One thing about Maui is that it has a ton of waterfalls. The second picture is of a water fall we saw while driving down the infamously treacherous Hana hwy (it's extremely curvy, frequently narrows down to one lane, is bordered by sheer ocean cliffs, and is packed with sight-seeing tourists like ourselves.) The first picture is of an enormous waterfall that we hiked two miles to see. The hike was really beautiful though. Part of the time it was like hiking through a tropical rainforest, while the other half was a hike through a dense bamboo forest. The picture above of our friend allison shows just how thick the bamboo was and the darkness of the trail (even though it was 10 am in the morning) because of the dense canopy.

Where Mordor meets the ocean

black sand beach

This picture is of christina and I at the last true blacksand beach on Maui (the big Island has a bunch). We went here after attending the local LDS ward in Hana - they only meet for a two hour block! Not to mention they attend church in a building that is paradise. The chapel walls are lined with screened doors that are left open so that there is an extremely pleasant breeze that passes through the church and brings with it the smell of fresh tropical flowers. Needless to say I had a difficult time staying awake. This black sand beach was very interesting. Most of the sand was still too rocky to walk barefoot on and there were several places where these vibrant green plants just seemed to pop out of the sand and rocks. After being on the beach we tried to hike back to our car the long way and ended up getting lost in what seemed like the land of Mordor (not withstanding the ocean). The pictures above and below this post are from that day.

the big jump

Our Trip to Maui

This is us at the Venus pools in Maui (just a little south of Hana - which is on the East coast of Maui.) It was one of the coolest places we went while in Maui. It was absolutely gorgeous; it looked like a set straight out of a movie. Although words can not really describe it, I'll try. It was a crystal clear blue pool surrounded by smooth terraced rock faces (those were the only places you could sit) and it faced the ocean, which you can see came crashing into the rocks on the other side. It was secluded and relatively unkown so it wasn't packed with people, and there were a few awesome jumps (about 50 feet high) that we got to go off of (look at the next pic). The other couple in the picture are our vacation and school buddies Allison and Moema Matsoso. Allison is an Airforce brat and has lived all over the world and Moema is from South Africa. He is from the Zutu tribe and speaks a bunch of different African languages (one of the languages utilizes clicks!) They met while serving their missions in South Africa.