Maui - Part 1

We started off our trip by leaving a day early and staying the night at the Worldmark resort in Las Vegas.  We did this at the end of our trip, too, and I think it really saved our sanity to not have to tack on an extra 2-hour drive after flying all day.  Santana was on our flights from Vegas to San Francisco, and from San Francisco to Maui.  I had no idea who it was, but could tell he was famous first because of his appearance, and second because everyone was asking to take a picture with him or for an autograph.  I kept taking pictures of my family and then sliding the camera over to include him (I know, talk about sly!), but I was taking them with my phone and it was a casualty of our last day on the beach.  So all my awesome pictures in baggage claim and the terminal in California, gone.  Luckily, I must have grabbed the camera from Adam for a minute in Vegas, so I have these:


Proof that I didn't just pull it off the Internet. 



A little closer up and less blurry. 

You see the lady travelling with him?  She stopped on her way back from the lavatory to tell me what a beautiful family I have.  As we were approaching Maui, a flight attendant came by showing off his autograph, and that's when I learned who the famous guy was. 

Here are some shots of my world-traveling family.



We arranged to have my someone present my parents with leis as we arrived on Maui.  Do we look hot?  'Cause the humidity hit us like a wall! 


You know all that rain that dumped on us here in Southern Utah (and in California, and elsewhere?).  Well, it started in Hawaii, and we caught a day of it our first day on Maui.  It really made us nervous that the rest of our trip would be rainy, but it only lasted that first day and it kind of forced us to take that day to recover from the long flight the day before.  That first day we ate at my favorite restaurant of the trip, the Five Palms.  It was a really nice fine dining restaurant in one of the hotels in Kihei.  It was really beautiful and peaceful, and they had the giant windows open, so we could listen to the waves rolling in and look out on the beach. 



No, you're not wrong, Max really did get more food than I did! (That's okay, he shared!)



When the kids got restless, we took them down to the private beach of the hotel. 


The second day of our trip, Adam took the big kids kayaking and snorkeling while I took the littles to the beach.  They said there were so many turtles, and they got so close!  Here are some shots from their kayaking trip, and from Anne and Jer's kayaking trip our last day on Maui:




Click on this one so you can see this turtle's face--so cool!



Yellow bikini woman will forever be remembered because she got in between Jer and the turtle in this shot that shows how close the turtles were. 

Throughout the trip, we spent a lot of time at the beach.  If I remember correctly, I think we went to the beach every day but two of our 8 days on Maui.  This slide show has some of my favorite of the beach shots. 

To Be Continued...