Hawaii Day 4/ Installment 5 (Kahului) Maui

Good Morning Hawaii!!!!!!!!!!! The ship rocked and rolled all night. We really slept good though with the movement and heavenly mattress! We woke up approaching Maui! WOW! It looks just as beautiful as imagined. We dressed and went back to the buffet to eat. Breakfast is just marvelous. Anything you can imagine from any Asian, N & S American or European country is available to eat!

After eating we checked back at the cabin to get ready for our day. We had this day planned to go on the "Road to Hana" and that's what we did! Some had told us not to try to drive it but to take the "tour".. noooooo we are not going with the "tour". Security is VERY tight at the ship but off we go and we caught a shuttle to the Air Port to rent a car. We Rented from Avis(Hindsight go with Hertz) The car was an up grade but we would have preferred to have had a little one like we own. It was most uncomfortable. It was hard to get in and out of and by the end of the day, AND the end of that highway we were stiff and sore just from the car! and by the way they have GPS's in the cars but we had brought our own and found it easier to use!

We found the highway that was the "Road to Hana"(we went by PaPa) street on the way.
The first few miles is flat and a lot of farm land. Very beautiful sitting in the middle of the Island. And then UP UP UP we went! around and around






and around and back and forth, in and out and round about:)!!!!!!!!!!!

To put it mildly the road was very windy, but very doable and just breathtaking.

The higher we got the more rain we would run in to but it was not cold and this was the one place that we had been warned to take coats because we would get cold. Never used umbrella's or rain coats the whole day and certainly not the jackets.




We made a stop at the "Garden of Eden" . It was a nice place but not really great.The garden is most popular for its debut in “Jurassic Park,” where the opening sequence of the movie was filmed,







specifically the Keopuka “Jurassic Park” Rock which can be seen from one absolutely gorgeous lookout inside the garden. It did, however, make a VERY good rest stop!.







There were lots of birds and ducks and statuary there and plenty of places to take really beautiful photo's. Very well kept and the tree's, flowers and shrubs were all marked well.

All the way up to the top we saw beautiful waterfalls, some right by the road and some way off. Some gentle, some roaring.



Just beyond mile marker 45 on the Highway after it turns into Highway 31 you’ll reach one of the most gorgeous falls in all of Hawaii, Wailua Falls. We crossed a bridge where its stream waters pass under the bridge .








Wailua Falls gracefully cascades 80 feet through a lush setting in the surrounding vegetation just feet from the road.I think that is the place we stopped both coming and going!





We also went thru the rain forest. Everything looks so glistening and beautiful in there.
On the lower part of the mountain we were looking over the water and the beach and saw lots of surfers. They were at the Waianapanapa State Wayside Park Everywhere we looked there were more birds, and flowers. Everywhere the ferns were thick.

Finally, after I'd guess about 3 hours(including our stops) we reached Hana. pronounced "hona". And by the way the Road to Hana is 52 miles of undeveloped road, 56 on-lane bridges and 617 curves!!!!! I read that some where:)

Some tourist said there was only one restaurant there and it was very expensive but it didn't seem any more so then any other place we had to buy food in Hawaii! And the hamburgers were very good!

We could have gone down the long way thru the valley etc on the way back to Kahului but we were not sure how long it would take and by then it was well afternoon. The trip back down was tiring, but we saw different things and some things we just saw again!






Drove by lots of sugar cane farms, it's a shame they don't export any more.

Back at the town of Kahului we stopped at a "Walgreens" type place called "Longs". We bought us an alarm clock we could see and some post cards.

Then we had to find the ship :) Of course, it's so enormous that you can see it 5 miles away but getting to it was tricky. The parking lot for the ship was full but the attendant showed us where to park outside where it was safe. The security is still very tight but we got back thru several check points.

OUR CABIN IS FRIGID! We went to the buffet to eat then back to the cabin, showered and hit the bed! It was a long tiring day but SO MUCH FUN!

The road to Hana is dangerous. the Road to Hana can bring you closer to heaven in more ways than one. With winding roads, blind turns, constant traffic, distracting views, narrow one-lane roads, cliffs, and wet conditions, Hana Highway has proven its worth as a danger with many fatalities. The road is long and offers many chances to pull over and take a break . Remember: Getting to Hana is not the gem of this trip; everything along the way is your reward.