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Health & Fitness

Aloha from Maui

Why am I on Maui when it's 90 degrees back home, and this is the summer we've been waiting for all year?
For one thing, June is usually gloomy and rainy in the Pacific Northwest and we sit around all month waiting for the hot sunny weather to begin. And, when I booked this getaway for me and the kids, I knew that the beach would be their main focus and we don't have great snorkeling and body surfing in Sammamish. I'd been promising my kids Maui (their favorite place in the world!!!) all winter and wasn't able to get away. So here we are.
I'm at my friend's house in Kahana, hanging with my tween and teen and having a great time. The temps are lower here on the Valley Isle than back home, the trade winds are glorious and the beach has been fantastic. Even though I lived here for ten years and know all the hidden cool places to snorkel, hike, visit, we end up with the masses at Black Rock on Kaanapali Beach because my son wants to jump off the rock and my daughter wants to snorkel around turtles. Yesterday we pool hopped, an activity you can only do if you don't mind crashing the big Kaanapali Hotel pools and risking social ostracism if they ask you to leave, which they never do. When we pool hop, we start at the south end in the Hyatt pool, work our way to the Marriott, Westin and eventually end up at Kaanapali Beach Hotel for a smoothie. My kids think I'm crazy that I make them do this but my daughter loves the pools. Teens already think their parents are stupid, weird, boring etc. so I have little to lose by proving it, dragging them from pool to pool. The teenager takes off on his own as soon as soon as we make a homebase.
Tomorrow we take a boat charter to the Cathedrals off Lanai to dive caverns. (The tween will stay back at the house with my friend to play on her laptop.) My teen and I already did a beach dive the other day to refresh our skills and now feel ready for the easy way to dive--off a boat!
We've eaten ahi burgers with our toes in the sand, drank volcano flows while watching a hula show, wandered shops in search of a funny T-shirt for Dad who had to stay home to sell houses, followed a green sea turtle along the reef at Black Rock, hung with my old friends talking story about the good ole days when we all used to make music and look hot, and I even got the chance to visit a book club to discuss my novel set on Maui.
Mixing a little business with pleasure has been perfectly wonderful as my daughter films me at Honolua Bay doing a video promo for my book. The kids are happy to help poor old Mom sell books as long as I buy them a shaved ice or get that parking spot as close to the beach as possible.
If you've never been to Maui, I highly recommend you consider a vacation to this tropical island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Maui is like nothing else in the world (except maybe Kauai or the Big Island). Sure it's expensive but like I keep telling myself when I pull out that Washington Federal debit card 'I'm making memories for the kids!' 

Kim Hornsby is the Amazon Best Selling Author of The Dream Jumper's Promise and Necessary Detour, Suspense Mysteries for sale at Amazon books

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