![\"maui\"](\"http:\/\/www.maryd.info\/travelblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/09\/maui-150x150.jpg\" "\\"maui\\"")
It is 6:15am on our first full day in Maui \u2013 I tried to convince my body to sleep longer, but it thinks it is 9:15 and wants to get up. So here I am. But it’s very lovely, sitting here listening to the birds, while everyone else is asleep (Lis is still gamely trying to sleep, I hope successfully). There are lots of birds and beautiful tropical flowers on and around the lanai, which is where I’m writing this \u2013 a very excellent start to the day.<\/p>\n
Yesterday we got up early to get to the airport for our 9:45am flight. We were (uncharacteristically) already almost completely ready to go \u2013 just had to shower and change the sheets and kiss the kitties goodbye and we were on our way \u2013 ON TIME (or pretty close). Lis had a master plan of food and entertainment for the 5 plus hour flight \u2013 she had rented a DigE player<\/a> from AlaskaAir, and determined where we should get food for the plane (Big Town Hero<\/a>) \u2013 so the flight went quite well (though the huge 8″ sandwiches that we got, which we thought would be enough for a meal and a snack, turned out to be mostly bread, and the bread turned out to be mostly air \u2013 so we each ate our entire sandwiches and then had to buy one of the airline’s snack packages. Ah well \u2013 best laid plans and all\u2026)<\/p>\n We watched Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian<\/a><\/em>, and I LOVED IT!! LOVED IT!! It was such high silliness, from start to finish \u2013 and I am a girl who is a sucker for nonsensical silliness. I had read reviews that said it was a so-so movie but you should see it for Amy Adams<\/a>, who steals the show as Amelia Earhart<\/a>, and while I loved Amy Adams as I always do (plus she could not have looked any hotter in her little Amelia Earhart outfit), I think it was Hank Azaria<\/a> as Kahmunrah<\/a> who really stole the show \u2013 he was HI-larious. So I was much pleased. We also watched an episode of CSI:NY<\/em><\/a>, and then Lis watched an episode of Bones<\/em><\/a> while I listened to music and watched (minus audio) the end of My Life in Ruins<\/em><\/a>, the movie that the person in front of me was watching on her DigE player. It looked mindless but mildly entertaining, plus it was shot on location in Greece so it was beautiful \u2013 so we might watch that on our DigE player on the return trip.<\/p>\n And then we arrived. We got our baggage, and then Lis went insane at the tourist literature kiosk and we came away with a stack of tourist brochures 2 inches high, which we perused at bedtime (though we’re still not done by any means). And we bought ourselves some flower leis (tuberose and some round purplish flower that reminds me of a clover flower) from a lovely lady selling them in the baggage claim area. Lis was very pleased, as she had done research (she has logged countless hours researching this trip \u2013 I have the best travel agent ever!) that said not to pay for the relatively expensive lei greeting, as you could just buy them at the airport \u2013 so we paid 10 buck each for our leis, rather than 25-40 bucks each for our lei greetings.<\/p>\n It was pretty hot by the time we got our rental car and got on the road. It was about 2pm, which meant our bodies thought it was 5pm, so they were starting to want some feeding. We came to the condo<\/a> and checked in (it is gorgeous \u2013 more later) and then hit the road in search of food. We had wanted to go to Roy’s<\/a> \u2013 we had eaten lunch at Roy’s in Carmel with Lis’ parents and really liked it \u2013 and were saddened to learn that the Roy’s in Kihei is closed. This is still another one on the island, but they only serve dinner. So after some consulting of Lis’ travel notes and our iPhone Urban Spoon app, we decided to go UpCountry<\/a> to the town of Makawao<\/a>, to a Mexican Restaurant called Polli’s<\/a>. Our hosts had said that they really liked this town, and they really liked this restaurant \u2013 so off we went.<\/p>\n We were concerned that maybe it would take too long to get there, as for various reasons time had passed and it was nearing 4pm (7pm for our bellies, who are used to being fed around 6) and we were quite hungry. But it was a gorgeous drive through sugar cane fields and tropical flowers, and the town was cool (a little trendy, though \u2013 reminded me somewhat of Cannon Beach<\/a>), and the restaurant was good, and because it was early we were able to order off the happy hour menu \u2013 we had two drinks and three pupus<\/a>, and the whole thing came to 15 bucks. We’re hoping that we can maintain our early dining ways our whole stay, and hit the happy hours and pre-sunset specials for dinner.<\/p>\n After dinner we walked around the main drag a bit, bought some local beer and some sugar free desserts at a People’s Co-op<\/a> type store we found, and then drove back to Kihei<\/a> (where the condo is)\u00a0a different way, through the town of Pa’ia<\/a>, which is another cool but somewhat trendy little UpCountry town. It appeared to have a lot of neat places to eat and another health food type store, so we will probably be back (my friend Toni says there’s a good restaurant there we should try).<\/p>\n We didn’t get back to the condo in time to watch the sunset from the pool, which I guess is pretty awesome \u2013 we did get to see a little of the sunset from the car. Back at the condo, we were fairly wiped out, but also a little hot and sticky from being out in the heat of the day, so we went to the pool for a dip. The upper pool has a little waterfall \u2013 it was pretty neat, and we had it to ourselves (it was dark by this time). We didn’t swim long, but it definitely hit the spot \u2013 I felt refreshed, and able to unpack a bit before bed.<\/p>\n I loved driving around the UpCountry \u2013 the cane fields and flowers are gorgeous, and then once you turn around and start heading back down, you have these sweeping views of the cane fields you’ve just driven through, plus the ocean and\/or Haleakala Mountain, and neighboring islands in the distance. It was really spectacular.<\/p>\n There are some other UpCountry places I hope to get to this trip \u2013 there is a lavender farm and a goat farm, an orchid nursery and a winery, and a cool sounding hike along the Haleakala crater \u2013 I hope we can do at least of few of these things, as they sound fun in themselves, plus I really, really like the UpCountry.<\/p>\n For the morning, though, I want to go snorkel with some turtles \u2013 so maybe it’s time to go roust my sweetie and get this show on the roadJ<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n