Haleakala-Day 3

For Brian and I day 3 started SUPER early. We only got about 4 hours of sleep but we pushed ourselves the whole day even with only that much sleep. We got up at 1:50 am since we were being picked up at 2:40 am by the company we were doing our sunrise bike ride with. Jan and Spencer got up about an hour or so after us to drive themselves up to see the sunrise since they couldn't do the bike ride with Kaden.
Although we were tired, the sunrise on Haleakala was gorgeous!! Plus Brian and I learned a lot of history from our guide that took us down the volcano. It was funny because we found out that our tour guide's family we actually know in Utah. Such a small world.

Bright and early waiting for the sun to rise in the "cold"

 We were really cold up here waiting for the sun to rise but a couple locals kept saying that it was so warm!! It was a 47 degrees which I guess is warm for the morning up here but we were definitely cold.

Caught up with Jan and Spencer and cold Kaden.

Only my hands were freezing at this point from taking pictures. Luckily with our company they gave us windbreakers for our whole bodies. I am so glad I had some warm clothes that I didn't have to pack.

 Once the sun rose up they came out and did a cheer/chant. This park is so special and full of history. Sadly we had some people who didn't understand how to truly respect it. They had to be yelled out for going off the trail which kills a lot of the plants and the animals that bury eggs in the ground. It is a very fragile ecosystem up here.

Jan and Spencer spent more time up at the vistor center after the sun rose since they drove themselves up.

Trying to hold the sun in his hand.....

Look into the crater which is technically not a carter anymore since it is not in a full cup anymore due to erosion.

This is an extremely rare plant that if you get even close to it you could kill the roots and it dies easily due to this and so is hard to find.

 We were back in the bus heading to get our bikes at this point. We were told that we had seen a glorious sunrise that isn't seen very often from here. Although advertised as the best spot for the sunrise in Maui, the sunrise we saw is only seen every 2 to 3 months. It normally is not this clear. The clouds like to cover a lot of the sky most of the time. We did have some clouds move up and in the way if you look at the pictures above but luckily it wasn't that bad of clouds coming up.

 Here is where we were let out to get our bikes. This is a picture of a sugar cane field on fire. We found out how this came about. There were some workers who were upset with their wages and decided to burn the field in protest. When they went out to assess the damage of the fields afterward they found that the sugar had actually crystallized and had more sugar for them to harvest. So the workers were fired and now they burn all the sugar cane fields before harvest.

Getting ready to get helmets and jump on the bikes.

No pictures on the ride due to safety. Here is our first stop. We pulled up to the side of the road and took some fun pictures. We had to wear a full head helmet to do this ride for safety reasons since we were going anywhere from 18 mph to 30 mph down the volcano. It was a blast. We got clocked at one time and I was going 25 mph!!! Crazy!!!!

Playing around on the bike

One of my favorite pictures of us.

There is a forest you see there and we ended up riding through it. Here is where we learned a lot of history about the island, cities, and the other islands around Maui. There is one island that was used for lepers. Any time someone got sick with it they were banished and thrown in the ocean to swim to this island. That island has now been purchased and sold by a couple people. They guy who owns it now wants to cover the island in windmills to power all of Hawaii islands.

Ready to ride again. This time I wasn't nervous. Our first driver really scared me and a couple other people into thinking we couldn't even ride a bike, luckily our guide was amazing at boasting our confidence and we flew down the volcano. It was so much fun and believe me when I say anyone could do it if you have the right guide. Ours was riding down with no hands on his bike like the whole time. If he can do that, I can do it with only the light pressing on the breaks.

It was interesting to learn that this vegetation was what is actually native to Maui. Not the tropical green plants that we saw lots of other places around the island. Everything has been introduced through the people who discovered the Hawaiian islands.

 One interesting thing to learn was that Maui has a very big pest problem. They have major rats and ferrets problems. The rats were introduced accidentally but the ferrets were brought over to get rid of the rats, only problem they are awake during opposite times of the days. So now they have both pests with no natural enemies so they don't die very easily. The national park wants to keep the native vegetation and animals so every day they have people monitor the fences and kill any nonnative animal that gets through the fence. Then once a month volunteers walk the land and get rid of any plants that have taken root that are not native.

  The whole bike ride was a blast. We had one person in our group fall, we aren't fully sure why all we can say is we are happy she fell to the right and landed on the grass and not to the left where she would have fallen into the road. When we finished the ride we were starving. We stopped to grab food and then got into the van to head back to get dropped off at our place. Once there we met back up with Jan and Spencer, we changed, and headed out. First stop, Shaved Ice. We asked our local guide and the place that was just a mile and a half down the road from our place is said to be the best on the island. We didn't try anywhere else because we enjoyed them so much that why try somewhere different when these ones are supposedly the best?!

we shared so we could come back and get a 2nd one later. We got the Sunset one with Macadamia Nut ice cream on the bottom and a snow cap.

I don't remember what they got but they liked them

Then we headed to the beach to relax. Sadly the wind was blowing like crazy so we had a few interesting things happen. Like we tried to boogie board and Jan and I got catch in a current that was pushing us toward the rocks. I was able to swim sideways and pull myself out of it, Jan wasn't able to as well and she had a battle with a couple of rocks before she got out. It was scary! We then moved way over on the beach to the other side of the beach to prevent getting caught again and that close to those rocks. We had fun relaxing in the chairs and playing in the sand. But the wind was really blowing so we didn't stay super long just an hour and a half to two hours.

Or the sidewalk beach.....we think. We got weird names from the people we were staying with on the beach names which made it even harder to find them.

Playing in the waves while the others rest from boogie boarding.

He would sit up when the waves came in and splash in the water.

Then he would crawl after it when it left.

Building a sand castle with mom......more like destroying it. He loved to see it break apart.

We all loved the beach even though we were exhausted by this point in the day. We were all smiles and laughs.

Loved the holes his dad would dig for him at every beach. This was the first hole.

This beach was pretty and empty. It was a perfect place to come and relax after a long day.

Although I didn't get a picture of Brian and I at the beach we enjoyed our time here. It was the perfect first day on the beach. We left the beach to go and eat at a local place at a normal dinner time. We ran to get cleaned up and to figure out where to eat. While we were deciding Brian and I didn't really care where we went we just knew we wanted another shaved ice since we wouldn't have much more time to get some so we headed out to grab one before dinner.

Best shave ice place in Maui

I don't remember what this one was called but it had mango, pineapple, and coconut flavors on it with a coconut pudding on bottom and toasted coconut on top. This was divine. It was probably my favorite one!!!

We went to the MonkeyPod Kitchen for dinner. Brian and I had the local catch of the day. It was good but we were all exhausted by this point Kaden actually crashed and put himself to sleep this night because we had had so much fun and went so hard the whole day. Here Slater joined us and we got a picture with him.

We were ready for our next day adventures and to go to sleep at an "early" hour. It was fun to go out to a fancier place for one night.