Whales and more whales....

As you may know, one of my main goals for this trip (other than fun in the sun, ocean, and black sand beaches  AND time with Gary and his mom) was to see humpback whales in the wild.  Sunday evening we headed out on a smaller boat to enjoy "sunset and whale watching".  Of course they don't promise you see whales but we went in the middle of the birthing and mating season off the coast of Maui.  So we did see whales, mostly spouts and tails, and it was amazing.  It wasn't quite like National Geographic specials where they seem so close, but to see spouts of air even was great.  We saw some large ones jump, baby ones break the surface of the water over and over, and one highlight was a large whale tail slapping over 20 times in a row (usually part of mating behavior).  I loved it and rather than feeling like I can cross it off my list of "Just for Fun Mortal Goals"  (now referred to as my bucket list by most of the world) I want to add other whale watching adventures in my life.  Alaska will probably be next.

We also had whales all around the cruise ship as we cruise the Na Poli Coast off of Kauai.  Again a fun site even though they were quite a distance from the boat except occasionally when one surfaces nearby.  The Na Poli coast can only be seen by boat and it is a beautiful collection of waterfalls and cliffs of all colors--black, orange, reds--and green anywhere something can grow.  The pictures don't really do it justice.  If you can notice most of the people are looking away from the coast into the ocean.  That is because they were trying to catch pictures.  All I got were pictures of the ocean where a whale had been.  Oh well.  We saw some great scenes.

Wouldn't be Hawaii without the palm trees.
I took a lot of pictures of them.

Kauai was my favorite island and I love love to go back and spend a week there.  There is a lot to do and some nice beaches and ocean.  These are scenes from Kauai.

Gary and his mom (he is in the center of the overlook)
taking pictures of the canyon.

Grand Canyon of Hawaii.
It is about 10 miles long and very deep.
It actually took my breath away when I first saw it.
None of my pictures show the grandeur of it.
I was expecting just the red canyons and the greens
were amazing.  You need to see it.

Lookout to the ocean and sky--breathtaking!

For some reason the caption feature is flipping my pictures around.  However the chicken picture is because there are chickens everywhere in Kauai due to the hurricane a number of years ago that blew over all of the island's chicken coops.  There are no predators so they are spreading everywhere.

The next picture is from the Fern Ghetto where many people go to get married in Kauai.

Google Car
Interesting side note--Google was actually mapping this area while we visited. 
We got to speak to the two men who were working and learned about about how they do google maps. 
In about 9-12 months, if someone zoomed in on this part of the map, we could be seen walking the paths by the lookout.  How many people can say that? (And this is actually at the canyon lookout but the site bounced it down and it won't move back.)

This one made the Cruise Lady CD.
She kept trying to get a kiss picture from us.
Again we were some of the only ones getting our feet wet here.



And the ocean.....

We headed back pass the Na Poli coast of Kauai and headed to Honolulu by Saturday morning.  It was a restful but busy trip and it was hard to believe that it was over and time for the next adventure...

Our Cruise

So we were cruising with an LDS group of about 32 people organized under a company called "Cruise Lady".  We have traveled with them before although this was by far the smallest group we have been with.  Traveling with this group adds some LDS flavor to the cruise including visits and historical information about LDS people in Hawaii, the first LDS Chapel built in Hawaii, and the Kona Temple.  The other thing they do is provide a headliner who speaks at special meetings when you are at sea.  This time it was Michael Ballam who is a opera singer and director of the Utah Theater Opera in Logan, Utah.  He performed three concerts for us and talked about musical theater and other topics as he performed.  He was awesome.

We took over 600 pictures plus "Cruise Lady" took another 1000+ so I can't possibly even begin to share them all (hey, I can see the relief on your faces...at least pretend you want to see them all!)  I will share some of my favorites and in the process tell a bit about what we did.

As a framework, we got on board the ship Saturday night in Honolulu and disembarked on the following Saturday morning in Honolulu.  In the middle we spent 2 days at Maui, two days on the Big Island, and two days on Kauia.  We saw volcanos, palm trees, beaches, plants and flowers, waves, and lava.  We rode on buses, hiked, took a few small boats, and took walks on the beach.  Gary and I managed a few minutes of snorkling and saw a great variety of fish in a short amount of time.

Haleakala Volcano--inside
Maui
It was very cold up here.

Then the fog moved in to cover the volcano and the road as we traveled down

First LDS Church in Hawaii

Hawaii greenery

Rainy morning on the Black sand beaches--
but walking in the black sand was on my bucket list so
Gary and I took our shoes off and enjoyed the sand despite the rain.

A venting volcano on the Big Island

Our group in front of the Kona Temple
It has a beautiful view to the ocean.

End of the first section..........................more later!!!!

Feb. 17-18th

We left snowy and cold Hawaii on Friday....on separate flights.  Gary and his mom flew on a Delta direct flight from Salt Lake to Honolulu.  However, since I was flying on to Hong Kong later, it was much cheaper (like $2000 cheaper) to fly a different airline which had no direct flights.  I left at 6:00 a.m. on Friday and met them at the airport around 5 in the afternoon in Honolulu.  They enjoyed free movies and games on their flight.

The weather was gorgeous in Honolulu Friday evening and for most of our trip except for some rain now and then and one very cold and rainy day while we were on the Big Island.

Saturday we got up early and headed off to visit Pearl Harbor and the famous military cemetery at Punchbowl.  These were the two main places that we didn't visit on our prior trip to Hawaii about 25 years ago.  They were both very touching places.  It is humbling to stand in places that honor people who died in defending our country during a very difficult part of the world's history.

Punchbowl Cemetery

View at the top

The cemetery is built inside a volcanic crater

Lists of names of those buried here or honored for their deaths during the many battles in the Pacific during World War II

Looking down the stairs

The three of us walking down the middle

Gary found a grave stone (in the grass to our right) for an LDS serviceman--

depicted by the Angel Moroni on it.

Pearl Harbor

Part of a display at the entrance to Pearl Harbor--very sobering reminders.

A rusted piece of the US Arizona where it was left after being attached and sunk.  It hit the harbor floor so hard that it sunk in to the ocean floor itself.

A close-up of the list of men who were buried when the Arizona was sunk.

To the side is a list of men who survived the attack on Pearl Harbor but whom elected to be buried here when they died.  The most recent one was last year.

The Monument over the sunken Arizona

We made some other fast stops around the city and then headed on to our boat to get settled in, enjoy a dinner and relaxation.

Hawaii Feb. 2012

I flipped through some of our pictures and really have no idea how to pick and choose to put together some posts about our great trip.  It was so nice to be with Gary and his mom and to enjoy the beautiful things we did and saw on our trip.  People have commented that they can't wait to read our blog to learn about our trip so I am going to write it to them.  The rest of you can just skip our trip posts.  It just depends on how many pictures of ocean and palm trees you would like to see.  (The odd thing is that these posts will appear in somewhat in backwards order as I do it day by day.

I will be honest.  I was nervous about leaving Ben and Jena for so long.  Since Ben has been sick, Gary and I have only let for a couple of times over night and then one three night trip to San Fransisco last year.  Also, on a cruise, it is much more difficult to be contacted and make it home if needed.  I am so grateful for Scott and Chantel, Jessica, and Tosha for their help as we were gone.  It was a bit of a crazy schedule.  Ben was the main one who took care of Jena after school and made her dinner each night.  He did a good job as well.  I think we feel that we can now go away yearly like we used to do.

Enjoy----------