Maui

Yes, I know this post has been a long time coming.  There are many more pictures to share with you, but when my friend Dori came all the way up to exchange photos with me, Andy didn't copy any of hers!!  So you just get a brief glimpse for now.

My first day in Maui at the beach.  It was amazing!  I liked the water splashing up on these rocks.  My favorite thing to do at the beach is wander around, inspecting little bits of ocean debris on the shore, like pieces of algae, coral, or shells.  Living in Utah my whole life, these things are so foreign and interesting to me.

Great picture, huh?  I love sitting with my toes in the sand, watching the sun go down. 

We went on a whale watching tour!  I took many pictures, trying to get a great shot, but I finally decided I could waste the whole time taking pictures, or I could just enjoy the moment.  So I chose the latter.  Here you can see a pectoral fin and the spray from another whale.  They're a bunch of males competing for the attention of a female.  Just like high school all over again--different species, same obnoxious
behavior.

There's a good poof.  We got to listen to the whales with an underwater microphone.  They sound a lot like cows to me. 

Another lovely day at the beach.  The temperature is pretty much always in the 70-80 range, year-round.  Hard to believe when we have such extremes here.

This was our little condo vacation rental.  It was so cute and nice--perfect for our needs! 

View of the pool from our balcony. 

This is Spencer's favorite car, so I had to pose like Vanna White with it.

Here's Dori with our rental Jeep.  We did take the top off a couple of times.  The second time we tried it was much quicker.  Later that day, it started pouring rain, so it was a good thing we had practiced putting it back together!

The water is every shade of blue you've ever seen.  It made me want to put blue in every room of my house.

Here's a guy skim-boarding.  It's like surfing but on a much safer level.

We drove up a mountain and found this lavender farm on the way.  The lavender wasn't in bloom, of course, but it was still beautiful.  I ate my first veggie burger there.  I can feel the heartburn just thinking about it.

This is the top of the mountain, an inactive volcano.  It's significantly colder up there and hardly anything grows.  The ground is made of chunks of lava rock.  We saw a few people biking up.  Crazy fools. 

We were above the clouds!

Back at sea level, I saw this rainbow.  I've rarely seen the complete arch like this.  Hawaii--it's the rainbow state!

This is how I looked after I tried to be brave and get in the water.  I was about waist-deep when a big wave came and knocked me off my feet.  It was a couple of days before I stopped finding sand in my hair.

We took a couple of little hikes.  These trees are super tall and many of them were covered with philodendron.  I have a "Phil" in my laundry room.  I acquired him about the time I met Dori in college.  In the last 17 years, he has never looked like the philodendron in Hawaii.  I had no idea he had such potential!

We stopped at this cute little food stand and ate crepes. 

Here I am posing with the sand castle I built.  I've learned I'm not much of an architect.