We leave on an April 26 flight to LA and then to Maui; we arrive at 5 pm.  We are staying on Maui until noon on Tuesday, May 1, when we fly to Oahu.  We are in Honolulu until noon on Friday, May 4; then a stop in LA and finally to Chicago at 6 am on Saturday.

Since the airfare and hotel are paid for by my company we have to do a little bit of “work stuff.”  We have a meet & greet dinner on the first night. (I am not looking forward to this. I will have to be on my best behavior. Boo!) and then I have a breakfast meeting the next morning for 90 minutes.  (Read: Sue sleeps late.) Other than that, we are on our own.  I am very excited about this trip–especially since it is snowing this morning (April 9; Cubs home opener postponed).  We have created a short list of potential activities and will need to figure out which ones we have time/energy/inclination to do:

1. Watch the sun rise on Haleakala and then a 23-mile bike ride down the mountain
2. Scuba (try dive for Sue)
3. zip lining–yes, Steven, who is petrified of heights, thinks this would be fun.
4. Hiking on Haleakala
5. Hiking on the Acid War Zone Trail
6. Drive the road to Hana and hike along the way
7. Visit Haiku and Paia
8. Kayak to Molokini
9. Sunset kayak tour
10. Some other kayak tour
11. Surfing!
12. Kayak trip to Gilligan’s Island! – wonder if it will be more than a three hour tour (a three hour tour)
13. Hiking on Diamondhead
14. Visiting with Sue’s niece (actually my second cousin’s kid) who lives in Honolulu
15. Relax? – probably not, but figured I would put it in anyway
16. Avoid Steven’s colleagues

A couple of interesting points.  Seems like everything starts early in the morning especially the kayaking.  Haleakala is about 11,000 feet high and the sunrise tour starts at 3 am, so it will be cold.  The kayak trip to Molokini is 3.5 miles each way and since neither Sue nor I are real kayakers, we have no idea how hard that would be. (How hard could it be???)  Sue is not interested in surfing (I have trouble balancing on firm ground.), but I don’t think that will stop me.  I am a certified Scuba diver, but Sue has never done it, so maybe we will try and fit that in to see if she likes it.

When we decided to start up this blog, I did the only thing reasonable –I went out and bought a new toy–a GoPro camera.  (I helped the purchase along when he was dithering by suggesting the blog.) Now I am trying learn how to use it and will hopefully master it before we go. (Hmmm, I noticed this is I and not we. Where’s my GoPro?)   I’ll post some videos before we go so you can see the learning curve (which hopefully isn’t too long) on my new favorite toy.