Thursday, February 1, 2024

Hawaii Day 7: Iao Needle, Maui Brew Co., and lots of time in the Airport

Sunday morning, travel day. We woke up got a run in before we packed up and checked out of the condo. 


Run day 2! 


We had a FULL day to kill since our flight didn't leave til 10PM, yes PM! We had to be out of the condo at 9 or 10, then we had planned to go to the aquarium... but when we realized the cost it just wasn't worth it to us.  We went back to that whale watching spot to fly my drone in an attempt to capture a whale from above. Spoiler alert no whale capture, but we did SEE a lot of whales and even closish, just nothing via drone. 





We are there at that parking lot pull off spot. 





So instead of the aquarium, we pulled out Thomas's 'Goodnight Maui' book for ideas and read about the State monument: Iao Valley State Monument (pronounced ee-yow like you burnt yourself) 





We hiked up the many steps.... realizing we were at the top when we were expecting to only be halfway... so a little disappointing, haha. Didn't take us long and we still had a whole day to fill. 





We hiked down to the river. 






Then hiked over to the garden. 





Next up was lunchtime. We'd seen a bunch of people in Maui Brew Co. attire so we decided to go there. It was a 30 minutes drive back over by where out condo was but what else were we going to do? :-) 


We had lunch then decided to go find the beach called Jaws. We thought it was the big wave place we went with the Hana tour guide, so we started there. CHICKENS: 




Got to see all the sea turtles again and a Hawaiian monk seal! 


We figured out where the real jaws was. It's not called jaws because of sharks it's called jaws because of the big waves. We drove a ways but then discovered the only way to get there was in a 4WD vehicle or to walk a mile. The kids were not up for walking... which stinks cuz Kyle and I wanted to. So we decided to abort mission. We drove back over to the north west and hit a beach in the Waiehu area. 


Played some football catch and the girls found sticks. 




We stayed there as the sun went down. Our flight wasn't until 10pm but we had to return the van at 7PM so we planned to just eat dinner at the airport. 


Made it back to the airport for our long night ahead. Had a meh dinner at an airport restaurant and then just chilled as we waited to board the plane. 


Made the kids sleep as best they could on our flight into Seattle. Thomas got the most sleep. We were all pretty tired during our 3 hour layer over Seattle. Got breakfast and more screen time, then back on the plane for our last leg home. 

 




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