Maui Day 1 & 2: Arriving, Exploring Kihei, and Haleakala National Park

 Oh my gosh, Hawaii is SO FAR from Connecticut. The ONLY thing about this trip I was truly dreading (aside from someone getting sick/injured and ruining our plans entirely) was the very long plane ride.. 

We headed to Hartford, Ct the night before our flight. We slept at the Holiday Inn express and woke up at 2:30/3:00 in the morning to get our car dropped off. Our flight was leaving at 6 am and the airport was so crowded! 

We landed in Dallas on time to open our app and find that our Hawaii flight was boarding in 45 minutes and we still had to deplane and get across terminals (not quite the hour and 45 minute layover I had planned on). 

We found our plane/terminal, ran to the bathroom and some of us grabbed food from a grab and go mart.

Our flight from Dallas was 7 or so hours long and they did serve some food/snacks (that none of us really liked or ate) and we had inflight entertainment. I watched The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes then a few older movies/tv shows hoping to nap a bit. 

I was so happy to finally get off that plane-- we landed in Hawaii around 3:30 or so Hawaii time (8:30 pm our time) and headed right to baggage claim, got our rental car, and were on our way by 4ish. 

Our rental was nice and easy to find. We had lots of restaurants and stores within walking distance and the beach just down the road.

Our first order of business was finding food. We went to Maui Fish and Chips for dinner; a non-descript little strip mall right next door that had deliciously fresh fish and teriyaki chicken/rice meals. I didn't even think of snapping food photos because I was SO HUNGRY after not having had anything but a handful of snacks to eat all day but man the Mahi I ordered was incredible. 

We walked over to the beach, watched the sunset, and walked out on the beach. The sand is SO soft!

We walked to a local mart and bought water and ice then stopped for gelato and ice cream from Maui gelato. 

I got a small cookie butter

We got a kick out of all the chickens anywhere. There was a cute little light parade that went by on the street and we saw holiday lights shining in the neighborhood.

We had no plans on our second day, not knowing how our jet lag would be. But we all were completely fine. My husband, Ian and I walked to The Cinnamon Place (I had read this was a "must try" food place on Maui) and got cinnamon buns for us all; they were HUGE and so delicious.

Love starting my day on the lanai!

cream cheese frosting is extra and served on the side so some of us had it and some didn't

While eating breakfast we settled on a plan for the day. But first my husband, Alec, and I went grocery shopping (I had major sticker shock over the grocery prices!). We packed lunches and headed out to the summit section of Haleakala National Park. We knew the national park both here on Maui and on the big island would be on our "to do" list so I had bought the Tri-Park pass that Hawaii offers ahead of time. 

Haleakala means "House of the Sun" and it sure lived up to its name today!

The closer we got, the bigger it got

It starts getting pretty lush and green too

Driving up the mountain, the views were incredible

It's a bit of a crazy ride with lots of switchbacks

Part way up the mountain we started to see some clouds

We were enthralled with these silvery green plants that grow at the summit

They start as small balls like this and grow tall and pointy; flowering just once in their life

Views from the summit tower:

The observatory at the summit

The two dark blue bumps on the horizon are actually the Big Island; a view that we were told is rarely seen from the summit! 

All the rocks around the summit are red.

sitting on Maui with the big island in view behind us.

View into the crater from the summit. It looks like something from another planet. 

We then drove just a short way down from the summit to the sliding sands trail and hiked to the rim of the crater (after eating our lunches in the parking lot). 

The photos just don't do it justice! The rim of the crater shows so many beautiful colors and you can see the sliding sands trail cutting through nearly the whole thing. 

It's a really huge caldera! 

Zooming in to try and capture more of the colors. 

From there we got in the car and drove to the Halemau'u Trail with the intent to hike to the rainbow bridge. Once on the bridge you're supposed to be able to see the caldera on one side and lush greenery on the other. 

It was already much more lush where we began hiking

more silvery green ferns and plants along our hike..

Sadly, as we approached the rainbow bridge the flog and clouds got thicker and thicker. 

We couldn't see into the caldera at all so we turned around and walked back to the car. 

We spotted this pair of birds on our way back to the car

We drove down the mountain to a nearby botanical gardens.

They were closing and we missed their last ticket sale of the day slot by 15 minutes! We decided to just head back to the condo, take showers and head to dinner. 

We walked over to Moose McGillycuddy's for dinner. All my guys got some sort of meal with kalua pork while I tried their teriyaki chicken bowl with veggies and crushed macadamia nuts. 

We stopped for some shave ice and then went home to watch TV and rest before bed. 

I know that was a lot of photos and if you made to the end I am so impressed! Just to warn you ALL my Hawaii posts are going to have lots and lots of photos.  It's such a beautiful place that it was hard to resist taking a ton and sharing (most of) them with you! Between Evan and I we took over 800 photos. 

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