Last Day, Boo Hoo

Packing day, how awful! It has been a wonderful trip.

 We have seen a lot of beautiful places from land, sea, and air.

The guest speakers we had throughout the trip definitely

did their job as “enrichment speakers.

First we had our maritime expert who told wonderful stories

about cruising through the years.

Then we had both a former NASA employee and a naturalist

who works with the Hawaiian volcanoes, and they gave very

Interesting presentations. (Two more today).

I won’t close this blog until after we get home because I

may remember things I want to add.

Moon over Pacific

I told you about the moon. The next night it was one of the most

beautiful moons I have ever seen. We got some pictures but they

did not capture the full beauty.

A Distant View

A Little Closer

Really Close

After Dark

In the Clouds

WHALES! WHALES! WHALES!

One of the few we captured on film

It was there

At a distance\

A Nice Picture (finally)

Almost caught it

YES!

See what I mean about trying to 

photograph around others

Pal Sunday Part 2, WHALES!

Our afternoon adventure was incredible! I have not had

an interest in whale watching until recently. We keep sailing

through areas that have lots of whales and I never see any.

I decided we would have to take a tour and hope we saw

some.

 Did we ever pick the right day and time. We saw whales

Whales, and more whales. It was fantastic. People were moving

all over the boat trying to see them.

Whales do not surface and hang around, so you have to focus

quickly. The boat is not steady. Sometimes it bounces really

bad. Therefore, it is difficult to get good pictures. But I promise

you everyone was ecstatic at the number of surfacings we saw.

The guide with us described what we were seeing.

We saw a mother and calf with her escort several times. We

saw two whales that seemed to be trying to make a claim on a

female. We saw tails surfacing, we saw flukes. And we just
saw lots of whales.

It was an incredible new experience. We couldn’t have asked

for a better day.

After dinner as I was walking outside, we saw a small whale near

the ship. It was so small I wondered if it were really a whale,

but was told it was a calf. It had a small tail compared to most we

had seen earlier.

Then to top the day off, a beautiful full moon.

It was a really wonderful Palm Sunday.

Maui Helicopter View and Beyond

Grand Princess from Helicopter

Maui Mountains and Valley

More Maui Mountains and Valley 

Foster and Linda after great helicopter ride 

World's Largest Banyan Tree?

And this is not the Complete Tree

Aerial Views of Molokai

Coastline

More Coastline 

And More Coastline

Mountains and Valley 

Reef 

Closeup of Reef

Palm Sunday Part 1

What a day!

When we came into Maui the sky was almost covered

with clouds. I was concerned about our helicopter ride.

The clouds did not all go away, but we still had a fantastic

ride.

We went first to Molokai and then returned over our

ship back to Maui. We flew over and around mountains,

saw lots of waterfalls, and the reef around Molokai was

beautiful. Just the experience of seeing all this from the

air is incredible.

Since we were tendering, we did not want to go back to

the ship before our afternoon tour, so had lunch at a

local restaurant. We had seats at the bar and could watch

the NCAA. We did not get to see FGCU win but knew they

were close at halftime and I reminded Foster they were a

good second half team. We were delighted when we got

back to find out they had won. Way to go Eagles!

While we were sitting at the bar a waitress came by to pick

up beverages and Foster began talking to her. She said she

was born in Maui but attended high school in West Virginia

and Florida. We found out it was in Fort Myers and the

school she attended is very near us. Small world.

All grown up Hawaiian Children's Hula Dancer

Hawaiian Children's Hula Dancers

Last night we were entertained by the Children's Hawaiian Children's Dancers.
They were delightful.

More Hawaiian Children's Hula Dancers

Two more young hula dancers

Narrator and dancer

Hula

More Hula

Hawaiian Children's Hula Dancers

Young Dancers

One of the beautiful young girls

More of the lovely girls

Dancing the Hula

More Hula

Kauai

We have been to Kauai three times before and two times we took

the helicopter tour. Obviously we liked it or we would not have

done it again. We had never done a helicopter on the big island

although we had done one on Maui, but they have another that

also includes Molokai so we chose the ones we had not done before.

Maybe we’ll be back and can do Kauai again.

On two of our trips here we visited the Fern Grotto which is really

nice.

We have some beautiful pictures of Kauai but we were here long

before digital cameras so all our pictures are either slides or

photographs. 

Brandi and Foster

Brandi and Foster

Lunch with Brandi

I forgot to tell you we had lunch with our “almost next door

neighbor” on her last day here. Brandi is a very nice person.

When I asked her about getting back on ship with her passenger

in transit card, she said she stayed with an elderly couple who

needed help. She tried to explain to the people near her what

was going on because they did not know what was causing the

delay. Hopefully she will be on a future cruise with us.

March Madness

We did not get the NCAA game shown on our schedule much to

my delight. Instead we got FGCU vs Georgetown. So we got to

see our home team pull a major upset.

We moved to Fort Myers in 1997. That same year just a short

distance from where we were renting while waiting on our coach

home to be built, a new university opened-FGCU. We have grown

up with them and watched it grow into a very good school. The

sports teams have done very well as they’ve gone through various

divisions on the way to Division I.  Most people didn’t know who

FGCU was. Now the March Madness fans do.

Kilauea

Steam along ocean

Note the trees. More than 100 homes were

destroyed during this recent erruption

What a way to see a volcano

Not a lot, but at least we saw some lava

More volcano

Nice view of Kilauea 

A little more lava

Waterfalls

Returned from great trip

Chef'sTable

Appetizers and champagne in galley

One of the many appetizers and a beautiful carving

Caviar

A Real Bread Basket

Dessert

Menu 

Linda and Foster with Chef Jeremy