Advertisement
Published: August 19th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Pupukea
Fishing license? No need Jimmie left today after a 16 day visit. I am sad. We had so much fun going to the North Shore, Maui and just snorkeling and bodyboarding in Waikiki. His niece had her wedding at Kualoa Ranch, North Shore and it was amazingly beautiful and perfect.
While he was here we camped at North Shore's Malaekahana State Park, Haleakala NP (Maui) and Waianapanapa State Park (Maui).
After spending a Friday night at Malaekahana campground, we packed up and left early heading to Shark's Cove to snorkel. We got there early, around 8:00 am, and there were only a couple of people in the water. The snorkeling was great. There wasn't coral reef but lot's of rocks and clear water. We saw a snowflake eel swimming along the bottom. That was the highlight. We then went to Hale'iwa (a surfing town) for some shave ice at the famous Matsumoto's. Delish. Then it was off to Sunset Beach for some swimming in the clearest ocean water I have ever seen. During the winter, the waves are huge, but summertime is like a swimming pool. We stopped in Punalu'u on the way back to Waikiki for the BEST plate lunch, which we
Shark's Cove
North Shore, Oahu. View from water took right down the road to a beautiful beach/picnic area and ate. Perfect.
We snorkeled a lot near our apartment at Waikiki Beach and the next weekend we flew to Maui to camp at Haleakala National Park (famous for the sunrise above the clouds) and Waianapanapa State Park (a black sand beach park before Hana). We brought sleeping bags, goosedown comforter and jackets since Haleakala is over 10,000 ft and cold. We didn't need the goose down...overkill. It wasn't that cold sleeping. It was really cold in the morning, so I am glad we had the jackets. We saw both sunset and sunrise and I have to say I prefer sunset. It is less crowded and not as cold.
After leaving Haleakala, we took the "Road to Hana" (a VERY curvy road with lot's of one lane blind bridges) and stopped to get a campsite at Waianapanapa State park. After picking out a primo site, we headed for Seven Sacred Pools and the bamboo forest for a hike. It was very hot. We stopped in Hana at a roadside stand (Ali's) for what? A mahi plate lunch, of course. These plate lunches always have rice (usually sticky..yum), macaroni
Shark's Cove
North Shore, Oahu. salad and some type of meat/fish. Ali's wasn't as good as Kaya's but for Hana, where there are LIMITED choices, it was great and fairly reasonably priced (around $8). After lunch we went back to camp and decided to cool off and try some snorkeling off the black sand beach. There were hoards of people (day trippers) standing on the beach and just staring at it, afraid to go in (is it any wonder with all the warning signs up, urging people to stay out of the water), but we saw a guy swimming earlier so Jimmie went right in, with me following (those big black, round rocks are soooooo painful on the feet) and soon all these people were following us in and frolicking about in the waves having so much fun. Everyone was very social. It was like a big party. We swam out pretty far, in the rough, choppy surf, to see if there was any good snorkeling, but we didn't see anything, so we just went in closer to the beach and played in the surf with all the others.
It was so funny because we were talking to this one guy that was having
Shark's Cove
View under the water the best time in Hawaii. He wanted to stay. Jimmie asked him where he was from and he said New Jersey, so then the conversation turned to see if they had any common aquaintances and it turned out that he was at Jimmie's niece's wedding earlier that week (and we didn't even recognize each other). He was one of Jimmie's niece's friends. We went to a wedding with him on Oahu and ended up swimming with him on Maui. Small world.
It poured rain while we slept to the sound of crashing waves. We managed to stay totally dry and comfy. Then the next day, our last on Maui, we drove down below Kihei to find a good snorkeling spot. This guy, Blake, who we met while we were camping at Haleakala, told us about a place called Ulua/Mokapu Beach. When we got there, we lucked out and got some chairs from the Renaissance Wailea Beach Resort and found some of the best snorkeling yet (my camera ran out of juice right after we arrived). We stayed all day (Jimmie got really burned) and we took outside showers with some Dr. Bonner's soap that we bought at a health
Shark's Cove
North Shore, Oahu. Jimmie faking out the fish by snapping his fingers...they think they may be fed food store in the little hoeli hippie town of Pa'ia, then we got dressed, went back to Pa'ia, split a riduculously overpriced plate lunch at the Fishmarket restaurant. After eating we went to the airport to catch our plane back to Honolulu.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.271s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 21; qc: 107; dbt: 0.1483s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.3mb
Tiki
non-member comment
You photos of Hawaii are absolutely beautiful! I've read some of your blogs and they are so in intriguing. Your stories and photos have allowed me to appreciate all the things I forget about and or take for granted since I am a Hawaii home grown girl! Thank you for sharing them with us! Tiki ;)