After a morning of snorkeling (only two turtles today, but one big octopus) we had an afternoon of Thanksgiving hula on the lawn of the condo.
The kids had a good time
Took some family portraits:
And enjoyed our own take on Hawaiian Thanksgiving with pulled pork, mashed yams with coconut, seared sesame crusted ahi tuna w/wasabi, Hawaiian Poke, pineapple and passion fruit salsa, and of course a little roasted turkey, at sunset…
Mmm…plate lunch. It is a quintessential Hawaiian experience. The day before we had passed a plate lunch truck and we vowed to go back to there the next day for lunch. We made good on that promise. Plate lunch is a Hawaiian tradition of generally a main dish combined with white rice and macaroni (mayonnaise) salad and sometimes green salad as well.
My best memory of plate lunch was on the North Shore of Oahu a few years ago when we passed a permanent shrimp truck and bought a plate of garlic shrimp. It was incredible. However, In Kihei we found Kina’ole Grill which proved equally as good in their airbrushed truck of deliciousness.
Kina’ole food truck
Kina’ole Food Truck
Right sized menu
I ordered the Pulled Pork w/guava BBQ sauce and then added sriracha to the plate. It was so juicy and delicious I ate it faster than I could take a photo of it.
Tamra got the seared ahi w/wasabi cream which proved so delicious nobody got a bite.
Everybody else got the coconut shrimp (real coconut and made to order) – which I can attest to was incredible. It was a good 15 minutes of waiting for the order to be hand prepared. Yum! Outstanding!
Coconut shrimp plate lunch
No way am I sharing with you!
If you make it to Hawaii don’t hesitate to hit up a food truck or a Mom & Pop plate lunch shop. You won’t regret it.
Kina’ole Food Truck
Tuesday started with a great Daddy/Daughter snorkeling adventure. Seven turtles in 20 minutes of snorkeling right in front of the condo! It was awesome.
We decided to venture out from the confines of Kihei to visit Paia for lunch followed by surfers and a pursuit of waterfalls on the Road to Hana.
We had a good meal of fish tacos in the hippie com surfer town and then headed to Ho’okipa to watch world class surfers, wind surfers, and kite surfers, as well as turtles that you can see in the surf from the cliff’s above.
Ho‘okipa surfer
Tawny and Clara @Ho‘okipa
Ho‘okipa kite surfers
Ho‘okipa kite surfers
Ho‘okipa surfer
Ho‘okipa surfer
We had heard that if we continued on the Hana Highway (I’ve driven this road several times before) that we’d come to a road side parking area where we could hike to a waterfall and swim. I remember being there a few times as a kid and perhaps again as a 20-something. But it proved to be farther along the 68-mile windy and narrow road that makes up the Hana “Highway”. At mile marker 9.5 we pulled to the side of the road thinking this was the spot. But as we got out of the car we saw a sign that read “No waterfall access”. Dejected we headed back to the car…
But in the turn out there was a “coconut cowboy” (as he’d describe himself) who was selling coconuts and other fruits of the land from the back of his pickup truck (covered with animal hides) while his girlfriend was preparing a meal with a camp stove on the tailgate. It was only us (my family, my sister and her kids, and a Japanese couple) engaged in getting a coconut from the “cowboy”. Another car pulled up (a mustang) and another family stepped out of the car and came to see what was going on. I looked at the woman and thought “I know her”. But from where? Wait! I know! “You work at Salesforce.com don’t you?”. “Yes” she said. I pulled off my sun glasses and hat (to show my bald head) but I didn’t have my goatee (I’d shaved it so my snorkel mask would stop leaking). “I was in San Francisco 2 weeks ago today and we had drinks and tapas together at Michael Mina’s R74!” I had been in San Francisco visiting Salesforce.com to do a dry run of my Dreamforce presentation. Afterwards we had gone out for drinks where my Salesforce.com host ran into a few colleagues who invited us to join them. I spent an hour talking to this woman (a French Canadian transplant to San Francisco). It was very small world.
Suzanne (the SFDC Account Executive) left and we engaged the Coconut Cowboy for our coconuts.
