Thursday morning started just like the prior two – me up early, downstairs just after 4am to work on the blog, Ash joining around 5:30 for coffee, breakfast at 6. But once we were done, we got moving to pack to leave for the airport by 8:30. We had a 10:30 flight to Maui and while the airport was only about 15 minutes away, we wanted to give ourselves lots of time.

Everything went the way you want it to when you’re flying, and we arrived on time about 11:15am. We are staying at an Airbnb and check-in wasn’t until 2pm, so after we collected bags and our rental, we headed south to Kihei for lunch and some beach exploring.

I went to TripAdvisor for some lunch ideas and decided on Nalu’s South Shore Grill, which was rated #1 of 102 in the area.

And it turned out to be a pretty good option. We started with Volcano Fries as an appetizer – with sriracha aioli and sesame seeds, very tasty. I had a Korean bulgogi burger with homemade potato chips.

Ash and Vasco both got the poke bowl, and we split an acai bowl for dessert. Everything was great!

After lunch we went to Boss Frog’s to rent snorkeling equipment for Vasco. We ended up getting some for all 3 of us; we’ll see if Ash and I ever use it!

Our first stop was at Malauka Beach.

Vasco went into the water and Ash and I went for a walk.

The land mass in the distance is the far west side of Maui, where we would be later in the day.

There wasn’t much to see from a snorkeling perspective, so we moved on once Ash and I returned from our walk. Our next stop was Makena Beach a little further south. We went our separate ways again – Vasco in the water, us on a walk. That land in the distance we think is an island called Kaho’olawe.

When we returned from our walk, Vasco was way out in the water. He returned very excited to have seen a turtle. This was the first thing he would say when you asked him what he was excited about for this trip: swimming with turtles. So he was thrilled that happened the 2nd time out.

Our next stop was Kaanapali Beach, up along the far west side of the island. A friend of Vasco’s had been there before – when she was here a couple of years ago on an exchange program – and told him that she had swam with turtles there. And we had to go that direction anyway since it just so happened to be on the way to the dinner reservations we had. And mission accomplished again – he came across a turtle this time, too, and pretty sure he saw an octopus as well. And I caught a cool silhouette of him with the sun setting.

For starters, Ash and I both had the scallops. Ash did his “two appetizers” thing again and also got the Brussel sprouts. All excellent. Vasco had friend calamari but I didn’t get a photo of that. The last photo is Ash’s main, seared ahi.

Vasco and I both had the beef wellington, which was a much better version than the one we had on Christmas Eve. He had “island cheesecake” for dessert and I had pineapple upside down cake with coconut ice cream. Overall, this was a significantly better experience than the other night, at roughly the same price. Thanks, Greg Wine, for the suggestion!

And that was our day. It took over an hour to get to our Airbnb which is in a town called Haiku. We got settled in and Ash went straight to bed. I showered and worked on the blog a bit, just to get everything started.

Today, well, we have no real plans. So we’ll see what we come up with for our one full day here. We leave tomorrow morning for Honolulu.