Lahaina

This is a fun little tourist town. Sort of reminds us of an the old Main Street Park City by the Sea. Their "Main Street" is called Front Street and is much longer than Park City's Main Street. It's filled with tourist gift shops, art galleries, eateries, activity booths where you can sign up for tours, more shops, art galleries, etc.
In the center of Front Sreet is a huge 100 year old Banyan tree which takes up almost the entire block.
The capsized boat was the end result of a Halloween party in 2004. I guess it just goes to show - too much partying can be a bad thing.

Parasailing!

How's the view from up there?

They even "dip" you in the ocean!

We ate at "Cheeseburger in Paradise". A fun Hawaiian atmosphere. The Burgers were great!



Now that's a double cheeseburger!

We also stopped at the Jodo Mission Buddhist Temple
The Buddha is 12 ft. high and the largest in the Western U.S.. It was built in 1968 for the Commerative 100th anniversary of the 1st immigrants from Japan in Hawaii. It was built to honor their herritage and sybolize the peace & unity of the people of Japan and Hawaii. This has special meaning to us because my grandfather was a Japanese immigrant, highly respected in the Hawaiian community, taken to internment camps Dec. 7, 1941 and who later became a citizen after Hawaii gained statehood. This has further meaning as Dylan studies and teaches in the Martial arts.

Beach Days of Course!

Place of Refuge - Pu'uhonoa o Honaunau
In ancient times it was said that anyone breaking a law who made it to this "Place of Refuge" and performed certain rituals assigned by the priests, then they would be granted asylum and return home with all forgiven.

The Gods watching over the Bay


Hmmm....Making friends - just in case?

Kahalu'u Beach - Kona

Surf's up!


The kids were both glad they tried it but both agree they'll take snowboarding any day! They said you had to swim hard to get out to the break waves, swim hard to catch the wave and then the ride was too short for the effort. They said it was fun but really tiring after a couple of hours.
Honokeana Cove - West Maui

Swimming with turtles.



Spiny urchins too.

Napili Bay - Right next door.
Beautiful and calm in the mornings.

Wicked riot in the afternoon!
Fun if you do it right...

or get knocked on your butt and rolled like a pebble if done wrong.(Speaking from experience.)
Well done Kel.

Oneloa - West Maui
Another Boogie Boarding Beach

Always pretty windy, but the later in the afternoon it gets, the windier it gets with bigger waves.
On the beach, unless you're close to th water you feel like you are getting sand blasted.

Dylan & Kelsie made it look easy!



Kraig caught some good waves too!

Kraig & Kel riding tandem.


Big Beach -
One of their favorites for Boogie Boarding. In other words another great place to get pummeled by the waves. We all came away with battle wounds from this one! Kel-ankle, Dylan-back, Kraig-shoulder and me-whole right side.


This is how the locals do it.

Lots of fun! We went back to this beach for more a few times. Crazy!