Home Again

Our first port was Maui where we stayed for two days. I always feel like I'm coming home when I go to Maui. So I felt very relaxed despite waking up with a fever and chills. I was tempted to spend a few more hours in bed until I saw the look on Ryan's face (kid in a candy store) and knew I needed to muster some mind over matter to get through the day.

We met the Cutlers in the Salt Lake airport and I promised I would take them to the best place on Maui to see turtles first thing Sunday morning. So despite how miserable I felt we headed to Makena behind the Maui Prince hotel to turtle town.

At first I was very discouraged because the water was so murky and I couldn't see any fish let alone turtles. But finally, after a good half hour of searching one appeared almost right before my eyes. I called out to Dave Cutler and had my camera ready just as it turned to face me (the perfect picture) when all of the sudden my toe cramped. I missed the shot as I struggled to get my fin off. A claspe broke and sank, forever lost on the bottom of the ocean, and I floundered about trying to tread water with one fin off and one on.

Fortunately, that wasn't the last turtle we saw and Ryan was able to get this picture.

Unfortunately, I had to swim with a fin on my hand and one on my foot and spent the rest of the cruise just snorkeling without fins (which ended up being just fine). I also lost my snorkel as I was getting out of the waves and didn't realize it until I was putting my gear away. I ran back into the waves to see if I could see it (on the bottom) when someone called out "hey, I think I just found a snorkel!" Uh, yeah, that would be mine. Good thing I bought the pink one!

After a little bit of shopping at our favorite ABC store we headed up country to Aunt Lynne's house. It was so cool to finally meet Don. What a great guy! We had a really nice dinner (and dessert) together and got a nice feel for Lynne's new house. It's a sunny little place that's just perfect for her. I wish we could have stayed longer but Ryan had a group get together we needed to be back for which I opted out of since going to bed sounded like a better idea. I was still feeling pretty miserable and hoped I could get better quickly since we had big plans the next day.