Honeymoon Part V - Up in the Air/ Down in the Sea

Thursday morning was something I'd been looking forward to. Not that I wasn't looking forward to everything else so far, but this day came with great anticipation. Today, Richel and I were to drive to the helicopter pad and fly around Maui via helicopter. Cool! Is it like TV where everyone is hunched over and running over to the chopper? Well, we would soon find out.

Driving to the helipad was interesting. We were surprised how far away it was from the airport. We made a couple of wrong turns here and there even though there are only so many roads in Maui; we were bound to get the right one sooner or later. But I knew we would be driving around cluelessly trying to find out destination, so it was a good thing we left an hour and a half early.

We managed to find the place eventually, but had so much free time that the girl at the front desk told us to come back at 11:15am or so. It was 10:30. Okay. So we drove back to K-mart because Richel wanted to use the bathroom there. I would wait in the car and eat Cheetos. For anyone who has ever eaten Cheetos, you know how everything turns in to an orange mess afterwards, so I had asked Richel to pick up some paper towels while she was going to the bathroom. I thought she was just going to grab a couple of extra paper towels in the paper towel dispenser in the bathroom, but she came back with this big huge role of Brawny (what the....? I didn't make THAT big of a mess, did I?)

Anyway, being the anal person that I am about being on time I thought we should head back a few minutes early. So we got to the helipad, again, at 11:05 or so and the same girl was in the process of rounding everyone up to take over to the helicopters. By 11:15, we were riding in a little shuttle over to the helicopters (didn't that girl say meet back at the desk at 11:15, and not 'we'll be in mid-transport to the helicopters at 11:15'?).

So we got to the landing pad. No helicopters. I guess they were in the process of landing. But while they were doing so, I suddenly felt like I was back in the 3rd grade. The guide/girl had us line up by size and stand on a line while we waited. Reminded me of lining up in the yard during the end of recess. I have to say that our boarding on to the helicopter was quite disappointing because it wasn't at all as exciting as it is on TV; people are crouched half-way down, scrambling over to the helicopter and jumping in just as the helicopter takes off. No, in fact it was quite slow and quite orderly. Our guide broke us up in to 2 groups, depending on which package we bought. Obviously, the 1 hour package (Group A) was more expensive than the 30 minute trip (Group B).

"Those of you in Group A, you'll be flying with Joe. He has the MOST flying experience of anyone on this island, he's been flying for about 30 years."

"Those of you in Group B, you'll be flying with Frank. He has the LEAST flying experience of anyone on this island."

Uh...you're joking, right? Good thing we were in Group A.

So up we went, flying around the skies of Maui while our pilot gave us a nice smooth ride with entertaining bits of information and wisecracks. I had expected that it would be just a regular ride and that we would just fly around, but Joe proceeded to tell us all about the island, the people, the economy, a little of the history, etc., etc. It was every interesting, more interesting listening to him I think than the ride itself. But putting the two together made for a very interesting and fun experience overall.

And I found out that I'm not the only geek out there who buys soundtrack music. As Joe was giving us our tour, he had music playing in the background that changed depending on what he was talking about. And as he talked about a secret government project that was going on the top of Mt. Haleakala he started playing the X-files music! Hey, brother! Then later on, he started playing Jurassic Park! Alright! Another John Williams fan.


Somewhere over the rainbow...



Anyway, a big disappointment Richel and I both had was viewing of the waterfalls. We thought we would get up really close to these giant magnificent waterfalls, but no such luck. I guess having a helicopter flying really close to every one of these would be really disturbing to the residents and hikers and visitors, with helicopters buzzing by every few minutes. But, oh well. Thank God for that zoom function.






These would have been pretty good pictures had it not been for the reflection of my yellow life-jacket. And there we go, again. We're flying in the air and they give us floatation jackets. I'll never understand that. Wouldn't a parachute be more appropriate?

Anyway, just about at the end of the ride I was starting to feel sick. I'm not sure if it was from all the flying around or the fact that we were flying over some sacred grounds in the mountains. But either way we made our way back to the helipad before I had the urge to puke.



No, that's not a dress I'm wearing.

Next was a trip to the Maui Ocean Center that was located halfway to Lahaina. Richel and I had nothing else planned for the day so we decided to check it out. There were many stores and shops around the Ocean center itself, so we broused around, ate lunch, and finally went to the Ocean Center.

First thing I noticed about the Maui Ocean Center was how incredibly expensive it was. Now, I know I can be a cheapie at times, but 25 bucks/person for an aquarium is an awful lot. They better be serving cocktails in there or something.

I have to admit that it was pretty interesting. They had a good mix of indoor and outdoor aquariums filled with all sorts of interesting fish. It seemed like it started out with small fish and the species on exhibit became progressively bigger and bigger as we went along. It was quite interesting because unlike many aquariums where they just have tanks of fish swimming around and you have no idea what they are or why they're important, this one had very detailed descriptions of the types of marine life.




Unfortunately, my camera ran out of battery by the time we got to the larger more interesting fish. But Richel's camera battery was still going strong, and she managed to take a number of pictures.

After the Ocean Center, we went shopping for bathing suits, again. We were actually preparing for the next day, which was snorkeling, again. But being that I was so badly burned that first day, I wanted to find a dry-fit shirt or wet suit/shirt so that I didn't have to expose myself to further sun damage. I found a good shirt, and Richel picked out some swimwear, too.

After buying swimwear, we had to go to Costco (of all places). She really wanted to get Macademia nuts there, so okay. I'm not sure what the difference between buying Macademia nuts from Costco in Maui vs. buying them in Indianapolis is, but okay.

We were all set for the next day.