Feb. 13, 2015: to Kahului and the Maui Tropical Plantation:

  Weird things have been happening to me with Blogger this trip!  Don't know if it's our old laptop, the internet here (at both Kauai and Maui???), or some unknown user error :(, or is it because it's Friday the  13th!?!!!  My Maui blog disappeared.  At least it was only 1 day long, so it was easy to replace.

Anyway---we started the day by going to the Expedia presentation at our resort hoping to win one of the activities.   Last time I won a free luau and the time before that I won a free sunset cruise.  No such luck today.  Then we went to the Worldmark owner update; remember the 15 minute one we went to for Wyndham on Kauai?---they pretty much matched that here.  Took our gift card and left. Thanks Worldmark and Wyndham for the $325 in gift cards to spend in Hawaii

The day was another one not conducive to snorkeling.  They keep getting hit with South swells and before the water can totally clear up, another one hits.  Seems to be affecting the West shores, too.  East seems ok, but the only snorkel beach I know of on the East side is by Hana and that's quite a ways away.  Suppose to be bad again tomorrow.  I hardly know what to do when I can't go snorkeling!!!  But we did have to find a Walgreens one of these days for one of hubby's meds to be refilled, so we decided to do that and take in lunch at Stillwell's.   Just a view here of some of the clouds.  Surprisingly, it was like this all day, but we didn't see any rain.

 OK, there were some areas of blue sky.  Here I was taking a picture of the sugar cane fields.  Wonder how long they'll be around.

  I hinted we should go tour the Sugar Mill, but I got no response from Ken on that.

  On to Stillwell's in Wailuku (next to Kahului).  Interesting area.  Lunch was very good!  They make a great Caesar salad.  Of course the real reason to go there was for dessert.  Got the special---coconut cream pie.  It was good, but not as good as the lilikoi cheesecake we had before.  Guess we'll have to go back!

 

The Walgreens was farther into Wailuku.  We were a bit early, so I suggested we run up the mountain and check out the houses there.  Neat area with great views!

 We were really close to the Maui Tropical Plantation, so we went to see what it was about.  We never would have gone here had we been able to snorkel, but we really enjoyed this place.

 The grounds are huge and well landscaped and maintained.

  Even had a couple old cars here.

  Just an interesting flower. 

  We decided to take the tram tour for $16.50 per person.  It lasted about 50 minutes and was interesting and informative.

  Our guide explained that the palms that have these are Manilla Palms from the Philippines and are for decoration only.

  They have 2 longhorns down from their reserves.  They hope to bring more down.

  I'm still amused when I see people using their tablets as a camera.  Of course I have about 5 cameras and twice as many lenses (only have 1 DSLR camera with 1 interchangeable 18-200mm walk-about lens, a polarizing filter, and 1 underwater  Point and Shoot with me this trip).

  Here are some of the many William or Apple bananas they grow.

  Ti leafs.  She showed us how they're split into thin strands to make hula skirts out of.

  Here she's going over the way to open a coconut.  Very interesting!  From which end to start on, how to use a sharp edge to remove the husk.  Then how to find the soft spot on the "seed" inside and how to know if the fluid is good or not.  Then where to break open the seed.  finally to put it back together with a rubber band and freeze for 3-6 hours, then defrost to be able to peel the white meat off the shell.

  The wind was really blowing.  But it was probably 80 degrees, so it was a comfortable wind.

  views of the mountains.

  more of the plants

  one of the pineapple fields

  Avocados---surprised me.  I thought they grew on a totally different tree.

  Mango orchard.

  how mangos grow on the tree.  I love mangos!

  Even got a kick out of their rainbow painted fire hydrant.

 some of the activities here at the plantation.

  they even have a working windmill that pumps water.

  more of their pretty grounds.

  lots of "decorations" using large old sugar harvesting tools.

 loved the roof covering of flowering vines on the building.

 brilliant green headed duck.

  getting artsy with palm trees reflection.

 anthiriums

an open reception hall

  Two oldies, but goodies.

  They have these old coffee grinders around much of the ceiling of the store.  The store had a lot of neat stuff, too, at very reasonable prices.  I bought a baby outfit (for a baby shower the day after we get home) for $17.99 and a t-shirt for myself for $15.  They had a lot of neat artwork, too.  Not too mention the food market and lotions and stuff made from the stuff they grow.

  From there we decided to check out Costco.  It was a madhouse!  I bet the locals wish us tourist would stay out of there!  We were going to top off the gas tank, but after seeing these lines at the pumps, we decided we could wait.  As I recall, gas was $2.75 at Costco.  We saw it for $2.99-$3.30 at other places.  Not bad considering it was about $2.50 at home.

 Sunset wasn't colorful at all tonight.  The clouds moved quickly, but more piled in and it got too heavy to produce color.  But it was fun sitting in Kalama park watching the activities and the sun, although it was a bit chilly with the strong winds.

  And I did see our first breeching whale---even though it was about a million miles away!

  Dinner was a pizza from Round Table.  We really like their pizza, but don't have Round Table back home!  Didn't hurt that we have coupons from our resort for 20% off.  I didn't get a picture of it before we dug in, so I took a picture of the leftovers.

 No fishy friends again today, but it turned into a pretty good day after all.