Operation Maui Mustache begins… NOW!

Awesome baby doves right outside my office window

Awesome lizard in our yard

Awesome vintage solid koa coffee table – craigslist score!

Awesome license to drive – my eyes are “BRO” colored!

I’ve seen a lot of green sea turtles since we’ve lived here, but always from the shore. Today I got lucky and swam up close with a big male sea turtle in the reef at Palauea Beach! It was close to 4 feet long from nose to tail, which is kind of intimidating at first, but he didn’t mind sharing the water with me.

The footage is a bit disappointing because I had literally just stuck my head underwater when all of a sudden a big turtle appeared right in front of me, less than 10 feet away. Unfortunately, while fumbling to get my camera I took a big snorkel-full of water into my mouth. The combination of excitement, choppy water, lack of preparation, trying to avoid the coral and trying not to drown, resulted in sub-par footage… BUT I am still thrilled I finally got to swim with one of these incredible, gentle animals.

I know I will have many opportunities to swim with the beautiful sea turtles of Hawaii, but this will always be memorable.

What’s a Paniolo, you ask? Well, it’s a Hawaiian cowboy. Don’t worry, I didn’t always know there were cowboys in Hawaii either. They ride wild boars, wear grass skirts and make ropes out of palm fiber to lasso ripe pineapples. NOT!

We went to Upcountry a couple of days ago with friends and got a little taste of the other side of the island. Upcountry is a region of central Maui consisting of Makawao, Haiku, Kula, and other small rural towns. There are long winding roads, small general stores, large estates, farms, and horses. It felt like a mix of Ohio’s Metroparks with a smidgen of California forest and a little bit of a small cowboy town out west somewhere. It sure didn’t feel like we were in Maui anymore. Kansas, maybe.

We started the day in Makawao. We dropped off Ashley where she works, a cute boutique clothing store called Jewels of the White Tara in the center of town. The rest of us not-working losers stuffed our faces with a big bag of rare, delicious donuts (the general store/bakery closes whenever the owners feel like it, sometimes for months at a time), some coffee, and took in the almost sickening level of charm Makawao had to offer. We drooled over $1900 hand tooled, hand stitched cowgirl boots at Aloha Cowboy, and Kent bought me some amazing yellow tagua earrings from Goodies. We shopped for a while and realized that Cheya knows just about everyone in Makawao.

We stopped in at Cheya’s high school – and everyone knew him there too. They even asked us to stay for lunch, which by the way, was the most amazing cafeteria lunch I have ever had in my life! We sat at the cool kids table and got all fueled up for our hike.

Hiking to twin falls was awesome. Aside from my traction-free paper thin shoes and a few mosquito bites, I would say that it was a perfect day. We ate wild berries, both Cheya and Kent got weird foot injuries, and we swam in a waterfall. We found some “sensitive ferns” that react instantly when you touch them. At the end, we gazed at beautiful bamboo as the sun set behind us. Can it get any better? Well, yeah! We ended the day with an hour at Mana foods, a great grocery store in Paia full of local veggies and good wholesome food.

It takes approximately two minutes, 10 seconds to get to this awesome beach called Keawakapu by vehicle. I am not exaggerating. That said, we still miss Skunky!

30 second exposures of the night sky over our house.

The 89th Maui Fair is in town, although we can’t figure out where it came from. Do they store the rides all year in a warehouse or does the entire carnival arrive on a boat? The important thing is that it’s here and it was really great. It would appear that the entire island goes to this fair, which made it even more fun. Back in the Midwest I think we have become jaded about fairs because we see so many in the summer months, plus we just have so many entertainment options fighting for our attention. The Maui fair, on the other hand, was PACKED with thousands of people!

Often Maui feels like a small town, in the best possible ways. In the short time we have been here we have already begun to run into people we know, all over the island. In fact, tonight we ran into Brad, the guy we have been buying used furniture from. He came over and gave Darlene a big hug and we chatted for a while. It’s those small moments that help us feel less alone here. Most of those moments come from the people of Maui, who are so incredibly welcoming and easy going. I know I keep saying that over and over but we are still getting used to it and it’s amazing what a ripple effect kindness and civility has on everyone.