The Final Days of Hawaii

Day 14
On Monday we woke up to winds and more rain--rain was definitely a factor on this trip. I'd been thinking of trying to find a hike for the boys and me while my parents went on their ziplining excursion but, like all other excursions on this trip, it was canceled. We waited out the rain for awhile, Garrett and I worked on his reading and my dad read books to Matthew. When the rain let up, we decided to go on a beach walk that we started in Napili. We didn't make it all the way because I had a couple of tired boys but what we did was gorgeous--albeit very windy. I was pretty sure Matthew was going to blow out to sea if we weren't careful.

That afternoon I made the boys both take a nap. Garrett, who WAS. NOT. TIRED. fell asleep in a matter of moments. Of course there was more pool that day and we finished with a trip to Aloha Plate for a Hawaiian plate dinner.

Day 15
It was our last day in Hawaii and I was thrilled that we had decent weather. We got up and headed to Black Rock to enjoy a long morning of snorkeling, swimming and jumping off cliffs. My dare devil five-year-old wanted to jump off the very top but I did not allow that since I didn't think he could jump far enough to clear the rocks. I did let him jump from a shorter rock. My dad took him first and he climbed up the rock and promptly jumped off. No fear whatsoever. I took him later and he begged me to let him go higher. I let him go up a couple more feet and he jumped again without hesitating. While I was out with him, a sea turtle swam directly underneath me. If I'd extended my arm, I would have easily been able to touch it as it went by.

When we got back to the condo, we had lunch and then the boys spent the afternoon playing with a couple of new friends in the pool. That's when I first heard about the shark attack. My dad saw some guys on wave runners patrolling the beach we were staying at. He went down and inquired as to what was going on. That's when we found out that, just a short distance south from where we were, a girl had been bitten in waist deep water. Our beach was closed for most of the afternoon.

I packed up the rest of our stuff that afternoon and we ate dinner. Then we watched the waves for a little while before leaving to head to the airport. Of course, we stopped in Lahaina for more shave ice first.

Our flight left at 10:50 and I had some very tired boys. They slept almost the entire way to San Diego. We landed in San Diego at 6:45 PST, which was 3:45 am to us.