After 5 long years, I did it. I actually did it. I booked a vacation to Maui, Hawaii!

This was originally supposed to be a graduation gift to myself that I was never able to follow up with. Things just kept getting in the way.

So here I am, in Maui. One of the commonly considered most beautiful places on Earth writing to you under a full moon.

I am here with a friend of mine who started as an acquaintance but our friendship has grown considerably in the past months.

I am here with her for a few reasons. One, she’s always up for anything, and two, she’s open minded, and three, she manages to have a good time no matter what she does. Which isn’t something I run across often with many people surrounding my life; including myself.

I suppose I should tell you the main reason why she is here. A couple years ago, she wrote a bulletin on Myspace that said something to the affect, “I don’t care who you are, what you like to do, but if I am friends with you on here we should hang out today. We should be able to hang out any day.” I wrote to her exclaiming how much I agree and appreciate her saying this, because it got me thinking. About how many phone numbers, social networking friends, acquaintances, etc that are all in my life that I never call or get together with. I really enjoyed this outlook she had and really wanted to adopt it for myself as well. And I did, or I tried at least. Which is all you can do if no one is willing to reciprocate. So after a solid year of trying to make acquaintances into friends, and failing, while having only her respond beautifully, I decided to bring her on my trip to Maui. Because I felt as though she would appreciate it more so than my first several candidates.

So I planned and researched until my mind couldn’t take it anymore. And I booked my first time zone crossing vacation!

Why Maui? Because Maui is the farthest I was able to get away without leaving the United States. Since I have never been anywhere ever, I figured staying within the US would be the smartest mainly because I’ve realized I work best when I am able to take baby steps. My goal would be to see other parts of the world, but I needed to come here first in order to feel comfortable going anywhere else. I chose Hawaii, because it’s tropical and I couldn’t get anyone to want to go to California. I chose Maui because it’s the perfect island in Hawaii that is still very traditional, yet has a very new age attitude.

I booked a room at the Maui Coast Hotel. Mainly because I had no idea what I was doing. I knew that I wanted to stay in Kihei which is essentially a town in the middle of the island since Kahului, the true town in the middle of the island, doesn’t really have any hotels to begin with, Kihei was the next best bet. I choose Maui Coast hotel because I panicked. :) Maui coast hotel and Maui Mana Kai were the two hotels I was torn between. Maui Mana Kai is right on the water and Maui coast hotel is across the street from the water. I narrowed it down to these two because most the “trusted sites” only listed these two hotels in Kihei as being hotels you could trust. Maui Mana Kai ended up being an extra $230 and I wouldn’t even be able to stay in on of their condos. I’d have to stay in one of their hotels rooms which they barely advertise and show pictures of which made me nervous. So Maui Coast Hotel it was.

Below are pictures of the first day…

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Aquatinting ourselves with Maui we decided to stay in Kihei and just see what was around us. So we ate at Cafe O’Lei where I had a Mango Mojito!! :) And then we walked the Kihei Coastal Trail.

For the most part it wasn’t anything exciting, but it did bring us to some nicer oceanfront resorts and got to see some really spectacular views Maui has to offer.

But that’s it. Those’re the only pictures of the first day.

We left there and decided to head into Wailea, the most luxurious area of Maui. Which is originally where I wanted to stay. But it was too much money, and you’ll realize why when you drive through the town. It was pretty f-ing insane. Honestly, any of you who wants to stay in Wailea? Don’t. Unless you don’t want to leave your resort. Because essentially, Wailea is good for people who want to sit on the beach at some hotel and eat the over priced generic food at those resorts and never experience the rest of the island like you should. So we drove through Wailea, trying to find Makena. Which is the southernmost town on Maui.

Makena is interesting because the minute you drive past Wailea, the money, for the most part, stops. Makena still has it’s share of extremely nice houses. But mainly it’s a very authentic Hawaiian town. Where it seems a lot of locals go to hang out. So as we’re driving down we notice the road getting narrower and narrower. We’re like WTF? Is this still a legitimate road? It is. So as the main road now becomes a road where only one car can fit on it we continue to drive. Eventually all housing stops and vegetation as well and on either side of you it just looks like there’s dirt everywhere. For as far as the eye can see. We keep going and then we realize, nope, not dirt…it’s aged lava rock! Lava that covered this side of Maui in the late 1700’s ! It’s looks like the end of the world. Seriously, it looked like nothing had survived and you’re driving down this Mad Max type road going god knows where! It was insane. Interestingly enough at the end of the road, which looks like someone’s private property, leads out to a really nice beach. So yeah the end of the world paid off :)

We stood there taking in the scenery, promising to come back, all the while realizing we needed food. Which is what we did next. We ate at this really fun pizza place in Wailea, Matteo’s, where neither of us got pizza, but really great pasta. I got a dish with vodka sauce, because you NEVER SEE VODKA SAUCE ANYWHERE!

And that’s it. Day 1 :)