Keith,
It's the most beautiful place to vacation, you won't want to go home. We spent a week on Maui and loved it. There's Hana with all the lovely water falls, blow holes, black beach, white beach, all that green vegetation. Lovely drive. Then there is the volcano you can hike down which we did, a little ways, always takes you longer coming out just like the Grand Canyon!! We took a sunset cruise the last night out to the middle of the ocean and saw bottle dolphins that came right up to the boat. Then a flying fish to say goodbye to a lovely night and beautiful sunset. Food is always great...luau was awesome of course. Then there is the usual things to do like swimming, snorkling etc. The pineapple plantation was an interesting site to see, Ino Needle (rock formation) and sugar cane fields. The fresh pineapple is so fresh and I ate way too much! So, are you thinking of a cruise of the Hawaiian Islands??? We'd love to go there again and see the other islands as well.

Pat

Jan and I went there for our 25th wedding anniversary in 2001. It was GREAT! Loved snorkeling, and I'm not a water person. Weather was fantastic, of course. It was during the release of the Pearl Harbor movie so went went to see it there and it was unique because there are so many Japanese on the island.

We didn't island hop but stayed on Oahu the whole time. It was recommended by a customer of mine that we rent a convertible and drive to the north shore. We did. It was GREAT and rode the train out to the west bank which is not very developed relative to much of the rest of the island!

Jan's dad served in the navy after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and he drove a ferry boat back and forth from Ford Island to Honolulu. THen he served in Vietnam and made several stops in Hawaii during that time. Going out onto the Arizona Memorial and the Battleship Missouri was especially meaninful since her dad had passed away a few yers earlier. All the movies and pictures he had taken and shared with the family were all of a sudden there before us.

It's an awesome part of creation. We went to a Sunday morning assembly on the beach and the preacher's daughter did a Hawaiian 'hula' dance with a song that was a wonderfully spiritual experience. Amazing how context can change your view of a dance form.

I literally had to drag Jan into the airport terminal when it was time to leave. I hope we can go again sometime with our family.