We made it to one week of marriage! Yeah! We woke up bright and early to catch a plane to Maui. I have never been one to be afraid of flying in a plane, but I'll admit, I was a little nervous! The inner-island flights are on small propeller planes and I know those don't have the greatest reputations for safety. Luckily I had a window seat and y'all it was such a beautiful sight. We made a pit-stop in Molokai (that flight took about 15 minutes!) which is one of the islands near Maui. Actually, Molokai used to have a community of lepers. When Hawaiians would get leprosy, they were abandoned on Molokai and left there to live. I don't think that's still true today and I don't think they would appreciate me telling you that, ha!
We made it to Maui in a total of about 45 minutes. I wish I would have taken pictures from the plane but they said no phones on and I wasn't about to risk our flight with some crazy radar from my phone just for a few pictures. We had to get up so early that we skipped breakfast, so I was thrilled when we got to the airport and realized there was a Starbucks there!
I grabbed a coffee, we got our luggage, our car, and headed to the hotel! The first thing we noticed was that Maui was completely different than Oahu. The part of Oahu we saw was complete city. There was always something going on, the typical hustle and bustle of a city. Maui was calm, open fields with cows, sugar fields, and gorgeous mountains off in the distance. The clouds from the mountains caused the sky to change colors- rainbows of colors. The drive from the airport to our hotel in Oahu was 15 minutes. The drive from the airport to our hotel in Maui- 45 minutes. It was probably the shortest 45 minutes of my life! At one point on the drive, you can see both Molokai and Lanai (islands) and the water was such a translucent blue. Absolutely gorgeous. My only regret is that we didn't stop to take pictures.
We got checked in to our hotel, was showed to our room, and this was the view from our balcony:
Breathtaking, right?! It was such a beautiful day, you'd think we would have spent it outside exploring...but no. We were starving and it was lunchtime. And we knew there was a Clemson game on back home! So we asked the concierge about any good bars around town...specifically those that had ball games on, and maybe some Hawaiian brewed beer? She pointed us in the direction of Maui Brewing Company- the perfect spot for us! We got to check out a number of wonderful Hawaiian beers and were happily surprised to see quite a few football games on! We weren't the only mainlanders who wanted to catch a game! ;) But our tigers won big on our wedding night (our awesome DJ Joe had the game going on his phone for us!)
-- and again on our honeymoon!
What can we say? Our blood runs orange. :) We were happy campers and left the bar to get ready for dinner.
We grabbed our "before dinner" pictures as we had in Oahu, but for some reason, it didn't quite work out as well for David--maybe it was all the Hawaiian beer? ;)
Take 1...
Take 2....
Take 3...
Take 4...
And take 5....
After 5 shots, we just gave up and went to have our "happy we made it to one week of marriage" dinner! Dinner was at the Lahaina Grill which is a "must" if you ever make the trip yourself. They use fresh, local island ingredients to make the most delicious meals. Both David and I thoroughly enjoyed our dinners. My dress even got to enjoy a little bit of the red wine sauce that came with my meal! (Yep...so sad :( But I got the stain out enough that I don't think anyone can really tell unless they know where to look!) They took our picture together with their camera and said they would send us the picture but we never got it. We did get a card, though!
Our first day in Maui was completely different than I would have expected to spend it, but absolutely perfect in every way!
