It was an amazing vacation. This is the longest that I have ever been away from work, and the longest vacation Becky and I have ever taken together. Lots of fun. There was of course some stress and frustration, but that is kind of to be expected. But over all we all three agreed it was a wonderful time.
Our last day was no exception. We went fishing in the morning, ate some lunch in the condo, then spent the afternoon at the pool. Ally made an “eyelash lei” our of yarn, and then we ate shave ice one last time, did some souvenir shopping and met up with Gruncle and Aunt Suzie for Italian food for dinner. Then back to the condo for some major Wii action, topped off by Sleeping Queens and one final game of Spite and Malice. For the record Suzie and Becky played 21 games over our 7 days and Aunt Suzie won – 11 games to Becky’s 10 games.
In the morning as I ate my breakfast out on the lanai a cruise ship sailed in to the dock nearby.
The bamboo pole fishing was a success again today. Ally became a pro at taking the fish off the hook and throwing the fish back into the water.
PBJs and Maui style potato chips for lunch – and a beer brewed with passion fruit for Becky, Ally had strawberry guava juice.
On the way to the pool I took a few pictures of the grounds.
Fun in the pool with mama. They were in for about 90 minutes.
Then we saw some adorable black chicks while drying off.
When your 8 year old ask you to go lay in the hammock with her, you do not say no. My book could wait.
The clouds rolled in and it looked like rain so we headed back inside. On the way Ally stopped at the telescopes to look for whales. We could see them with our eyes (no need for the scope) every day in the bay near the hotel. Looking thru the telescopes we saw up close the waves crashing and the chickens on the golf course below.
This is Ellen the Activities Director and Ally – Ellen is who runs all the children and family programs at the resort. She was really fun and we enjoyed everything. Ally is wearing her eyelash lei.
Then it was off for shave ice. Gruncle gave up sweets for lent so he just took us, then he went back to pick up Suzie and we met up with them for dinner. He was astounded at how huge the shave ice bowls are. I will admit they are large – but we didn’t eat it all. Ally had Raspberry, Watermelon and Bubble Gum. She liked the raspberry the best. Becky had Pineapple, Strawberry and Coconut.
We laughed that my shave ice was the Irish flag, Lime, Coconut and Orange Creamsicle. Too bad I’m not Irish, just Manx. We saw more chicks at the shopping center.
Ally bought herself another journal – she used her own money for that.(she is writing in it above. We got her a turtle necklace that holds the pearl she got earlier in the week. She was thrilled because the necklace was only $10.00 – and she did not want something too expensive. She also got a turtle ring with a pretty turquoise gem in it. There was a very nice girl feeding the fish at the resort and she let Ally have some food and feed them too – the fish come right up on the platform and eat our of your hand.
Finally a group shot of the 5 of us!
The sunset was stunning when we got back to our condo and we had to take some pictures.
Ally was psyched she won at big pin bowling. She crushed Becky and Suzie.
Then it was tennis time and Ally played both Gruncle and Aunt Suzie.
Best of all was that Ally beat all 3 of them at regular 10 pin bowling.
A funny note here about the Wii is that Ally, Becky and Aunt Suzie each made their own character to play, but Gruncle played as Spitweed – the name of another character already in the game. Ally and he were so funny about that.
Team pink remote beat team blue remote. Or you could say the brown eyed girls beat the blue eyed people. Soon after Wii it was time to leave for the airport. We had an 11pm flight – a red eye 6 hours long to Phoenix.
Becky looking like a super tourist in her Hawaii T-shirt and Becky’s fresh orchid lei around her neck. Ally did great on the trip – she slept about 4 hours of the first flight. I slept about 90 minutes. Then on the 2nd flight – which is her all curled up above she slept another 3 hours. Becky wasn’t seated with us on this very packed flight, and so I sat in the middle and with Ally curled up using my travel pillow on my lap I was unable to sleep. But at least she was good.
We got home finally – around 6pm. We were so happy to see Cloey. And Cloey was running around so happy to see us. Finally she crashed later in the evening.
We had a huge pile of mail waiting for us. Ally was SUPER excited to open her Valentine’s cards – she got $5.00 from Grandma Debbie & Poppy, with a hand made pop-up card, and another $5.00 from Grandma Barbie and Great Aunt Martha. The girl was thrilled.
It was a rough first night back. Ally fell asleep around 830 – but then woke up at 1130 wide awake and couldn’t get back to sleep until 3AM!!! I woke her this morning at 9AM – we have to try and get back into our normal time zone and routine.
We are glad to be home. But it was a such a fabulous trip.
