Maui Memories

This will be a quickie as it is already 9pm and we are leaving early tomorrow morning for Idaho. This is one of cool things we did while in Maui. It was a 5 hour snorkeling trip to Molokini which is just a very tiny, horseshoe-shaped, uninhabited island just off the south end of Maui. It's a popular snorkeling spot so we were in the water with a few hundred snorkeling "buddies". Crowds nevertheless it was still really cool. We were in about 30 feet of water and could see all the way to the bottom. Once I got over not wanting to put my face in the water (which really is an issue for me) it was major cool. It is kind of freaky at first realizing that you are breathing under water. There was a lot of different types of tropical fish visible. Not as many as we were expecting but cool enough. It took about an hour to motor out to the island and we snorkeled for an hour or two. Spencer and I work wetsuit tops to help with sunburning issues--the water wasn't that cold of course. Then we took another boat ride to an area called Turtle Town--for the apparent plethera of turtles to be seen. Unfortunately it seems that the turtles are smarter than the tours. As soon as all those bodies hit the waters the turtles head for deep water. We did see one way down at the bottom. As soon as everyone got back in the boat, up pops a turtle about four or five feet from the end of the boat! Smart turtle. It was still really cool. Nobody got sunburned on this outing despite all the fears of sun glinting off the water making it likely.

We rented an underwater camera so we could get some cool pictures. They gave us a CD at the end of the cruise with all the pictures we took (so these are the only pictures we have right now--I haven't had a chance to download our camera yet and won't until we get back from Idaho). These next two underwater ones I took are from Turtle Town. I had finally gotten over that whole stick your head in the water phobia by then so my big thing was to try and get a picture of everyone under water. The first one is of Spencer just floating along on the top. It took a few tries to get it since just when I would get a good one he'd be too close or move the other way. Tucker was the only one who went all the way under however. He was the only one to swim the whole time with out the aid of a flotation device! (I didn't even get in the water without the float belt they had available.) All and all it was a pretty cool experience.

We had a great time in Maui. A cool family vacation which included a trip to the emergency room, a crazy lady and Mentos, sunburns on the last day, boogie boarding, a luau, watching the sun set and lots of relaxation. A trip we will all remember for sure. It's good to be home, even for a day or two. Will document more next time, plus the trip to Idaho!