Archive for the 'Hawaii' Category

This will be a long entry! Instead of dragging out my trip to two more entries, I’m fitting the last four days into one entry.

Day 5 – 11/11

We started the morning with snorkeling and decided to hit up three spots before lunch. The first and third weren’t that great, which were Makena Landing and Polo Beach. They didn’t have many interesting things to see, and the visibility in the water was a bit low.

However, the second stop was Ahihi Kinau Natural Area Reserve, and it was amazing. It was hard to get into the water since the beach was rocky, but once you’re in, it’s an easy swim with very clear water. There were sooo many fish here! There were even types of fish I had not seen in the other snorkel locations, especially the really big ones. This spot is a definite recommend!

After lunch, we took it easy. We did a short drive to Olowalu and back, stopping by a scenic overlook and the Kealia Boardwalk. At the boardwalk, I was able to take some nice photos of Central Maui 🙂

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I wanted to cover 2-3 days every entry, but on day 4 (11/10), we did Road to Hana! We stopped by enough places that it deserved its own entry.

Our plans for day 4 were a bit more ambitious than we expected. Prior to our vacation, I looked up places to photograph in Maui and came across Iao Valley. It looked beautiful, so we started there in the morning.

It was beautiful indeed! It was also kind of misleading as I thought it was a hiking spot, but the path was paved and very short. After we went up to the lookout area, we came across this sign:

Yep. Phallic stone. Now I cannot unsee… well, uh, yeah.

So after that short stop, we started on the Road to Hana. In hindsight, we probably should have dedicated more time to it. The road is winding, and in some places, only narrow enough for one car, so it’s a very slow drive. It takes close to 2 hours to drive from Paia to Hana, and you also want to leave enough time to drive back before the sun sets.

However, the point of the Road to Hana isn’t actually to get to Hana. That’s just what the road leads to, and most recommend going past Hana. All of the stops along the way are actually why people make the journey, and it’s why it ends up taking many hours. There’s amazing views, waterfalls, and parks all along the way.

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Alright, I edited enough photos to do the first entry! Out of… two or three maybe? I’ll be splitting my Maui trip up, so it’s not terribly long each time 🙂

Day 1 – 11/7

The start of our trip was actually not in Maui. Since we have to fly out from the west coast, we decided to spend a day in San Francisco to see two close friends and also two of my cousins. We arrived in the morning and met up with our friends for lunch before heading to Muir Woods, which is known for redwood trees. Though there were many people near the entrance, we found a longer and less traveled route that let us walk through the park in peace.

Afterwards, we stopped by Marin Headlands on the way back and saw that there was a beautiful, clear view of the Golden Gate Bridge at sunset.

Then we met with my cousins and their girlfriends for dinner! Two of my cousins moved to San Francisco just this year from New York for work. One of them has been a close friend growing up, and it was so great to see him and catch up 😀

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