We’ll find it.

And we did. Dropped the car off and everything was well planned… Thank you very much. Wah! Anyway we got on our plane and had a quick flight across the way to Maui where we picked up an almost too awesome for words PT Cruiser. Almost. So what do you do in a PT Cruiser? Go to a McDonald’s is what you do. Actually we were both kinda thungry, that’s thirsty and hungry and I just made that up. We had an hour drive to the kaanapali coast and who knew how long we’d be without food.

I’ve never been here but we’re definitely on the dry side of this island. We scientifically stuck our heads out the window and figured that out. “Yep, it’s dry over here.” Well, we wound our way down the road and along the coast. Very nice, and some beautiful trees along the way with the ocean sometimes right alongside the road to our left. We aren’t staying at one of the new resorts but at a more 60’s style hotel. The Kaanapali Beach Hotel. It looks like one of those vacation hotels you would have won a trip to on The Wheel of Fortune or the Price is Right showcase in 1976. And it did no disappoint in that category! It’s up to date and very clean though and we loved it. No taller than the coconut trees with old school tikis, volcanic rock, and torches layed out around the grounds. An evening show too!

After we got checked in and had a look around I thought we should try and get up the coast to see the blowhole. I had no idea how far it really was but it was a nice windy ride up and around the north corner of Maui. We got there with a little bit of time before it started to get dark, but it was a little bit of a hike down a hill and some rocks. Even had to dodge some guys on motorcycles putting around.

We got down the hill and the blowhole was shooting up pretty high! Very nice. So of course Liza told me to go stand near it to get a picture with it. It wasn’t the blowhole I should have turned my back on, it was the ocean. Yes! Rogue wave! Just like the band! Thanks. So giant wave decides he’d like to show me a thing or two and comes barreling over the wall of rocks making stupid blowhole look weak in comparison. Good thing I wasn’t holding my video camera. Oh, I was? Well, I hunched over clutched it to my chest and took the brunt of the wave. And what do you know? It only got entirely wet!

OK, I’m cold now lets finish up and get to the car. As we were walking back up to the car a rainbow was hanging about, which was nice. We got back to the hotel after dark and went down to the bar and watched a little bit of the show before heading back to the room. Took a warm shower to get the wave off me.