This guy was great. What a nice guy. You can find him on Facebook at Coconut Cowboy on Maui. He spent a lot of time with us (no cost, only donations) opening a few coconuts so we could drink the nearly 1L of coconut milk.
Coconut Cowboy explaining the coconut
The kids loved the coconut juice – and it had the extra benefit of keeping them regular!
Yarrow with her coconut
Yarrow drinking coconut water
He also showed us a jackfruit. Apparently it was the original flavor of Juicyfruit gum.
Heath w/Jackfruit
After the milk was all consumed he split the young green coconuts in two (after making a spoon from the husk) and you then ate the “jelly” from the coconut before “bowling” the husk into the bushes.
Coconut Cowboy Tailgate (and kitchen)
Cutting “spoon” from husk
Spooning the jelly
Coconuts for kiddos
Bowling with coconuts
It was a great time with the Coconut Cowboys. We learned a lot about coconuts, jackfruit, bamboo (he made us bamboo whistles), and the history of the Hana Highway. A wealth of information and fun with the kids.
We returned to Kihei just in time for another spectacular sunset…
Cody and I went snorkeling on Monday and got up close and personal with six turtles.
Swimming turtle
Little guy
One in particular was eating algae off the cliff wall we were snorkeling around and the waves pushed me right into him. I apologized, but not until I snapped a few paparazzi. Sorry Dude!
Turtle eating algae
Turtle eating algae
Today’s adventure? A trip to the shave ice shack across the road from the condo. We (and the kids!) love shave ice. That right! It is called shave ice not shaved ice. Only a haole (which has an interesting etymology) would call it shaved ice and only a fool would equate it with a sno-cone (ick).
S&Q’s Shave Ice Shack
S&Q’s Shave Ice Shack
Shave ice, although it originated in Japan, is a long standing Hawaiian tradition. In Hawaii, if you order it correctly it has 3 layers:
Choose 2 Flavors
Everybody got something different, but equally delicious.
Heath putting in his order.
Cody with gummy worms on bottom and POG & Shark’s Blood on top.
Gummy worms on bottom and Shark’s Blood and Pina Colada w/Haupia on top.
Tawny w/Ice Cream bottom and POG & Lilikoi (passion fruit) w/Haupia on top
I put adzuki beans on the bottom of mine!
Marc’s with Coconut and Lihingmui w/Haupia
Yarrow’s Cotton Candy with gummy bears on the bottom
Heath w/mochi on bottom and blue raspberry on top
Tamra and Heath
The Kids! All sugared up!
I come back from snorkeling and I’m waiting at the shower to rinse the salt water me and sand off my feet, but somebody else is using the shower. I’m thinking to myself, “This person is unusual.” I make a few mental notes, rinse when its my turn, and walk over to Tawny who’d been watching me. “Don’t you think that’s Brigitte Nielsen?”. Without hesitation I said “Totally! I thought she looked familiar”. I didn’t follow her career but I did watch the train wreck that was her stint on celebrity rehab. Unfortunately she wasn’t with Flavor Flav.
We sat as near her as we could and read up about her on wikipedia, IMDB, and other reputable sources such as TMZ and National Enquirer online to deduce if it really is her. We are 98% sure it is. You be the judge from my incredible crappy attempt at being a clandestine paparazzi.
Brigitte Nielsen?
Brigitte Nielsen?
What do you think?
Sunday morning I headed out by 6:30am to reserve chairs on the lawn – launchpad for our snorkeling adventure. Yesterday Cody and I had seen two turtles swim right by us. But today I was bringing the under water camera and bringing Clara and Tawny along as witnesses.
Tawny and Clara Snorkeling
Cody and Clara Snorkeling
After fresh papaya and toasted Hawaiian sweet bread we headed into the calm morning waters to snorkel before the trade winds set in. It wasn’t 5 minutes in before we saw our first turtle. A baby. So cute! Only perhaps a foot or two long. Following it was perhaps the largest male turtle I’ve ever seen! It was enormous. Whereas we had swam up to the little turtle we swam away from Papa and Big Mamma – both several feet across and possibly 4-5 feet long (meaning possibly up to 80 years old!). All told we saw at least 4 babies and 3-4 adult turtles today.
