Maui video

Here's the video from the Maui trip. Didn't do a short version for blog visitors so you get the full family archive edit which is a little long. The dolphins are at the end, around minute 16 or so if your wanting the main highlight. Very fortunate morning at La Perouse Bay where we stopped to find people with binoculars watching dolphins about 3/4 mile out. We grabbed our fins and masks and headed out, only to find nothing once we got to where we thought we needed to be. We'd started back when they popped back up - about 14 total that stayed in smaller groups of 3 or 4. It was pretty surreal being out in the open water with them, they stayed around for about 15 minutes without ever acting like they were very interested in our being there, but always keeping about a 10-15 foot space between us. We were mesmerized.

Our soundtrack while on the trip was Xavier Rudd, so his music naturally made it's way onto the video. You're welcome if you're not already familiar with his stuff - exceptional.

Some brief color commentary on a few highlights and the vid:

We got into Maui around 9:30 pm, and rather than drive over to Lahaina and then back the next morning, we just headed straight up to Haleakala to catch the sunrise. We went about 2/3rds the way up the volcano, pulled over next to some cattle, and dirtbagged it in the car to sleep for the night. In the a.m. we were fortunate to get the cloud carpet below the peak that makes for quite a spectacle when the sun makes it's way up the horizon - can't do it justice trying to describe it so won't, nor does the video capture it, but totally unique from anything we've ever seen.

Stopped for a quick hike/run through the Redwood forest on the way down - we were needing something invigorating after the flight out and the early morning, and this did the trick nicely. The Redwoods there were relatively young, so big, but not huge. Cool trail, several transitions from alpine, to rain forest, even some real dry, high desert type terrain on the northern edge.

We had dinner that night with Earl and Sandy. Got a table next to the ocean with a fortunate view of some whales jumping out of the water a ways out - that was a first for both Annie and I. Wasn't a close up view - but amazing none the less to a couple of kids from Utah.

We went pretty hard the rest of the trip - tried to put a little bit of most of it on the video. We rented some bikes and made an attempt at going from sea level to the 10,000 ft summit of Haleakala, but hit cold and weather a little past 6,500 ft' that we weren't prepared for, so abandoned and rode back down. Blow holes, snorkeling, swim approach bouldering, waterfalls, mountain/rain forest hikes, caves and lava tubes, Hana, paddleboarding and surfing, could have used one more day to relax - we came home tired. But truth be told, that's how we like it.

One of our favorite trips ever.



Huge thanks to a couple of our favorite friends - Earl and Sandy, who provided their sweet digs to serve as base camp, thank you again, we absolutely loved it!