We broke the norm with Kahului, spending two days here instead of one. The itinerary planners must have decided that the island of Maui is much too cool to have only one day there. And more importantly, if you want to see the sunrise from the top of Mt Haleakala you have to be spending a night on the island.
At just after 3 o'clock in the morning our cellphones (which we had with us purely for this purpose) were set to wake us up. There was a moment there where the thought of flagging the trip crossed our mind, but more pressing on my mind than the missed opportunity would be the lost cash since our tickets had already been paid for.
Now the first thing you should realise when preparing to drive up a 10,000 ft (~3000m) high mountain is that the temperature at the bottom, and for what has been 99% of this holiday means nothing at the top of the mountain. The ticket even had written on it to be dressed for cold conditions. Well, Adrian reads this and thinks "Hmm, maybe I'll bring a jersey then". I was freeeeeeezing at the top, I should have worn every jersey I'd packed (2). In case you're wondering how is it possible to drive to the top of a mountain 200 m taller than Mt Ruapehu, it's because it's shaped like a great big shield, and the sides are nicely rounded.
The cold was worth it though. When I saw all the clouds I was thinking to myself that we'd be missing out on seeing the sunrise, but really they made it all that much better. There was a layer of clouds below us, so it felt like we were floating on them, and then as the sun made it's way up the few remaining clouds above us turned all the colours from a deep purple to bright golden yellow. A single photo doesn't do it justice. We actually took a whole succession of photos which show the changing colours, but still they don't do it justice.
Once the sun was up I'd hoped things would warm up, but they didn't really, so I quickly jumped back on the tour bus. Other sites we visited on this tour were the obvservatory, which we didn't go inside of, so was really just a view of pretty white dome shaped buildings, and a view of some of the craters of Haleakala. Haleakala in Hawaiian means "House of the Sun" by the way. It's supposedly the place where in Polynesian legend Maui captured and slowed down the sun. On top of the mountain there was also a visitor centre with some small souvenirs like fridge magnets and postcards etc. We bought the album of Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, a really big guy in Hawaiian music. Unfortunately we never had the chance to listen to it on our honeymoon, but it gets regular playing time now that we're home. It always reminds us of our honeymoon since a lot of the tour buses would play it in the background.
With our excursion for the day starting and finishing so early we had lots of spare time in the afternoon. Most of the restaurants and bars onboard the ship are closed during the day time, since mose of the guests are off on excursions. So we saw this as the perfect opportunity to try out room service. Room Service is great! Just like all of the other food on the boat, food ordered from room service is also free, the only cost is if you want to order drinks. It's pretty strange that you can order stacks of pizza, wraps, fruit, soups and chocolatey desserts for free, yet pay $4 for a litre of water. Claire and I were pretty hungry after the sunrise tour so we ordered a fair bit, and I was on the verge of bursting afterwards as shown in the photo. One thing we learnt about Hawaiian culture on this trip though is that you don't eat till you're full, you eat till you're tired. So I had a nap after lunch. And calories are something to worry about once you're back home.
The rest of the day we spent onboard and chilled out, and took the opportunity to do a tour of the ship with the camera. Here I've also posted a few of the photos from the boat, showing the stairs with shiny banisters for sliding down; the very tropical looking pool and spa area; the hallways that seem to stretch on to infinity; and our favourite place: Mixers Martini and Cocktail Bar.
Despite stuffing myself full for lunch we still had to have a nice dinner. This time it was Cagney's Steakhouse, which was one of the restaurants that attracts an extra cover charge charged to our room account. So naturally my expectations were high. Honestly, I was a bit disappointed. It was funny that they offered their "Cagney's special Ceasar salad" yet it was exactly the same as all the other ceasar salads at all the other restaurants. I'm guessing that this restaurant (and I'm stereotyping here) is for larger than life Texans who can't go a week without a half kilo steak.
So ended another great day of our honeymoon =)
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