Aloha, Mahalo and Farewell...

My last few days in the sunny San Diego. Without an apartment of my own, with my car at Chau's place it really feels like I'm leaving...but, it's for New York that I'm departing, which cannot be a turn for the worse. And no matter how sunny San Diego can be, it's just no match for Maui, Hawaii.

Yup, I just came from Hawaii yesterday morning. And boy, what a trip it was. It was Thursday December 14 when I took my flight to the island of Maui, home two volcanoes and from what I had heard, an island of immense beauty. We got there in the evening; Me, Mike, Steffi and Sunshine. But since it was so dark we couldn't really discern whether it was beautiful or not. Our hostel for the first night, the Banana Bungalow was located in a less than inviting neighborhood but our room was decent enough. The owner thought we should have been carrying knives or something while out in that neighborhood. Well, we survived and started off towards Lahaina the next morning. Our car for the week was Dodge Caliber, arranged by Mike, and the car was actually pretty good, very European. And that must be good.

The town of Lahaina is a beautiful old village, though a bit spoilt by tourism, as is most of West Maui. We just chilled at the Kaanapali beach for the most part on that day, and then headed to our condo in Kuleana Club, north of Lahaina and Kaanapali. The apartment was very nice, especially the view from our balcony. We didn't spend much time wondering, but decided to go touring around North Maui despite the warnings by some Expedia tour guides. Told us that you can't drive up there, that you gotta take one of their helicopter tours. Yeah right...my ass. While the road wasn't exactly a seven lane highway, it was decent enough for driving and not that dangerous at all. Instead, it was incredibly beautiful there, with all the villages, bays and mountains. We also saw this hill called the Iao Needle, which, quite frankly, looked like a huge penis to us. Well, turned out that the "peak is known as the phallic stone of Kanaloa, Hawaiian god of the ocean". So it wasn't just a product of our perverted imagination, fortunately.

The next day, Sunday, we just chilled for the most part, at the beach. It was a fun day, but the next one was even better when we went to Big Beach, hands down the best beach I've ever seen in my life. Straight from a paradise post card, like the Garden of Eden. There was also a nude beach right next to it and of course we just had to check it out. Surprise surprise, it was mainly vacated by obese Germans; not much to see there really...in fact my eyes are still burning. After the beach me and Mike hiked up a hill that was strictly forbidden to climb because of some recent earthquakes or something, and landslides. We hiked it up nevertheless and it really wasn't all that dangerous, just some American paranoia. The view was easily worth the 40 minute climb, and it would have been fun to climb it even without the view.

Tuesday was perhaps the best day of the whole trip; we drove down the Hana highway and checked what the southern part of the island had to offer. Simply put it was one of the most beautiful places I've even been to. We saw dozens of waterfalls, small hidden pools and some bamboo forests as well, in addition to the jungle that was all over the place. We had some local banana bread and fresh pineapples for snack, and man it was goood. After driving all the way down to Haleakala national park, we took a hike there to some big waterfalls and bamboo forests, along with some breathtaking sights indeed. Maui wow wee!

The last couple of days were just mainly chilling at the beach and stuff. On the last day I actually played a few rounds of tennis with Mike and man it was fun! I gotta start playing again, it's a lot of fun and a good exercise, especially in the heat of Maui! After playing tennis we went snorkeling and I finally got to see one of those big sea turtles! Damn it was nice swimming amidst all the coral and fish, and even feeding them with some bread...and then seeing a big turtle right before sunset. It was like a meter long almost, so not exactly a baby. After the snorkeling I packed up and flew to San Francisco for my connecting flight. Had a pancake breakfast there, and after a while I was in San Diego again.

These last couple of days in San Diego...well, I got the deposit from my crib, my car is already at Chau's place and available if someone wants to buy it, I'm at Trever's house and pretty much ready to go. Good times, I love San Diego but I know it's time to move on, towards New York City and towards my homeland.