The Maui Oceanfront Marathon!

It felt very weird leaving the hotel 15 minutes before the race, but we chose this place because it was about 4 blocks from the starting line. Arriving at what we thought was the starting line (actually the finish line), there was hardly anyone around, and I started getting nervous. Turned out it was just about 400 feet down the road. The corral for the runners was about half as big as it needed to be, and many of us were scattered all around the gates. This wasn't going to be a fast start.

The race course was gorgeous, running out and back along the ocean and among the tropical vegetation.

Heading out. The whole course was on the highway along the ocean. Traffic was great. Everyone slowed down. Many people waved

VERY welcome shade towards the end of the run.

We had surfers, fishermen, gardeners and people in random trucks cheering us on as we ran past. Getting to see the sun rise over the mountain as we approached the halfway point was also pretty cool. Due to my lack of time to train properly and our rather active last few days, I wasn't expecting to run very fast, and I didn't, but it was a fun race.

I ended up 16th in my division, Sumi was 26th in hers. And, most importantly, we both got fish medals!

Fish on the front, turtle on the back

Tonight will be an ocean dinner cruise for the marathon participants. I'm looking forward to being a little pampered! Until then, I think we're going to do our best not to move too much :) Snorkeling is a great full body workout, but it takes it's toll.

A "Day Off"

It was supposed to be a relaxing day before the half marathon. We started with a walk up Front St. along the ocean, intending to head up to a restaurant we had heard good things about. It was about 1.5 miles, so we figured it was a good way to keep loose.

Someone had other ideas..

The walk up to Star Noodle took us past the boat launch we used the other day for our great boating trip, past the Cannery Mall, which rather obviously used to be a pineapple cannery and is now a mall, and through a new industrial park at the base of Puu Kukui, the local volcano. It is said to still be active, in that it should erupt every 250 years or so. The last eruption was 1790, so I wouldn't want to live in the nice new condos here in about thirty years. Past the Maui Trapeze Acrobat School (seriously) and a dry dock that holds the Baywatch Hawaii boats

Never saw the show...

is Star Noodle. The two of us, being television ignorant, didn't know until today that Star Noodle is a restaurant by one of the Food Network's Top Chefs, Sheldon Simeon. This meant nothing to us, other that it would probably be crowded.

Luckily we got in right before the lunch rush are were able to get some seats at the bar (no tables left by 11:30). The food was very well made, though not all of it was to my taste. We ordered...a lot of food, figuring we'd probably never be here again and probably never eat Top Chef food again, so why not?

Singapore Noodles. My favorite. Curry, vermicelli, bean sprouts, peppers, onions, chicken and shrimp, though I got mine without shrimp.

Garlic Noodles. Excellent if you like dashi(fish broth). I don't, and it was too overpowering for me to enjoy. The garlic, scallions and hoison sauce were tasty, though.

Pork Buns. Awesome if you use the horseradish sauce that comes with it. A bit strong, though, as the pork is actually pork belly and, thus, 90% fat

Yakitori. This is very close to what you get in Japan. Sauce was good teriyaki, not too sweet with sesame.

Hot and Sour. Not your typical hot and sour soup. More like bacon soup with a few shrimp in it. Lots of pork, bacon, scallions and what looked like spaghetti noodles. It was actually pretty good, if you like bacon.

Dessert! Malasadas! A Hawaiian donut made fresh when ordered. They were awesome! The sauces are chocolate and butterscotch caramel.

All in all, I'd give it a 4 out of 5, mostly due to personal tastes. The staff was friendly and quick, the food was really pretty good (we ate almost everything). I tend to not care for fatty meat (pork belly, dark chicken meat, bacon) which was the standard fare, but the sauces and fresh vegetables were great.

Sumi got the bright idea that we should really go snorkeling this afternoon, despite having to run 13.1 miles tomorrow at 6:30AM. Once I saw arguing would be pointless, I resigned myself to a slow half marathon and we went to Boss Frog's Dive, Surf and Bike shop

to rent some snorkeling gear and an underwater camera (which we found out about when we got there. I wish we would have had one the other day!). The staff was very good, showing us good places to snorkel and setting us up well for a trip. They also have a great mascot:

So, we headed down to Olawalu, about 6 miles away to the beach and just walked out into the reef. It was amazing how within ten seconds of being in the water, we were seeing fish and coral. It's also amazing how much underwater photography takes getting used to. Sadly, over an hour in the water and we have nothing to show, but trust me, it was cool!

So, we slogged back to the hotel, tired and somewhat dreading the 5AM alarm and the run that will follow.

Whales and Dolphins and Turtles, Oh My!!!