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Green Sea Turtle
Cody and Tawny headed in earlier but Clara and I stayed out a bit longer. On our way back we saw a sting ray. In all my years snorkeling in Hawaii I’ve never seen one. I’ve seen them in the Caribbean and in Tahiti, but never in Hawaii.
Sting Ray
Sting Ray
By 9:30 am we’d already peaked our day….or so we thought…
Why Maui? Because we wanted to relax and not run from one adventure to another. I told my mother, “We’ve driven the road to Hana, we’ve seen the sunrise from Haleakala, we’ve snorkeled Molokini Crater, we’ve seen the humpback whales, done a few luaus; we’ve done it all. We don’t need to do any of those things. Let’s go to Maui because we need only relax in paradise.”
Saturday was a busy morning of rising early and sending runners down to the lawn to mark out our territory reserve our lawn chairs. Once we staked our claim for the day we dined on fresh papaya with lime and toasted guava sweet bread with guava jam.
Morning View from room 704
By 9am Cody and I had snorkeled and seen two green sea turtles. Later in the day Clara and Cody would be boogie boarding and had another sea turtle surface right next to them. Day 1 mission accomplished.
Cody Boogie Boarding
Boogie Boarding
Our day consisted of being as lazy as possible and enjoying as much sun and books as we could stand to read. An exciting moment when Tawny went to write “Hi Laure and Seth” in the sand so they could log onto the local webcam and see our her message to them.
Tawny and her version of “sandskrit”
Niece Yarrow and nephew Heath had a great time swimming in the pool and running on the lawn.
Yarrow in the pool
Yarrow
Heathie
Yarrow
We were visited by a bibulous ibis (I think)…
Bubulcus ibis
And took some great family photos…
Clara at the beach
Sister Tam and her kiddos
Celebrating 70 years!
Clara and Cody
Cody
Cody sporting his new Hawaiian shirt
And of course enjoyed another perfect Hawaiian sunset.
Clara Sunset
Clara Sunset
Maui Sunset
Maui Sunset
Maui Sunset
Maui Sunset Afterglow
Maui Sunset Afterglow
Sunset over Pacific
I can’t promise that I won’t be posting more sunsets tomorrow…
Maui Sunset
My mother just turned 70. For her birthday she wanted to take her kids and grandkids to Disneyland. I look forward to the day when I’m old enough to throw my own birthday party. Its my party and I’ll have it in Disneyland if I want to. Except I put the kibosh on Disneyland. Don’t get me wrong, I love Disneyland! But my memories of Disneyland were fresh. I could just see my mother trying to get around (post knee surgery) as I did post Achilles tear. You can read about it on Cult of Achilles.
“I want to spend my birthday with my grandkids. But I don’t want to babysit them, so you are coming along too.” Fair enough. But, “Mom, if you want to spend time with your grandkids don’t go to Disneyland. Tamra’s kids are young and would be on the kiddie rides while Clara will be all about Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. We’ll never see each other. Why not go to Maui instead?”
Nearly a year later here we are. Maui. I love this Maui. Its like a second home for me. I’ve been coming here since the 80s when my father used to sail the Victoria to Maui race. I had my first job (as a janitor) on Maui when I was sixteen. I’m not sure how many times I’ve been to the Hawaiian islands but it has to be ~20+.
I’ve been to several islands. Kauai, Oahu, Hawaii, Lani, and of course, Maui. But there is one particular place on Maui (it will remain undisclosed so I don’t have to compete for space here) that we always want to come back to. “Mom, how about we go to….you know where…”.
And here we are – Maui – for Thanksgiving, although my mother’s birthday was in September, September was too close to my sabbatical and so we pushed it out to the holiday season.
As such, I’ve decided to revive my sabbatical blog and repurpose it for ongoing travel adventures. As I’m currently writing this with a Western exposure on Maui, I apologize now for the inordinate number of sunset pictures you’ll soon be viewing…
We flew into Maui on the afternoon of the 22nd, the day after my own birthday. We hit the store before our condo, made dinner and mai tais and watched the sun set. A pretty good way to end to day number one.
Sabbatikos 
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