Hawaii - Day 2: 12/15/2008

There was an orientation breakfast organized by the hotel for new visitors, where the Expedia local experts would suggest places to visit there and basically help us plan our stay there. We almost knew what we wanted to do in Maui, but attended the orientation to get more information. A lady named Sandra Lee (I did not make it up) was there to tell us all about it. She welcomed us with a song in Hawaiian and was a local - a typical Hawaii woman. Couple of hours later, we were done with it – all our activities were booked and we had a plan. And by the way the name is Hawai'i - pronounced as hawa-ii.

After that we decided to head to Lahaina, which is considered to be the old-Hawaii. We were driving in the convertible with the top open (of course) and the winds brushing the hair – it felt great! The drive to Lahaina is a beautiful one, got the first glimpse of the ocean – blue and the mountains. It was just plain gorgeous. Drove down to the town. The town has the old Hawaiian, Polynesian feel to it. It is a small little town, with stores, a harbor and a lot of ocean facing restaurants. It is very colorful with quaint little stores, friendly people and lots of good food. All the stores in Hawaii sell only swim suits, shorts, sarong wraps etc. Colorful dresses, and wraps can be found anywhere in the place. The prices might be sky-high but good stuff. The town has a very friendly vibe to it - basically a lot of Aloha! and Mahalo! I just got a kick trying to learn a few words in Hawaiian and use them whenever I could. Basically was behaving in a typical tourist fashion!







In the middle of the town is a huge Banyan tree. It is the second biggest banyan tree in the world. We spent time browsing the water front stores, walked down the streets which were lined along the ocean and spent the day there getting a feel of the place. We bought some stuff there and decided to call it a day!



It was evening and we headed back to our condo, stopped on the way at a Safeway to get some kitchen stuff. Reached the condo, cooked and ate dinner and called it a night.