Hawaii 0+1 - Maui

Welcome back! In late 2023 my Brother and his Wife put together a trip to Hawaii, and invited anyone along who would be willing to watch over their daughter for a few shifts here and there.  A trip to Hawaii AND we get to play with the baby? Both my parents and I were immediately all-in, and we over a week exploring the islands!

Hawaii Day 0: 

Slept a bit last night, and a bit more on our flights out to San Jose, where we met up with Adam/Dani/Sage. Then we had flew another 5 hours out to Hawaii. This flight was only 70% full, and since we showed up with a baby, we ended up with almost 3 entire rows to ourselves. But Sage was an angel, and this was the chillest flight I'd ever been on. We stretched out, people swapped seats all around, we talked to the family behind us because they adored Sage (like everyone), it was really enjoyable. Especially compared to the normal jam-packed survival of most flights. Between tourism being down, Hawaii tourism being down, and Maui tourism being particularly down.... definitely worked out in our favor.

First impression: Hawaii is gorgeous, more 3rd world than I expected, and quite warm. We picked up our rental car (on Island time) and I drove us out to our air-bnb which is a cute surf motel/condominium in Paia.

The AC was busted, but we figured out how to pull the fuse and reset the minisplits, and some of the crew went out to grab food while dad + I played with the baby. She made it almost the full hour just playing with toys, but the last 10 minutes or so she started crashing and I walked her so she wouldn't cry. Not an issue at all, she's an angel.

We went to bed early, I took the couch and made it several pages in my book before passing out, hard.... but we ended up waking up multiple times to fix the AC, limping it through the night.

Hawaii day 1:

We're sick of this airbnb. The AC has progressed from iffy to unlivable, and we decided we'd be happier elsewhere if only so we didn't have to debate the issue for the next 4 days. So we cancelled our reservation, which included a lot of phone calls and taking pictures of the AC "not working" :/   Ironically, or perhaps not, there was a magnet on the fridge about how you should only take away airbnb stars if the accommodations are truly terrible. Adam cooked us all breakfast, they found a new airbnb online, and we packed everything into the car.  I'm just along for the ride, so while they planned, I supervised sage and took pictures of a lizard that had very photogenically climbed up a leaf to pose, presumably just for me.

Anyways, off on today's adventure - the volcano! Haleakala.  We had a flexible schedule to account for weather, but the forecast and the weather number said the volcano was clear, so we headed up! Adam drove, while I navigated.  Despite being under 20 miles away, the trip took an hour - not including a brief stop in cow-country to check the diaper on a screaming baby.  Cow country was really cow country, they had a whole cowboy-themed town with western-style facades, branding, everything.  One restaurant bore the sign: "Eat here or we both starve".

The trip up was impressive, with switchbacks galore, several passes through recently burned land (including one house that had recently gone, and one that had somehow survived despite clear evidence of a wildfire sweeping through the entire valley surrounding it). I saw two large birds (aside from chickens). One that sorta looked like a kiwi or a quail, and one that looked like a turkey with a fancy tail, or a small peahen, or something... Since none of these birds live on the island I decided they must be NeNe, the bird they talk about on all their signs, a long-lost relative of Canadian geese from a flock that got VERY lost thousands of years ago. However, I retain the right to be totally wrong, since neither looked very goosey.

We stopped at the visitors center for a potty break, checked out the single room of displays, and headed up the mountain proper. We were already at 5000 feet, and the views were pretty amazing - looking straight out at clouds, across the Pacific to other Hawaiian isles, and down to the airport miles below us.  As we continued up the switchbacks (all beautifully paved and banked) we crossed the tree-line and headed up into scrubland - and the clouds. But the clouds were only on one side the mountain and intermittent. We'd call out the elevation markers as we passed... 6000, 7000, 8000....   The road was so steep it gave us a moment of pause looking out to the other islands, as our brains insisted the ground was level, which meant the ocean... wasn't.

Arriving at the top, our first stop was the crater overlook. In the parkinglot we saw the kiwi-looking birds! These are Chukar, or something. They're essentially half-qual half-puffins. We tried calling them quffins, but resorted to just puffins. The parking-lot puffins would check each newly arrived car for any crumbs falling out, and were overall quite cute.  We walked up to the overlook and it was incredible. Crossing the treeline felt like driving into a different country, but the overlook felt like stepping onto another planet.  Haleakala doesn't really have a crater, instead it has a bowl of cindercones - distinct piles of ashes from each eruption, building up to 600 feet high, and each with their own colors. Adding in the clouds sweeping up the valley there were green patches, black, grey, red, brown.... it was incredible looking and that alone made the drive worth it.

After admiring the view, we decided we'd try the short hike (.2mi+back) up to the secondary overlook. Knowing we were nearing 10k feet, we could feel the altitude making us breathe a bit harder... but it wasn't bad. Just a bit more winded going up the massive steps (8-14inches apiece). Sage rode in her backpack, which she adores. Constantly changing views, being on eye-level with the rest of us, plus - she's an angel.  The view from here was even better. If you ever go to Maui, this is the one thing I'd say is a must-do. Not only is the view even better, but since you can't see the parking lot behind you it's much more immersive - and you get it more-or-less to yourself (aside from the hiking crew of old hippy ladies, who loved Sage, and gave her some wild new-age life advice. It was great.

We walked back to the cars and headed up to the summit, a few minute drive up to the very peak. We walked up the path to the peak (10,123 feet!) and did the short hike around the circumference. The views of the other islands - especially the big island - were better, but the clouds were moving in and it wasn't quite as alien. However, the plants were. There were several infoboards all about the Ahinahina (SilverSword) plant, which looks like something out of a bad scifi movie.  They look like you took an aloe-vera and spraypainted it silver, but ran out of paint just before you finished the first coat.   Apparently they grow for 10-50 years, and then suddenly they burst from a low bush into a miniature Christmas tree covered in flowers - bloom - and then die. More weird scifi stuff you would think was far-fetched if you saw it in a movie.

