News, and some Hawaiian fun
Brief update: still living with Zaruba (still good times), and now I've been trained at Ruby Tuesday, so I'll start getting actual tables tomorrow. Pretty cool, huh? I really like the people there that I've met -- everyone seems really nice. And fun. I've had a good time just training, and I think it's going to be a good atmosphere in which to work.
With all that said, without further ado, here is the first installment of my trip to Hawaii. :-)
July 22nd 2006
Looong day. Jack and I had to get up freakishly early to catch our 6:00 flight out of Greensboro and into Dallas. Our flight attendant was a trip -- there was something about her voice that was odd, and Jack actually asked me if I thought she sounded like a vampire, so that's what we decided. Not sure what exactly a vampire sounds like, but that's what she reminded us of. :-P At least we were kept entertained so early in the morning. And that was the short flight... the one from Dallas into Honolulu was nearly eight hours. Gah. They showed movies, but I didn't really watch them. I just read my book and tried to nap -- I wasn't tired yet, except the kind of tired you are when you wake up really early, but because of the time difference we were getting into Hawaii with a whole afternoon and evening ahead of us. So I wanted to be able to last. When we finally got into Honolulu we had to get new boarding passes for Hawaiian airlines... that was an adventure. The flight number we had was different from the one they had, so it took longer than it should have to get it all figured out -- Jack finally found what we needed and I could have kissed him, I was so glad to be done talking to the stupid airline lady. We were both pretty hungry -- the food on the plane was NOT free, and it was super expensive, which neither of us were really okay with considering it was, um, airplane food. That's only worth it if it doesn't cost anything. So I got some Starbucks. Quality meal, let me tell you. ;-)
The plane ride (jump) from Honolulu to Kahului, Maui was really our first introduction to the islands. The plane flew below the clouds almost the whole time and we could see EVERYTHING. It's gorgeous. The water is this unbelievable color blue, and the islands all have rainforest on at least part of them, so the greens are incredible too. The pilot talked about the islands we were flying over as we went, too, so that was neat. Maui county has four islands in it -- you don't think of the Hawaiian islands as having counties, but they do. Go figure. Maui itself is really a cool island -- on one side is the 10,023 foot volcano, Haleakala, which means "House of the Sun," and on the other side are great jagged forested mountains. Connecting those areas in the middle of the island is a long stretch of flat valley that is so close to sea level, some Hawaiians are worried that global warming will cause the entire valley (all the farmland -- bad) to be flooded. But anyway, the view from the air is very impressive.
We arrived in Kahului around the same time as Mimi and Papa, Michael, and the Greenes (Aunt Mary, and cousins Duke, Libby, and Ben). Dad and Claudia were there to meet us at the airport, and Dad had leis for all the girls. It used to be a Hawaiian tradition to meet every boat that arrived with leis for everyone on board, and I think they did it for planes too for awhile, but honestly -- there are almost more tourists than natives now, so there's no real way to continue the tradition. Except if you're my dad. :-) We got in around 3:15, but it took quite a while to reach our condos. We were staying at the Makani Sands in Lahaina, which is across the valley from the airport on the coast around the moutainous region. It should have been an easy drive but traffic on a Saturday afternoon was insane. We moved at a crawl nearly the whole time. Thankfully, the views from the road were fantastic, and after hours and hours on a plane, Jack and Michael and I had a great time talking and joking and laughing, so the car trip seemed like a piece of cake. :-) It's nice when my brothers and I can have a good time.
When we got there, we did a little exploring and discovered that our family pretty much got the best condo. First of all, it's the only one with AC. (!!!) Sucks to be everyone else, I guess. I think we have the prettiest one, too -- they're all decorated, but I really loved the paintings and sculptures in ours. I took pictures of everything. :-) The view from my room was unquestionably the best seat in the house, too. I weaseled my way into the master bedroom! So I had a huge bed, the best shower, and my own balcony facing the ocean. Amazing. The sunset this first night was perfect. We ordered pizza for the whole family and some of the cousins got in the water. There used to be a beach right by the condos, but a storm last January apparently completely wiped it out. So you basically walk down these stone steps straight into the ocean -- no stretch of sand or rock or anything, just ankle deep water. I got my feet wet, but it was kind of cold and I wasn't as brave as some of the younger ones. :-) It was okay, I was perfectly content eating pizza and watching the sun set. Then we had this big family welcome meeting where Dad passed out matching t-shirts to everyone... he'd ordered Carolina blue shirts with "50" printed on the back (for Mimi and Papa's 50th wedding anniversary, the whole reason for the trip) and Maui 2006 on the front. Very cute. Slightly tacky. Ah well.
