Did I Mention I'm In Hawaii?

Just a brief update before I forget the details. We’re just past the half-way point in our trip with 3 nights and 3 full days of “Aloha Time” inscribed in our gray matter. I’m holding on to 10 exposed canisters of 35mm film mainly from three cameras (Lomo, 3D Loreo and Colorsplash) though one of them may be from the Action Sampler. I’ve got 150 minutes or more of video that is evenly divided between the wedding ceremony and whale watching. All of these will contribute to a slow media explosion over the coming weeks and months — and they will surely be expanded before we even get off the island.

Maui - Where Music Comes To Die

Maui radio (and a few stations we can pick up from the Big Island) fall into three main categories (excepting the one NPR station that plays only a tiny bit of NPR production and fills the rest of their time with instrumental music): Classic Rock, 80’s and 90’s, and Island Music. There is a noticeable dearth of popular music which is refreshing at first. Soon, you come to recognize that like many people, music has decided to make Maui it’s final resting place and is taking it’s sweet time in passing on. Lest you think that Island Music will be your retreat, let me assure that sandwiched between authentic Hawaiian and Reggae music are many indecipherable covers of songs you know and love played with a ukelele.

The Wedding

Mick and Em commited themselves to merging into a single being on a beach just North of Lahaina. Most of the men in audience wore slacks and Hawaiian shirts, while the women wore brightly colored summer dresses. Despite Wednesday’s 70mph winds that tore off roofs, shut down power to much of the island, and put a kibosh on a pre-wedding Luau the weather was absolutely perfect on Friday. I had the honor of video taping the ceremony and brought two newly purchased wireless mic’s for the occasion. One was attached to Mickey (and it did an excellent job of picking up the blessed couple and the minister) the other was attached to a great guitar player/singer, Will, who provided accompainment for the ceremony. (If you have an event in Maui and need a musician, Will substritutes for a whole symphony and is a consummate professional — send me an email and we’ll put you in touch with him.) Video forthcoming if the couple authorizes it.

Post Wedding Whale Watching

One of the celebration events after the ceremony was a whale watching excursion on a 35 foot sailing vessel. This was my first time getting beyond swimming reach of the shoreline and it was beautiful. I would definitely do it again — as long as someone else is in charge of the mechanics and I can just lay back and watch the water. We followed one small whale for about 15 minutes and he gave us one amazing breach before we got distracted by a mother and her calf. We idled within 100 yards or less of the two of them for over 20 minutes watching the calf learning to breach while his mother kept nudging him away from the boat. It was one of the most phenomenal natural events I have witnessed.

DIY Rentals

As people were leaving today I recognized the need for some mode of transportation. I figured I would give the local rental places a chance and found a good price on a Jeep ($46/day) at Rainbow Renters. Becky and I borrowed someone else’s ride before sunrise and drove into Kahului to get our car. Benny gave us the only automatic Jeep on the lot which had over 125K miles on it and looks like you would expect an island Jeep of that age to look. He cautioned me as I was leaving to “take it easy going off the curb”. I figure it’s his lot and his car so I did. I pulled across the road to cut through the mall to reach my highway back to Kaanapali. As I hit my first speed bump the engine died. I tried for five minutes to restart it with no luck. I went back to work something out with Benny and he gave me a standard transmission Jeep that had 136K miles and looked like you would expect, again. As we were driving away, Becky pointed out the strong smell of exhaust and fumes despite the complete lack of a top on our Jeep. I followed her suggestion and returned to Benny’s establishment, got my refund and we headed to Avis. They gave me a Chevy Tracker with 6K miles. For $36/day.

Haleakala Crater

Good thing we had a good car because Brain Walters joined us this afternoon for a drive up to the crater on the top of the world’s tallest dormant volcano. It took about 75 minutes and 30 degrees Farenheit to climb the 29 miles to the top — each mile getting thinner with taller cliffs. We arrived about an hour before sunrise and I started to internally question if we should even stay since you can only take so many pictures of the moon-like surfaces hovering just above a thick cottony cloud cover as the temperature was working it’s way towards freezing. Brian was resolute, though, and as the sun set the clouds cleared away. We were witneess to a world of colors previously unknown, plus a mind-expanding view of the entire east side of Maui and the enveloping Pacific Ocean surrounding it. As darkness fell and the lights of the towns came on it was simply stunning. I just hope my pictures come out.

More To Come

We have two more full days here. Tomorow will be spent mostly lounging in a cabana, reading books. We will try to squeeze in a Luau one night and sushi at the best sushi bar on the island the other night. Tuesday morning we’ll be rising with the geese and heading across the island for a 2-3 hour morning horse ride. We may try a jaunt across the rustic rural part of the island into Hana if our thighs and bums aren’t too sore. This will surely result in even more pictures and maybe a little more video.

I can’t wait to start posting photos. Surely with over 300 photos I will have something worthy. Since I have already started forgetting all of the wonderful things I’ve seen and done, the gaps will have to be filled with photos.

p.s. I am conflicted with my current means of access. I am staying directly above the lobby of our hotel. While arranging an event with the concierge I noticed she was working wirelessly, so I booted up and found the network open. I’ll try to limit my bandwidth…

Posted by etrigan at January 19, 2004 3:04 AM