I've Been Gone...

....on the BEST VACATION EVER!!!!

Oh man. Nine days in Hawaii. It. was. so. great.

I'm probably about to write the longest blog post of my life because I want to share every wonderful minute of my trip!

My sister wrote a very clever haiku about our trip.

I'm going to copy it over to this post and add explanations-slash-comments between the verses. I think that will give you the best overview of my last (glorious) week-and-a-half!

18,000 feet,
I saw a whale from the plane.
Everybody laughed.

[Just as we were starting to land in Hawaii, we were looking out the plane windows to see the wonderful scenery and EB says "Oh! I just saw a whale!" AB and I immediately burst into laughter, considering we were still at about 18,000 feet and it would be impossible to see a whale from that high up. Unless the whale was four miles long and jumping out of the water. Which it wasn't.]

Up the volcano
to see a summit sunrise.
Awe-inspiring.

[Since our body-clocks were "off" anyway, we got up at 3:30 AM on our first day to drive to the highest point in Maui (over 10,000 feet) to see a BEAUTIFUL sunrise. Although, the brilliant night sky that we saw when we first arrived at the top of the mountain may have been my favorite sight of the day.]

The luau was fun.
The fire dancer licked the
flame. It made me squirm.

[Indeed, the luau was fun - and I did my obligatory "get on the stage and learn the hula".]

Did two 4-mile hikes
to beautiful waterfalls.
Un. Be. Lievable.

[We certainly weren't sedentary during this vacation - which was great. Not only because I didn't come home feeling like a total sloth, but also because the reward on many of our hikes was AMAZING scenery and waterfalls! Loved it so much!]

Crossed swinging bridges
Just like Indiana Jones.
Ain't your momma's trip.

[One of our hikes was seriously Indiana-Jones-esque. There were literal swinging bridges, muddy slopes, and hiking across calf-deep streams. We started to say that this was not your momma's trip to Hawaii. It was adventurous, to say the least.]

Blue water rafting
on the choppiest day there.
Totally. Crazy.

But it was fun.
Swells coming over our heads
and spine-jarring jumps.

[Again, not your momma's trip. The raft ride we went on was EXTREMELY crazy on a very overcast and choppy day on the ocean. In fact, toward the end of our trip, the Coast Guard had a helicopter and plane flying close to the water searching for a lost kayaker. We were told to keep our eyes open for him as well. We then headed in, and found out that we were basically the only boat (actually it was more of a raft) still out on the water....]

We saw whales breaching
and swimming by the resort.
They. Were. Everywhere.

[We could lay at our pool, and see whales all over in front of the resort. It was awesome. The closest we got to a whale was on our raft ride - there was a mother, calf, and their "escort" within about 100 yards of us.]

Highway to Hana
Another highlight of mine.
Beauty beyond words.

[My highlight of the trip was hiking into the jungle along the road to Hana and swimming in a natural mountain spring beneath a waterfall. I could have spent the WHOLE day there! Also, there was a 400 ft waterfall at the end of the road to Hana, which was also amazing. On most all of our hikes I felt like I was on the show LOST. Loved it.]

Thought we blew a tire.
It must have fixed itself. A
Maui miracle.

[We seriously thought we had blown a tire on the way back from Hana. There is a much longer story to this, but it is better in person, so we'll just leave it at that. It really was a miracle that we hadn't truly blown a tire. Although, there may be a dead goat along the road somewhere in Maui...]

In my attempt to
remember the cross-street, I
got called autistic. :-)

[Again, a long story. A funny, long story. Oh, EB is very, very funny.]

And then there was the
"Hall of Hawaiian Heroes"
with Stacey Santa,

the bus driver guy
who only hit his brakes four
times up the mountain,

the fire dancer,
and Aaron and Mike - the guys
who kept us alive.

[We ran into so many great people who helped increase the enjoyment of our time in Maui - so we started to call them the Hall of Hawaiian Heroes. The manager at the Alamo gave us a huge upgrade w/o charge, which was so wonderful. Aaron and Mike were the workers on the raft that kept us alive on the ocean, the fire dancer at the luau was basically amazing, and the driver of the bus is another long story....]

We laughed a little.
I mean, look who I was with.
They're funny people

[We laughed A LOT]

I've never liked fish
but I ate Mahi Mahi
and Monchung. So. Good.

[I DO like fish, and the Monchung was the GREATEST MEAL I'VE EVER HAD. If you are ever in Maui, you HAVE to go to Cafe Ole in Keihei. So worth every single penny (and more). Even with all the GREAT food we ate and yummy ice cream drinks I had at the pool (every day, multiple times a day), I only gained two pounds, which is worth noting - I consider it a huge accomplishment seeing as I was out of state for nine days and out of my routine for more like twelve days.]

And of course we had
pool time, sunsets, snorkeling,
and I read three books.

[I got a great tan, which should more than get me through February (a month that I have long thought of as the UGLIEST month there is...) thanks to time at the pool. We saw a sea turtle while we were snorkeling, and I also read three books. All very good things. Another highlight was watching the end of the Super Bowl - which had an AMAZING ending - in my swimsuit at the pool bar. Definitely a first.]

Best trip of my life.
I'm not exaggerating.
Pictures to come soon.

[It seriously was the best trip ever. I'm not putting any pics on my blog, but if you are reading this you are more than likely my friend on Facebook, so you can see pics there! We ended our trip by EB and myself taking bumps for free airfare - so that is always great! The Phoenix airport has free wi-fi, so we wasted the hours online and the ten hours weren't too bad overall. EB ended up taking another bump to get sent to Las Vegas for the night, but I really felt like I needed to get home. I wish now that I would have taken the bump for more free airfare and a night in Vegas. After all, ten years from now I won't be telling anyone about all the laundry I got done on Monday, but I definitely would have been able to tell about a free night in Vegas with my sis. I need to remember these things when I'm feeling really OCD and and Type A at the end of a trip. Laundry can (and will) wait. Vegas is not always free. So...lesson learned.]