So yeah, the first day (well, half a day) in Maui was a really good start. Everyone was happy, everything was beautiful, the weather for the week was supposed to be perfect.... yeah. :-) Good times.
More to come soon.....
With all that said, without further ado, here is the first installment of my trip to Hawaii. :-)
July 22nd 2006
Looong day. Jack and I had to get up freakishly early to catch our 6:00 flight out of Greensboro and into Dallas. Our flight attendant was a trip -- there was something about her voice that was odd, and Jack actually asked me if I thought she sounded like a vampire, so that's what we decided. Not sure what exactly a vampire sounds like, but that's what she reminded us of. :-P At least we were kept entertained so early in the morning. And that was the short flight... the one from Dallas into Honolulu was nearly eight hours. Gah. They showed movies, but I didn't really watch them. I just read my book and tried to nap -- I wasn't tired yet, except the kind of tired you are when you wake up really early, but because of the time difference we were getting into Hawaii with a whole afternoon and evening ahead of us. So I wanted to be able to last. When we finally got into Honolulu we had to get new boarding passes for Hawaiian airlines... that was an adventure. The flight number we had was different from the one they had, so it took longer than it should have to get it all figured out -- Jack finally found what we needed and I could have kissed him, I was so glad to be done talking to the stupid airline lady. We were both pretty hungry -- the food on the plane was NOT free, and it was super expensive, which neither of us were really okay with considering it was, um, airplane food. That's only worth it if it doesn't cost anything. So I got some Starbucks. Quality meal, let me tell you. ;-)
The plane ride (jump) from Honolulu to Kahului, Maui was really our first introduction to the islands. The plane flew below the clouds almost the whole time and we could see EVERYTHING. It's gorgeous. The water is this unbelievable color blue, and the islands all have rainforest on at least part of them, so the greens are incredible too. The pilot talked about the islands we were flying over as we went, too, so that was neat. Maui county has four islands in it -- you don't think of the Hawaiian islands as having counties, but they do. Go figure. Maui itself is really a cool island -- on one side is the 10,023 foot volcano, Haleakala, which means "House of the Sun," and on the other side are great jagged forested mountains. Connecting those areas in the middle of the island is a long stretch of flat valley that is so close to sea level, some Hawaiians are worried that global warming will cause the entire valley (all the farmland -- bad) to be flooded. But anyway, the view from the air is very impressive.
We arrived in Kahului around the same time as Mimi and Papa, Michael, and the Greenes (Aunt Mary, and cousins Duke, Libby, and Ben). Dad and Claudia were there to meet us at the airport, and Dad had leis for all the girls. It used to be a Hawaiian tradition to meet every boat that arrived with leis for everyone on board, and I think they did it for planes too for awhile, but honestly -- there are almost more tourists than natives now, so there's no real way to continue the tradition. Except if you're my dad. :-) We got in around 3:15, but it took quite a while to reach our condos. We were staying at the Makani Sands in Lahaina, which is across the valley from the airport on the coast around the moutainous region. It should have been an easy drive but traffic on a Saturday afternoon was insane. We moved at a crawl nearly the whole time. Thankfully, the views from the road were fantastic, and after hours and hours on a plane, Jack and Michael and I had a great time talking and joking and laughing, so the car trip seemed like a piece of cake. :-) It's nice when my brothers and I can have a good time.
When we got there, we did a little exploring and discovered that our family pretty much got the best condo. First of all, it's the only one with AC. (!!!) Sucks to be everyone else, I guess. I think we have the prettiest one, too -- they're all decorated, but I really loved the paintings and sculptures in ours. I took pictures of everything. :-) The view from my room was unquestionably the best seat in the house, too. I weaseled my way into the master bedroom! So I had a huge bed, the best shower, and my own balcony facing the ocean. Amazing. The sunset this first night was perfect. We ordered pizza for the whole family and some of the cousins got in the water. There used to be a beach right by the condos, but a storm last January apparently completely wiped it out. So you basically walk down these stone steps straight into the ocean -- no stretch of sand or rock or anything, just ankle deep water. I got my feet wet, but it was kind of cold and I wasn't as brave as some of the younger ones. :-) It was okay, I was perfectly content eating pizza and watching the sun set. Then we had this big family welcome meeting where Dad passed out matching t-shirts to everyone... he'd ordered Carolina blue shirts with "50" printed on the back (for Mimi and Papa's 50th wedding anniversary, the whole reason for the trip) and Maui 2006 on the front. Very cute. Slightly tacky. Ah well.
So yeah, the first day (well, half a day) in Maui was a really good start. Everyone was happy, everything was beautiful, the weather for the week was supposed to be perfect.... yeah. :-) Good times.
More to come soon.....
posted by Kira at 11:52 AM
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