You’ll never guess where I am…..You know the movie Sound of Music? You know the very opening scene when Maria is charging up over the hillside, that great shot of her spinning in the open field surrounded by mountains?…Well imagine that, with mountains as a back drop and the open sea in the front. I’m sitting on the very edge of this amazing sea cliff on my pink beach towel in complete darkness listening to the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks below. Jessica and I are sleeping here tonight. Yep, we’re sleeping under the stars (well, clouds right now, but we’re hoping that will change). Ok, I’m not sure how much sleep we’re going to get, but we came equipped with snacks, drinks, and movies on the Mac book- we’re really roughing it :) The best part is that it’s totally secluded. Just us, some bugs, a scary big bird that keeps flying over -head, and the country cows. We are just above Homoa Beach, and we plan on seeing an amazing sunrise in the morning.

We left our condo this morning around 11:00 and headed to the Hana Highway, #36/360. We stopped at Hookipa beach to see some windsurfing, and then continued driving most of the day, stopping at some scenic spots, and cute roadside stands. The drive was all twists and turns (Heather, you never would have made it :)) but Jessica did a great job driving and we made it to Hana without any problems. We did a little exploring in the cute town, which seems to be virtually untouched by regular “Maui” tourist stuff….it was a nice change of pace. Then we scoped out our place, stopped at a public bathroom to change into our pj’s/jeans and headed up to our hill. It should be an interesting night, but I’m so happy to be having this spontaneous little adventure. I’ll let you know how it goes, and who knows maybe you’ll get a phone call in the morning from me if I can’t sleep.

-4 hours later-


You’ll never guess where I’m sitting….you know that cute little diner called Denny’s- Well, here we are……drinking our bottomless hot chocolates….What happened you asked?? Well, what didn’t happen. Things were going sooo well. We were sitting on our little cliff, we had unpacked our stuff and we were enjoying nature at it’s finest (later in the story we will end up hating that same nature….but I’ll get to that) Anyways, we were like two little school girls camping in the backyard…complete with our flashlights, and fun little games to play….Unfortunately, boredom set in a lot sooner than we had anticipated, in fact, at one point Jessica looked at her watch and said, “8:19! What the hell?!”….It was going to be a long night….and then it rained. Well, let me clarify, in my opinion, we bailed a little early…If it wasn’t for all of our dumb computer equipment, we might have stuck it out, but I couldn’t risk the MAC book, and to be honest, it was the cloudiest night in Hawaii history…(what rotten luck), so a downpour was just around the corner. We made it to the car with no real plans, so we drove around Hana….which apparently shuts down at sunset….Where are all the people??….It was now 9:03 and way dark…what to do, what to do?? I know, we’ll just drive to the Oheo gulch…it’s in the guide book after all, and it says there’s camping there…what a great idea……(our plans after Denny’s include burning said guide book)….

We took off in the direction of the Gulch along highway 31….Something you should know, I use the term highway very very loosely….this is the worst rode I’ve ever been on (the forbidden road as we now refer to it- mostly because the car rental place told us we weren’t allowed to go on it….I’m sorry I doubted you Alamo- but in our defense, we were looking for the dumb campsite/Gulch thing, but apparently got sucked into some kind of crazy abyss/void where everything is quiet, dark, and creepy) Ok, back to the road, how do I explain this?…one lane all the time, dirt/bumpy rocks, Mountain wall on the passenger side and sheer cliff drop off to the crashing waves 500 ft. below on the driver’s side- not a picnic by any means…kudos to Jess for not killing us.

I think the two of us remained quite calm (at least outwardly) in spite of the circumstances….Inside though, I was freaking out. We were driving FOREVER- with no end in site…the road just kept going and going…at one point I think we entered the Haleakala National park, so we now had volcano crap on the right….Has anyone ever heard of a road sign?? We never saw any towns, any houses, any other cars, it was like being the last 2 people left on the planet. I was afraid of these things, 1- running out of gas, 2, flat tire, 3, killed by stranger ( not likely), or 4, driving off rode into the sea (very likely). We were reaching a breaking point…our light conversation was slowly turning into scary silences where neither of us knew quite what to say…we were both pretty scared I think….

Just when we thought our car would fall to pieces from all the rattling, the bumps and rocks turned to pavement, sweet, glorious, pavement!……Then the cows came. They were everywhere…big ones, bigger ones, the biggest cows we’ve ever seen! Oh, and deer too…what was this the Maui zoo??! It was one obstacle after another…..Then we hit a cow…oh yes, you heard me correct…..WE HIT A COW right in the face!….I think that could be classified as a low point in our otherwise perfect trip. Alamo’s not going to be happy…for multiple reasons.

So here we are, we made it to civilization. We traveled the whole way around the island….in the dark. We never made it to the Oheo Gulch, and we don’t really care. This Denny’s booth is way more rewarding. Now, only one small thing, It’s 1:30 am, and we still have no place to stay….hmmmm I feel another adventure coming on….or maybe Denny’s will let us spend the night here :)

Oh, PS- I have no pictures of the drive….too scared and too dark….maybe I’ll put some pictures on from the first part of the trip, the carefree and fun part. I also want to tell you about how great Maui has been- I'll post that later though, this just couldn't wait :)