2nd port of call - Maui

Our 2nd port of call was in Kahului, Maui. These are some of the fantastic views (and sunrise) that we saw from the boat. We even saw this random guy paddling his surfboard. We ended up splitting our 2 Maui days and rental car with Nick and Liz. It made it a lot less expensive and a lot more fun (and what can beat that?!). We started off our first day with a drive down the Hana highway. It was gorgeous!

We visited the botanical gardens called "the Garden of Eden." There were signs saying not to honk at these ducks as you drove along. It said just drive forward. The ducks will move. They didn't, even though we were less than 1/2 a foot away from them!

At the end of the Hana highway, we came to Haleakala National park, home of the 7 sacred pools (though there are actually a good deal more than 7). This Hawaiian hut is the first thing we saw before beginning our bamboo filled hike. Here are some shots of Oscar with the enormous bamboo.

And here's an awesome shot of Oscar in a big banyan tree we saw along the way.

This is one of the pools we saw along the hike. Oscar took videos of the stream off to the side and the terrain we walked alone

And here's the beautiful waterfall we saw at the end of the hike.

And finally we arrived at the gorgeous pools leading down to the ocean. On our way back from Haleakala national park, we took a route back that traveled along the southwest coast of the island. It was also incredibly beautiful. You could even see Mauna Kea on the big island from this southern part of Maui.

For our second day in Maui, we drove around the north west side. First we went on a small hike in the Maui mountains to see the Iao needle, the site of a very famous battle won by King Kamehameha. In spite of this natural lookout, the Maui natives lost the fight. Here's the remarkable needle itself. And here are some gorgeous views of the West Maui mountains As we came around the coast we stopped at this gorgeous lookout where you can see the nearby islands of Molakai and Lanai.

When we got to the city of Lahaina, we did the historic Lahaina walking tour. Lahaina is home to the biggest banyan tree outside of Asia.

These were some other pretty sites we saw on our tour.

And here's the biggest Buddha outside of Asia. This worship area was set up for the many Japanese immigrants during the 1800's. And we finished off our day snorkeling in Honolua bay