Weren't we supposed to rest?

So when Kristen and I first talked about Maui, the assumption was that I was going to be delirious from travel, and need to rest. It wasn't entirely that way. I was extremely tired, probably more than I knew at the time. But from 2 months of straight travel, I was used to operating on this exhaustion. And there was SO much to do on Maui!

The first day was a little more relaxing. We decided to check out the beaches on the South-Western side of the East half of the island. Unbeknownst to us, these beaches were actually mostly made from former lava fields. They made for some really cool rocks, cliffs, and blow holes. (Holes made by waves, the result being waves that shoot up 10 feet in the air through them.) The waves that day were particularly heavy, and the lifeguards were warning tourists not to go into the water because of it. Mostly we hiked and took pictures, followed by some much needed sleeping on a beach. That night we went to Bubba Gump Shrimp. It felt very American. I felt like I was home.

The next day was the road to Hana, a trip we were really looking forward to. We had to wake up really early for this one to beat the crowds. Hana is the only town on the far Eastern side of the island, and it is tiny. The reason for this is probably because the road to get there is even smaller. It twists and winds against the cliffs of the volcano, passing by waterfall after beautiful waterfall. We must have stopped 20 times on the way to Hana, but each time it was worth it.

At one point we decided we wanted to get up close to a waterfall no one else was going to. So we climbed up a cliff, over a shack (which may or may not have been there to prevent this sort of thing, up a river bed, and through the jungle... but we still couldn't make it. We came to a cliff we couldn't climb. I still jumped in a pool though, which was absolutely freezing. After that we stopped at a park with black sand beaches, and old lava tube caves. We went swimming in the caves, in some of the cleanest water I've ever seen. You could swim down and under to even deeper caves really easily. It was so cool.

Finally we came to the "end" of the road to Hana, at the 7 Sacred Pools. It's a National Park where waterfalls create 7 pools all of which can be swam in. We swam in one a little higher than the crowds and basically had the place to ourselves, minus the suicidal people who were jumped from the 30-50 foot falls and bridges. They survived, but they are still insane.

At this point, the crowds started to show up, so we started heading back the other way down the road to Hana. It's about 3 hours one way if you're ahead of the crowds, not including stops for banana bread (we got it fresh out of the oven and couldn't stop ourselves from shoveling down a whole loaf between us). That night we took it easy, and had dinner at a local place. Because the next morning we had to wake up at 3AM to go see the sunrise at the National Park.... worth it!