Wednesday 4/17/13- West side of the Island and "Rehersal" BBQ

 After Iao, we drove around the west volcano to Lahaina (there is still contention about how this is pronounced).  What follows lacks pictures because of driving and food and alcohol. 

 But both mountains did have wind farms on them.  This is the best we got while driving. 

 My memory card was then filled with about 20 blurry shots of ocean and the fronts and sides of cars until Zach snapped this picture. 

The reason we were driving to Lahaina was to find the Maui Brewing Company.  It was about an hour drive from Iao and well worth it.  We were going to hit up the actual brewery, but their tours were on the wrong days.  So we went to their Brew Pub instead.  Best idea ever.  Delicious food.  The beer battered onion rings were of course made with Maui Sweet Onions and the batter had their beer in it.  They also had homemade ketchup and mustard.  Apparently I only like mustard on Maui.  I ate it with gusto.  Zach was confused.  I then had Kalua pork with Coconut Porter BBQ sauce and I don't remember what Zach had because I shoved my face in my plate.  We also had two tasting boards of their beer.  So good.  Rarely have I had beer where I could actually taste the ingredients they started with.  Most of them were local.  But then Zach ordered a Coconut Porter float.  OMG!  The vanilla ice cream just made the coconut flavor pop.  Amazing.  I was very sad I was driving and couldn't have one of my own.  And then we had bread pudding.  I think the beer was in the sauce.  So much food.  So worth it. 

And then we headed back for the family cookout/ rehearsal dinner.  We had to stop by the liquor store first.  We picked up some Maui Dark Rum, Mauicello, and more Coconut Porter.  As dinner was getting ready, we watched the sun set.

We ended the day in the pool. 

Wednesday 4/17/13- Iao State Park video

I would like to start by apologizing for my pronunciation.  The word is all vowels.  Seriously

Wednesday 4/17/13- The Morning and Iao State Park

 This is going to be one hell of a picture spam post.  We went out to Iao state park in the morning.

 But we started with coffee on the Lanai.  Have I mentioned the coffee yet?  They grow coffee on Maui.  Good shit.  We brought back two bags.  It was not enough.  There are several things from this day that I will be finding ways to order.  The coffee is high on the list.  I don't remember if this was from first or second breakfast.  We had a bad habit of waking up at 6am.  We had a quick breakfast and went shopping at Foodland.  We really did go there a lot.  Then we came back and got in the pool.  It was nice getting up so early.  We accomplished a lot of stuff before lunch.

We arrived a Iao state park in the morning.  Also, have I mentioned the chickens yet?  yeah, they are running wild everywhere.  In particular was the group planted in the middle of the road in the parking lot.  The attendant informed me they would move.  I don't think the chickens realized that.  Also this erosion formation is a phallic symbol.  Yay!

 An amazing view with a Zach.  You can see the parking lot.

 Still an amazing view but with less Zach.

 The stairs we walked up.  I very much appreciate that I could just walk up them and Erin wasn't yelling at me to do calf raises up them. 

 Walking down.  This was the greenest area of the island we had been to so far.  We didn't make it to the side of the island Hana is on, which is supposed to be the more tropical side. 

 There is a garden that has only native species of plants in it.  Lots of taro. 

 And the first palm tree I had seen with coconuts actually on it.

 Down the road a bit were the Kepaniwai Park's Heritage Gardens.  Many of the cultures that made up Maui's immigration history had small parks.  This was Japan's.

 Complete with Koi pond and bamboo path.

 Portugal.

These were unicorn lion statues in the Korean garden.

Tuesday 4/16/13- The Luau VIDEO

This was the opening number.  Lots of fast moving and fabulous dancing. 

I want one of these dresses.  I bought some fabric and I really hope to try and make something similar.

Fire Dancing with one stick.

Fire dancing with two sticks!  I apologize for any colorful commentary at this point.  Lots of drinks in at this point.

Final number!  So sad to see them go.

Tuesday 4/16/13- The Luau

Unfortunately, Dana's sister was delayed on several of her flights.  So I took her place at the luau.  We went to the one at the Westin Maui Resort.  

 This would be us still sober.  They had an open bar, delicious drinks and a waiter that kept them coming. 

This is the MC for the evening (the one on the right) and Dave (on the left).  The MC was hilarious.  And he used Dave to open a coconut using a pointed stick.  Dave's job was to hold the stick.  Dave didn't do a very good job of holding the stick. 

The start of the dancing!

Dancing!

Fire dancing.  These guys and the main guy were great.  I was also really drunk.  So it is possible he just stood up there and waived around a lighter. 

Finale!

Dana with one of the hula dancers. 

Nadine with the main fire dancer.  Like I said, super awesome job.  Oh and that lei is real flowers.  They had shopping.  Which we hit after our first Mai Tai.  The lei smelled so good.  Drunk shopping isn't a good idea.

One of the hula dancers.  Her hair seriously hit the top of her skirt.  It was amazing.  Again, drunk me just wanted to pet it.  You can see by the fact that she is smiling and not running away that I managed to restrain myself. 

The next post will have some videos because it got dark and they were moving fast so all of my pictures are crap.  But my videos, turned out good.