Maui News

So, here's the narrative to go with the photos that I posted yesterday.

The trip started out perfectly. We left the house in the dead of morning, 5:00am. Got to the car park, no problem. Opened the trunk to give suitcases to shuttle dude. OOPS, "where's my green suitcase?!" In my sleepy stupor I made sure I had my coffee mug, the newspaper, the garbage to take to garage but I HAD LEFT MY SUITCASE IN THE DARK LIVING ROOM !!!

Fortunately, I was travelling with Mario Andretti. We hopped back in the car and set out to get it. Trying to plan for contingencies all the way. Traffic was pretty heavy but no back ups (we were way early for our flight) Mario/Gina was able to drive 80+ the whole way, in and out of lanes, zip zip zip.... The intersection at Ravenna and 65th, the light didn't want to turn green so of course she ran it.... (and we worried all week that it was a red light camera intersection and we'd have a little gift in the mail when we got home- it isn't, we didn't) Got the suitcase, 80 mph all the way back. Got to the car park and the same shuttle dude was there. He thought we must live close by, when I said Green Lake, he was totally impressed. We didn't need to worry about exercise that day, the heart rates had been elevated enough. And we still had time to go thru the way long security line, and relax and wait for our flight.

So, we made it just fine to Maui. And our vacation went as it usually does. Here is a typical day's agenda:
6:00am wake up
7:00am running or a spin class
8:00am laps in the pool
9:00am select chaise lounges, drink coffee and read newspapers poolside
10:00am apply sunscreen
11:00am Lupe delivers first Heinekin to me
12:00pm we move to the tables for lunch and crib game
1:00-3:00pm fool around in pool, keep lookout for whales, talk sports with Jerome the bartender
3:00pm move down to beach for an hour of swimming, wave thrashing, people watching
4:00pm to the room for a bit of Rachel Maddow show, shower
5:00pm head to dinner (we actually tried a couple new places, and they are permanently on our list now)
7:00pm try to watch tv
8:00pm zz zzzzz


We did go do a bit of snorkel-less snorkeling. Which is perfect for me. Otherwise I spend the whole time concentrating on my breathing and not the fish. And we saw the big turtles swimming very near us. I think Gina could have touched him. (her?)

On Saturday we broke the routine and we drove to Wailuku to run a 5k race that I had read about. It was a fund raiser for a local HS kid who has cancer. We met the kid, Jarron. He was impressed that we came all the way from Seattle to run in his race. Talked with a couple of the local runners. It was a really nice time. We won a couple raffle gift certificates, which we re-gifted to Lupe and our spinning teacher.

The state of the economy was evident. The hotel was at about 50% occupancy. Which is a real drag for the staff, but nice for those of us staying. That week is usually slow but not that bad.

No rain all week, so it was perfect.
And then we come home to 20 degree weather.

Mahalo for listening to my stuff.