Today may have been the best tourist day of our lives. Not the best traveling day or best trip (I still think cycling through Hokkaido was the best vacation we ever had), but the best day of being a tourist. We booked an all-day snorkeling tour through a company called Ocean Riders, where they were going to take us around the neighboring island of Lana'i to see shipwrecks, wildlife and coral reefs. Light breakfast and lunch included all for $139 each. Sounded fun and was, for Hawaii, rather cheap.

So we geared up and found our way in the darkness to the boat launch at 6:30AM. They had given us directions with landmarks, but with virtually no streetlights, even at 10MPH, we drove right by the church with "Jesus Coming Soon" out front, at first.

Captain Patty and First Mate Jason quickly organized the twelve of us, had a nice breakfast of granola bars, fresh fruit (which on Hawaii actually means, fresh) and juice for us while they gave us instructions and stowed our gear in various places. The boat was small and the fourteen of us were about all that could comfortably fit, and by comfortably, I mean there were seats for about six and the rest of us were sitting on the sides of the big inflatable raft that was the boat. It was a good thing, for this and other reasons I'll mention later, that everyone on the tour was younger and/or in good shape. There was only one couple older than us, and they were experienced divers.

So, on our way to the first snorkeling stop, we must have seen four or five pods of humpback whales at varying distances. We only brought Sumi's iPhone, since nothing we owned was waterproof, and we were going to be in the water all day long, so we couldn't get many pictures while in the choppy water. At the first snorkeling spot, we were told there were a lot of turtles in the area, so we may see one. Well, for these guys, by "may" they mean you may have one come up and shake your hand. There were many green sea turtles hanging out in the reef, and, by following their instructions (don't stop directly over a turtle, they don't like that), I had to stop swimming entirely, so I didn't accidentally smack the turtle that came up to say hi. He hung out with me at the surface for a few minutes getting some air and staring at me, then headed back down to the reef. And I wasn't alone. Most of us had Close Encounters of the Turtle Kind in our 30-45 minute stop.

After getting us back on board, we headed over to a few shipwrecks off the coast of Lana'i. These are not Spanish treasure ship-type wrecks, but WWII and earlier era boats that ran aground or were purposely beached (the standard way of getting rid of unwanted ships pre-1950s). The first one we saw was an old cargo ship that had blow onto the reef during a storm as it was being towed.

Note the rebar mesh. This is a concrete ship!

The island-facing side fares much worse, due to the more constant sun exposure

 The second, that we couldn't approach as closely, was a 1940's fishing-style boat that was run aground and left to die in the Lana'i Ship's Graveyard.

Our next stop was more snorkeling, where we didn't see more friendly turtles, but an amazing amount of colorful tropical fish and coral reefs in very clear water. No waterproof camera = no underwater pics, sorry! After that stop, we headed to a remote beach on Lana'i, where they used to dump female criminals overboard and let them swim a mile to shore and survive on Lana'i, which was a female prison island around the turn of the 20th century. Had we not all been in shape, we would not have stopped here, since the only way on and off the boat was to swim to/from shore. Sounds easy until you note the five foot waves and steep shoreline. Getting to the island was easy: jump off the boat and let the current carry you to shore. Getting back to the boat was a bit more challenging. You had to time the waves to not knock you on your butt (something we failed at, twice) and then swim against a strong tide to the boat. It was a LOT of fun! The beach was deserted and pleasant, and we got to walk around while they get lunch ready.

Lunch was no-frills do-it-yourself deli sandwiches, pasta salad and chocolate and after a morning of snorkeling and boating in the tropical sun, was absolutely delicious. We spend about an hour relaxing with lunch in the cove, then off to see the northern, more severe side of the island with it's steep cliff faces and sea caves.

Hundreds of these little caves dot the island

On our way to our last snorkeling stop, we came across a school of dolphins and Patty decided to "become one of the pod", and we ran with them for a little while!

You will have to forgive the videographer. Sumi was stretched out over the bow of a boat, hanging a few feet over the somewhat choppy water with her iPhone. I chose not to think about either her or the phone ending up in the ocean and just enjoyed the dolphins.

Our last snorkeling spot was possibly the best, with a vast, colorful coral reef complete with turtles, lobsters, schools of tropical fish, and visibility of up to thirty feet underwater.

Minus the shark and manta ray, that's about what we saw

On the way back, we followed a bunch of fighting male humpback whales as they vied for a female's attention. Imagine some cats play-fighting on your living room floor. Now imagine those cats are 35 feet long and weigh about 70,000 lbs. And they're only sort of playing. And there's about five of them. The water would have been a bit choppy without them fighting, and with it, I was afraid Sumi's phone would end up at the bottom of the ocean, so no video, sorry.

