The thing about a Maui vacation is that it is not very busy. This creates some challenges for me personally as I am typically a very, very busy person. Rest is good and my back is feeling better (thank you sun and ocean). But the days can be slow, filled with lots of lying about and reading in the sunshine.

In support of even higher levels of relaxation, I decided to combine two days of action into a single post – so here goes.

We started our day at the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary Visitor Center (that’s a mouthful). They were giving a talk on Humpback Whales. It was not long but so interesting! I will share only a few highlights here – some of the things that really stuck out for me.

• Humpbacks have baleen plates instead of teeth. They consume large volumes of small fish without chewing, about 1.5 tons per day.
• They have the longest migration on the planet, travelling about 8000 km of ocean form their warm water breeding grounds near Hawaii to the cold waters where they feed. They do not eat when they travel or when the mothers give birth and begin to raise their young for the long journey north.
• Only the males sing. Songs can last 10-20 minutes and repeat for hours. Their songs change slowly year over year and all whales will sing the same newly modified song each year.
• Thy are huge so it is particularly impressive to see one breaching. Adult females weigh ~35 tons
• Da Vinci would be happy to know that Humpback whales are evenly proportioned, rather like his proportions of man. A 45 ft long whale will have 15 ft pectoral fins, a 15 ft long mouth (1/3 of its total body length!) and a matching 15 ft long tongue. Their tail flukes are similarly sized – 15 ft across.
• They have two blowholes vs one and that distinctive mist is actually snot which scientists can capture using drones. Apparently it is very stinky but does contain whale DNA.
• They have a life span of 50-80 years (sources vary)
• Their tail flukes are all unique, making it possible to identify individual whales.
• They can work together to collect food using ‘bubble nets’ which are super cool and work just as they are named.
• Climate change, vessel strikes and entanglement in fishing gear are their greatest threats. The Humpback Center here is active in rescuing and freeing whales that have become tangled in nets, ropes and buoys. They have developed special tools for this purpose and most recently set a whale free using only a drone.

Humpback whales are amazing creatures. This photo is from the web and gives you a better look than my video from the other day.

The Center is located directly next to the turtle pond so we wandered down to check in on the green sea turtles. There were a number of baby turtles swimming about (about 1-2 feet in size) and more adults sunning on the rocks. Amazing!

Our next stop was the King Kamehameha Golf Course. Rick had no clubs and golfing was not the plan. The clubhouse at this private course ($40,000 to become a member) was based on a design by Frank Lloyd Wright. It was originally intended to be a house for Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller – which we know did not work out as planned. The course is spectacularly located on the side of the mountain and the building is impressive, though virtually empty.

We decided to take a different route back to the condo, which took us past the Sugar Museum. This accidental discovery was a small-ish but informative display about the history of the sugar industry in particular the cultural impact to Hawaii.

Directly across the street was the old mill which had been in use until 1960’s when tourism replaced sugar as the primary industry. The sugar cane fields are now being converted to crop land.

Our dinner plans that night took us back to Wailea and the Andaz Hotel. Our meal was impressive in it’s presentation and flavour, though prices were high and portions small. We shared a salad, some scallops, and ahi tuna, followed by a wonderful dessert of coconut ice cream and cake. It was surprisingly light in spite of the description.

The hotel was quite grand and Rick looked into the room price while we sipped our cocktails – $1700 USD a night for a standard room. We could have stayed a mere 2.5 nights for the cost of our little condo. I was surprised by how many young people were there; the poolside bar was hopping. How can they afford this kind of luxury?

Yesterday began with a longer walk on the beach – going right until we arrived at the far end where a number of likely homeless people in all shapes, sizes and ages seemed to have taken up residence.

Since high amounts of rain had been forecast, we had not planned much. I guess this is a rainy day in Kihei:

We extended our beach walk back the other way, returning to the market for more papaya, and this little baby called a mountain apple. It was a bit like a pear and apple hybrid, juicy and very tasty.

Rick had shave ice number 3 at Ululani’s, graciously including passion fruit syrup, is one of my absolute favourite flavours with the mix of tangy and sweet. I was quite surprised, and reassured, to see that the brightly coloured syrups are mostly made from real fruit. I remain confident there is nothing natural on this earth that could create such bright colours.

Umm – fill this gap with more reading and lounging by the water.

We roused ourselves mid afternoon, dressed in respectable clothing and headed north to Whaler’s Village. It is part of Ka’anapli, a master-planned town seeming to consist primarily of hotels, restaurants and gold courses. We had stayed in that area on our last trip here with the Moms and Rick’s aunt.

It was beautiful and sunny. I wandered the shops for a bit while Rick waited patiently sipping an actual Mai Tai near the beach. Although I looked at a ton of beautiful tropical style clothing, I bought nothing. Somewhere along the way I finally figured out that buying vacation clothing while on vacation rarely translated to wearable goods once I was back home. (Fortunately this discovery happened well before any accidental purchase of lederhosen.) My ‘shopping’ is more for sport.

I met Rick back at Hulu’s, a restaurant right beside the beach walk. He had another Mai Tai, though I limited myself to a glass of Cava. We shared a salad and some Pu Pu – small Hawaiian appetizers. The ones we chose were all fish.

The super friendly waitress recommended the Hulu Pie for dessert – why not? It was ice cream based and I had just read a surprising article in The Atlantic about the health benefits of 1/2c of ice cream a day – for diabetics no less. Not a word of a lie. It is some combo of dairy, fat and sugar. It is somewhat equivalent to Greek yogurt which can still be good for you even though we throw in sugar.

I won’t belabour the point here but this research has been reviewed and re-studied multiple times and it is only ‘common sense’ that keeps it from gaining any traction. This is also not a dietary recommendation fr anyone.

The ice cream pie was a ridiculous size and we were unable to finish the plate – not for lack of trying. Good thing I didn’t buy a new bathing suit in my travels, which I had briefly considered.

Sadly, work interrupted our evening and I spent a bit of time on some presentation material for Marija. That led to some staffing emails. And a ‘quick’ budget question, before I felt myself getting sucked into the vortex. At that point, I wisely decided to log off for the night.