Hawaii 2009

Here it goes…the story of my wonderful trip with my amazing husband. All of you jealous people should stop reading now, because I will be gloating and rubbing it in as much as I possibly can in this post.

If you’re still reading prepare yourself, I’m about to take you on a journey I never expected to have, too rich for my blood, too perfect to be real…ok so there was the minor detail of a hurricane, but really the trip was so amazing Hurricane Felicia was long forgotten before the trip was even over. Last month, after having my husband working out of town for what seemed like eternity, he whisked me away on the most beautiful memorable vacation. He went all out on this one, taking me to the Ritz-Carlton in beautiful Kapalua, Hawaii.

I’ll admit it almost didn’t happen. Earlier in the year we talked about taking a vacation and he really wanted to go somewhere in the Caribbean, but I was adamant, I was not traveling to a hurricane zone in the middle of hurricane season, did he think I was crazy!?!? We finally agreed Maui was going to be the perfect vacation for us to reconnect. I had finally come to terms with leaving the kids, leaving work, and spending way too much money to relax, and I was just getting anxious to get on that plane and head to paradise, what happens…. Yes, a hurricane heads straight for Maui. Are you kidding me!!! When was the last time you heard of a hurricane hitting Maui, really? Ok, so I did a little research, a Category 4 hurricane (Iniki) hit Kaua’i in 1992, but from what I could find that was the most recent, and before that it was in the 1800’s. Anyway, I was instantly deflated, telling coworkers I could possibly be into work the next week, instead of on vacation.

Needless to say, thanks to nonrefundable tickets, we took our chances and boarded that plane. And what does the pilot proceed to say “We have a date with Felicia today”, nice! Although we flew through what was left of Hurricane Felicia, at the time downgraded to a Tropical Storm, the flight was uneventful, which was perfect for me.

As soon as we deboarded the plane, you could feel the storm, the wind was howling and the air was humid (although it’s always like that in Hawaii). We made our way to the rental car and took the hour drive to the hotel. As soon as we pulled into the hotel I knew it was going to take some acting on our part to fit in with this class of people.

The hotel was gorgeous and everywhere you looked was something amazing to look at. Because of the storm we stayed close to the hotel the first two days we were on the island.

We really wanted to relax, so we didn’t plan too much to do. We did go snorkeling to Molokini and Turtle Town. I was nervous because I’ve never snorkeled before, the water was cold, but we went right in. At Molokini the fish were beautiful and I was doing ok until I saw a snake looking creature…I made my way directly to the boat. On the way to Turtle Town we passed a couple turtles that were actually swimming around, with their heads out of the water. I was too excited not to be one of the first right in the water. Ronnie and I headed out, even though the water was much colder there, to find some turtles. It took a while, but we finally found one on the bottom, just sitting there. We decided to find some others, so we went out towards where we had seen the ones swimming and sure enough, about 10 ft away from us, there was one swimming. It was amazing! That is until we looked up and realized we were swimming in a current and we were the only two still in the water. I really thought we wouldn’t make it back to the boat, luckily they knew we were still out there and a couple of the crew was happily cheering us on to beat that current. Oh, and if any of you have seen School of Rock, you’ll know “Ned Schneebly”, Jack Black’s roommate in the movie…he was on the snorkel cruise with us.

We also went to a luau. We met a nice family who we sat with and enjoyed the night of wonderful food, good company, and beautiful entertainment. We also did a dinner cruise one night. I’ve never seen such beautiful sunsets! The only thing I wished was different about that night was the couple we got seated with. Not that I don’t like to meet new people, but we put at a table with an older couple, both professors at a university. Not really much for the four of us to talk about. We tried, but it just didn’t flow well. There was an incident, and an ambulance had to meet us at the dock to remove a passenger that had fallen, but that was about the only excitement.

We went to the beach a couple of days, of course we went to the pool, some days we did both. We even took a nap in a hammock.

The flight back was amazing. If you’ve never upgraded to first class before, you should try it. It’s not expensive. We actually bought the cheapest tickets we could find instead of spending a fortune. When you get to your gate, go to the desk and ask the agent if there is a possibility of upgrading. On the way there the fee was too much, we decided against it, but on the way home it was cheap, so we upgraded to first class and enjoyed the ride.

I know I’ve blabbed for way too long, but let me say this…I have NEVER been on such a relaxing vacation in my life! Even before I had kids and could do whatever I wanted, I was never so relaxed. If you can afford to stay at a Ritz-Carlton hotel, do it! They treat you like royalty, we didn’t even have to keep the acting up, we fit in, and they were great. I thought I would regret not doing all the tourist things while I was there, but if you’re vacations are to get away and relax, you just can’t possibly do both. I’m ok that we missed the Road to Hana and a few other things, mostly I wish we would have been able to make it to Pearl Harbor, but that is a different island, so really I only have one regret about this trip…that it wasn’t long enough!