Honeymoon Part 1: Maui

After taking the last year and a half to prepare for the wedding, it's weird to be back to normal life without anything to plan.  Everything came off as close to perfectly as possible and the honeymoon was exactly the relaxing time we needed.  We started off with a weekend road trip to Portland with a few friends who were in town for the wedding.  To sum that up:  we ate a lot of food(surprise!), visited the Tillamook factory, and took a drive up the coast.

Next, Jeff and I were off to Hawaii for a week and a half.  We started out the trip with 4 nights in Maui followed by 5 nights in Oahu.  It was an amazing trip, to say the least.

Day 1:

We pulled out all the stops for this trip, so we started out with a direct flight in first class to Maui.  This is important because it's where I discovered the magic that is POG(passion/orange/guava) juice.  They offered me a POG mimosa before the plane even left the ground and I knew it was going to be a good flight.  I had a surprisingly tasty meal and a ton more regular POG juice before we landed in Maui.  It was pretty dark on the ground and the roads seemed odd since the speed limit didn't go above 45.  We checked into our hotel, Andaz, in Wailea and zonked out.

Day 2:

The next morning we woke up to this:

I couldn't believe how beautiful the views were.  We explored the hotel a bit and knew we had chosen the perfect spot for us.  There were several pools, a beach, and lots of activities all with a relaxed atmosphere.  It was like staying in paradise.

We headed down to the restaurant inside called Ka'ana Kitchen and had the breakfast buffet on the patio and it was amazing.  They had everything from normal breakfast fare to fried rice and a juice bar!  I loved that the buffet was served in a kitchen that wasn't much different from a large home's kitchen and the chefs would talk to you.  We stuffed ourselves silly before heading down to the beach.  Over the course of the day we did a lot of walking, swimming, and planning for our adventures(yay concierge!).

We attended our first activity that evening:  a luau called the Feast at Lele.  The view was beautiful, the food was delicious, the drinks were flowing, and the dancers did a fantastic job.

Our first day in Maui was a huge success.

Day 3:

We headed out to grab some donuts on a stick from T Komoda Store & Bakery.  It was a tiny shop, but the donuts were better than our Seattle area favorites.  Next, we headed over to Surfing Goat Dairy where we got to meet all kinds of goats(and a few dogs) and see the dairy's set up.  We also sampled some cheese.  Finally it was lunch time, so we made a quick stop at Ruby's Diner(a chain Jeff and I loved that pulled out of WA state).

Our big adventure of the day was a Blue Hawaiian Helicopter tour.  We had a lovely pilot/guide named Glenda who flew us over west Maui and Molokai and taught us about its history.  The views were stunning and Jeff was able to get some great shots with the "big camera."

For dinner, we checked out Morimoto Maui's tasting menu.  It was very fancy and we really enjoyed our experience.

Day 4:

To start our day, we checked out the Maui Swap Meet.  It's a conglomeration of all kinds of stands selling various goods and food.  We had some great mini donuts made fresh right in front of us and also spent some time talking to a man who sold coconut pets.  All in all, an interesting experience.

Our next stop was Lahaina for our Skyline Eco Adventures ziplining tour!  We chose the Ka'anapali tour with 8 lines.  It was a bumpy and dusty ride up the mountain and I was pretty scared, but the experience was totally worth it.  It felt great to be zipping across screaming at the top of your lungs in such a beautiful place.

Day 5:

We were really bummed to be leaving Maui.  We'd had such a great time and really loved staying at Andaz.  The weather outside was echoing our sadness with overcast skies and rain.  We ate another giant breakfast at Ka'ana Kitchen before heading to the airport for our short flight to Oahu.  Once on the plane, we had more beautiful views.

We touched down in Oahu and it was like a different planet, but more on that later.