After our circumference in the clouds there was one other todo that was on my Dad's list. He wanted to hike out the Sifting Sands trail, which goes down into the cindercones.  We parked back at the overlook lot, and set off down the trail. The plan was to do a few hundred yards, and then some of us would head back and take over baby duty so Adam and Dani (who are in way better shape than us) could hike deeper in. The three oldest of us hiked out a few hundred yards to where it began to get steep, and talked through our options. Mom was done (plus, she loves baby-time). Dad wanted to go further, and I wanted to get some video footage. Not really sure why, I just like shooting b-roll now and thought the clouds would look good in a time-lapse. Plus, I definitely wouldn't want to send my 67y/o father into a mountain desert alone... so despite being slightly apprehensive about the hike back up, we set off down the mountain while my mom doubled back to trade off.

The top bit was steep, but it looked like it leveled out after that, so we targeted a spot about a mile in and set off down the mountain. The hike was incredible. Back into the alien landscape, which could just as well be mars as anywhere on earth. It was weirder than that though, because if you looked up-slope you saw grey alpine peaks dotted with the weird scifi bushes. And the "level section" of the path was all downhill. And not just slightly, all very downhill. Much like the slanted-sea earlier, the extreme geography was screwing with us. As we got to our preordained target spot, we were slightly spooked by the exhausted hikers heading the other direction, but slightly relieved to see some of them had decades on my father (though likely not in need of a new knee - something my dad has scheduled for this winter). Now here, we saw what appeared to be a great overlook a few hundred yards further. That, we decided, was our final-final spot. And as we approached it, Adam and Dani caught up from behind us, jogging down the mountain!

The overlook was a great overlook, offering another perspective on the bizarre cinder cones. And the path was soft, but not slippery, providing a great hiking surface. We hung out, chatted, and snapped some pics. My dad knew / was afraid it would take him ages to go back up, I wanted to shoot my timelapse, and the fit hikers were thirsty for more - so we talked it over, and my dad decided to start back now, I stayed to shoot, and Adam/Dani set a new target a half-mile further into the cindercones. It was a great plan. I shot video and watched them through the binocs as they jogged off into the distance, and 20 minutes later when they made it I looked back to see my dad half way up the mountain!  I packed up and set off to follow him.

It wasn't easy, but it wasn't terrible. I can best describe it as a grind, where you did your best not to think, put one foot in front of the other, and before you knew it you could look back and admire the progress you made. I definitely felt the altitude, but it didn't get worse over time. You were just on the edge of being winded the whole time, but never actually winded - at least not at my slow+steady pace. I almost caught up to my dad, but he stayed ahead the whole time. Back up top, I set up another timelapse and watched Adam+Dani make their way up, followed by a group on horseback! Fascinating landscape, and just a joy to be out there. When they caught up we walked back to the car where we learned Sage had slept the whole time! Because she's an angel, lol. And uphill had been kinder on my dad's knee than downhill had been, so we were all in great spirits.

On the way down the mountain there was one final overlook, so we hit that too! It wasn't as good as the others, but any cliff-side overlook of a volcano is still fantastic, and offered a great view of the trail we'd taken. It was pretty amazing to see it from this perspective, where it looked even steeper than it had from the bottom. But now the clouds were rolling in heavy, so we set back down the mountain in earnest - with the minivan locked in low gear the whole time.

At times, the clouds were so thick we couldn't see 100feet down the road. Even when we could, I'd often look out the other side of the car and only see sky. It could be a Chrysler minivan, it could be a Chrysler puddlejumper. Again, just so different and so fun. I reached out the window and the clouds were cold and wet, just like you'd expect. Oh! And we saw more of the turkey-peacocks! They're ring-necked pheasants. Now that I knew they lived here (they're non-native, so they get no press), that's definitely what I saw before. No NeNe's for me. Even if it is the only bird Sage can name.

Back down the mountain, through the burns, switching the switchbacks, and down to Paia for a late lunch. We had been alone on mars, now we were in a tourist-town filled with surf bums and instagram models, and ordered fish. The fish tacos were massive, the fish burgers were massive and overspilled their buns, and the blackened sashimi was a delicious twist, but not quite as good as I'd expected.  And the caffeine and lemonade did wonders to get us refueled and ready to set off across the island.

Our new airbnb was on the opposite coast, so headed back to the airport, stopped at a pharmacy to get some sudafed for Dani who has been feeling stuffy since the plane, and then headed off past more cattle farms and abandoned sugarcane mills to Kihei.  This town was less "authentic", it's kinda the LA of Maui. Lots of chain stores, condos, and a surprising amount of homeless people. But the airbnb was great. Not only do I have my own bedroom - with a BED! - we also have multiple air conditioners that all work. And a pool! All just a row back from the beach.

After settling in, we decided to walk down the beach, again in shifts so we can leave someone with the baby. My parents and I headed down to the harbor to watch the surfers (and the homeless), and cut through the park to head over to the icecream place. Beautiful park, but definitely full of characters, some of whom clearly enjoyed their substances. Icecream acquired, we watched the sunset, checked out the house for sale across the street (only $10M), and got back to our place, where we found out.... Dani has covid. And we've all been in the same car all day, sharing water bottles, some of us sharing food... so we'll see.

Tomorrow is our snorkeling trip, so we'll see who feels up to take the 3 tickets we brought, and make the best of it. Now I'm gonna drink some more water, read a few chapters, and hopefully sleep 10 hours again to prep for further adventures :)