So, at the end of our trip, it have been almost nine hours out at sea, we had snorkeled at three separate reefs, each with it's own unique flavor, seen sea turtles, humpback whales and dolphins up close (some up VERY close), viewed shipwrecks, walked on a deserted beach, swam in the ocean, sailed around the island of Lana'i, got quite the history and nature lesson and enjoyed some good food and friendly company. I know we were lucky to have a really nice, laid-back group of passengers with us, but I can't give enough praise to Patty and Jason for just a wonderful trip. They were amazing, and I would recommend this excursion to anyone with the following caveats in mind:

You need to be in shape to get the most out of this. Their site says no one with "severe back or neck problems or pregnant women". I would go further and say if you can't swim for several hours, can't handle a full day in direct sunlight, can't handle very jarring and bumpy rides and are unwilling to pee in the ocean (you're out all day in a tiny boat), you shouldn't go on this trip. If you can, this is one of the most rewarding and enjoyable excursions you will find at a very reasonable price.

So, after that unpaid advertisement for Ocean Riders, all we had energy to do was get some dinner at the aptly named "Penne Pasta" restaurant a block from our hotel. The food was very good family-style Italian at a Hawaii-reasonable price. I had the vegetarian baked penne, Sumi had the whole-wheat?(we don't think it was) spaghetti and we shared a bruschetta. All of it was very tasty and we stumbled home and retired at....5:00? It was an exhausting day.

Tomorrow is our first unplanned day, and if my muscles right now are any indication, will be a very quiet, boring day.

Aloha from Maui!!

Aloha! It's the only Hawaiian word I know!

Well, that's not true, technically. I also know "thank you" (mahalo) and "Merry Christmas" (mele kalikimaka).

Here we find ourselves in Lahaina, Maui for the Maui Marathon! Sumi and I, due to a very busy fall semester, are running the half this year. Oh yeah, and Sumi is here for CME (Continuing Medical Education), which means she's supposed to be hard at work studying, taking notes, etc.

Yeah, right.

We got in last night after about 16 hours of travel (10 of them on a plane) and collapsed in our very nice hotel/condo at Outriggers Ainu Nalu. This morning, we got up at 6:00 and headed out to drive the Road to Hana, which is an amazingly winding, narrow road that goes around the eastern edge of the island, through bamboo groves, rain forest-like areas and along the coastline. About 30 miles of the road is at 15 MPH or less, with many stretches where only one vehicle can fit at a time. It was the most harrowing, yet enjoyable drive I've ever taken.

Bright, sunny day

Volcanic rock archipelagos dot the coastline

Black sand beach

 Absolutely beautiful. The trip took almost seven hours out and back, with some rain on the return trip. I would highly recommend this drive to anyone that finds themselves in Maui. Leave at sunrise, return before sunset. I would never want to drive this road in the dark.

A typical view from the car. Rock face on one side, steep drop on the other, a road too narrow for two vehicles and a curve so sharp, you can't see more than 15 feet ahead of you

These little guys were all over the shore

Rush fans, you KNOW what was going through my head every time I saw one of these signs!

Many nice waterfalls along the road, too

After the long drive, we hit the local Safeway (only real supermarket in the area) to pick up some food for breakfasts and snacks. I knew things were going to be expensive in Hawaii, but I still had some serious sticker shock

Seriously? That's, like, $3.69 per scoop of raisins!

Everything was about twice as much as back home. We decided that eating out for lunch and dinner would actually be CHEAPER than making it ourselves. Heading back to the hotel, we decided to take a quick walk to downtown Lahaina (about 2 blocks away) and see the wharf and a really old tree Sumi had read about. On the way in, we saw a map listing some downtown attractions

An Exceptional Tree?

And then, a block later, we saw the tree

Those are not separate trees, that's all ONE tree!

It was absolutely huge. The tree took up about square block, with about seven or eight branches that formed full-sized trees of their own (including rooting into the ground) but all actually originating from the main tree. I've never seen anything like it. Or heard anything like it, either. It sounded like every bird in the city was there. We could barely talk.

That was it for the jetlagged duo today. Tomorrow, we leave bright and early (6:30AM meet-up) for an all-day snorkeling and whale-watching excursion. Sadly, there won't be any pictures of the day, since it will be largely in a glorified lifeboat in possibly choppy water. I will leave you with a sign from one of the national parks we visited on the Road to Hana, proving that the Japanese do not have a monopoly on amusing signage.

Ancient Burial Airport....