A Maui Getaway

Not only am I beginning a two week Fall Break from school, but my birthday is on Monday, too! To celebrate we booked a long weekend on Maui to have some relaxing beach time and finally drive the scenic "Road to Hana."

We got on an early morning flight to Maui, picked up our rental car, and headed toward a small Paniolo (cowboy) country town, Makawao. We got some coffee and stopped in at the cute little shops. We even picked up a couple of hats for baby! We stayed until lunch time and ate at a great little Mexican restaurant that had their own specialty vegetarian meat. We shared a delicious burrito. After lunch we were off to the lavender farm.

The Paniolo community is still strong in Makawao.

The drive to the lavender farm was gorgeous (as is most of the drive around Maui). The lavender wasn't blooming like we hoped, but it was still a beautiful walk through the farm.

View of the valley from the lavender farm.

Will putting a coin on Buddha.

Crazy avocado tree.

Will loves trees and taking pictures of them.

Hanging out with the chickens.

Intercropping with hydrangeas. They are all over on the slopes of Haleakala and are so beautiful and vibrant.

After an enjoyable visit to the lavender farm we continued driving up the mountain to reach the summit of Haleakala, a volcano that forms more than 75% of Maui. The elevation at the summit is 10,000 feet. We came to realize over the next couple of days that the mountain is very clear in the morning and quickly becomes cloudy as the day goes on. Since we drove up in the afternoon the visibility was minimal, but there was something mystical about driving through the clouds as the elevation got higher and higher.

The research centers atop the summit.

It is very Mars-like up here!

Volcano chickens! They were everywhere up here.

The bird's proper name is the Chukar.

A map of the trail we'd like to hike and camp along someday!

We drove back down the mountain and headed toward Kihei, a beach town along the South side of Maui. We stopped at the grocery store, checked into our condo, caught sunset at the beach, and went out for dinner at Monkeypod Kitchen. It was a great first day of our trip!