Thanksgiving on Maui

Sariah’s aunty lives on Maui and invited her over for Thanksgiving and Sariah invited me! This was our first time traveling to another island. We found great deals on Hawaiian Airlines and jetted off the day before Thanksgiving. We asked a guy named Helem from our singles ward to give us a ride to the airport, and he agreed! We didn’t know him super well, so the drive was full of awkward small talk. Not my favorite car ride. When we flew into Maui, I remember thinking how brown the island looked. One thing I didn’t expect about Maui was how dry it was. It looked like half the mountain had burned, and all that was left was brown, charred dirt. Sariah’s uncle picked us up and drove us straight to the house. We were eager to start exploring the island, but when we asked them what we could do, we quickly realized they had no desire to do anything with us. They were totally content sitting on the couch all day watching movies. So that’s exactly what we did on our first day. I think we watched three Captain America movies or something. That night, we booked a rental car on Turo so we could actually get out and see the rest of the island the next day.

I woke up on the roof the next morning because I couldn’t sleep inside. One of Sariah’s cousins or uncles snores super loud, and I wasn’t getting any sleep. So I dragged my cot up to the roof and slept under the stars. When her family found out where I’d slept, they were shocked I didn’t get attacked by night marchers. Apparently, I had my feet pointed toward the door, which (according to local legend) means they can come for you. I wasn’t stressed about it, though. We had Thanksgiving dinner early that morning. And I mean early. I came inside at 8 a.m. and the instant potatoes were already made, the boxed stuffing was done, and the pie was just sitting there on the counter. Our feast started right then. We scarfed down some food before heading out to explore the island. First time renting a car. I'm a big kid now!

We started off by driving the road to Hana stopping at all the waterfalls we could. We couldn't believe how beautiful this side of the island was. We ran through bamboo forests and jumped into many waterfalls. In the car, we had the windows down while singing country at the top of our lungs. One thing I really like about Sariah is that she is always down for anything anytime. I think we stopped counting all the waterfalls we jumped in.

On the road to Hana, we probably saw a million signs advertising banana bread. After the 50th one, we decided we needed to stop to try it. We were enjoying the bread when I found a long hair in mine. I would rate the world's best banana bread a 1/10 for that experience alone. Despite the hair in the bread we were able to see a black sand beach for the first time all the way at the end of the road. 

Some of our other Maui adventures included snorkeling for the first time! We saw a sea turtle the second we jumped in the water. I think it freaked Sariah out for a minute because the turtle was getting very close to her.

On our last day, we went to ʻĪao Valley and swam in these crystal-clear pools in the river that runs through the valley. We couldn’t believe how deep and clear the water was you could see everything perfectly just by opening your eyes underwater. We probably jumped into those pools a hundred times. Sariah’s family was really kind to let us come crash at their place. They’re huge Disney fans, so one night we stayed up for hours trying to answer Disney trivia questions. I swear I know some Disney stuff, but I couldn’t even BS an answer or come up with anything. Sariah and I laughed pretty hard that night in bed about how bad we were at that game.