Maui Honeymoon!

Honeymoon! Nathan and I spent our honeymoon in Maui, Hawaii with a short jaunt over to Kauai for a friend's wedding. We were able to spend 12 days in paradise, from May 12th-24th.

This is probably my favorite honeymoon photo. A friend took it at the wedding rehearsal dinner on Kauai. We were displaying appalling amounts of pda and kissed for the camera. Adorable, no?

 

But back to the beginning. This is us at Seatac airport, waiting for our 9am flight. Nathan convinced me that on Hawaii time, it meant it was time for a drink. It was 6am in Hawaii ... apparently it's always time to drink in Hawaii.

At the Kahului airport on Maui. Nathan went and got a lei necklace for me. I was rather delighted by this.

On our way to the Kaanapali Beach! We stayed at The Whaler. A HUGE thanks for an amazingly generous wedding present goes to Nathan's Aunt Tina and Uncle Jett who let us stay at their luxury condo for free.

More photos of the drive into our place - I was very excited

My sexy driver

His attractive navigator

First order of business once we got settled in - walking to the nearby barefoot restaurant The Hula Grill and getting Mai Tais in time for the sunset!

Couples massage. Seemed like a good idea but is highly overrated. It was nice enough but it was odd to be involved what I can best describe as a sort of synchronized swimming style massage routine. It was a little eery to have the EXACT same massage going on for both of us, right down to what they said to us. Also, I wasn't supposed to talk and apparently I'm bad at relaxing. So I tried really hard to relax and this caused some stress ... not a great outing all in all.

On our romantic dinner cruise up the Kaanapali beach!

The Whaler! We were on the 9th floor of the building on the left.

Black Rock. Some of the best snorkeling on the island was literally a few hundred meters from our condo. We saw a turtle here later on!

Sunset view on the boat. Yes, this is paradise.

A photo of the two of us at the front of the boat. It was quite windy but oh so pretty.

On our snorkeling cruise! See my swimsuit coverup? That's exactly how I burned that day. Boo.

Awesome photo using the underwater camera that turned out to be not so awesome ... it died after about 15 minutes underwater. It was our only camera for the trip and luckily it dried out after about a day, but we were pretty scared that we had killed it forever at first.

There's a humuhumunukunukuapua'a in this photo if you look carefully at the center. Yes, I enjoyed saying that around Nathan and he worked hard over the course of the trip to be able to say the name of Hawaii's state fish!

Me being a hardcore snorkeler. It was actually my first time snorkeling ever, I really enjoyed myself!

Our phony wedding rings Nathan insisted we wear for snorkeling in case our real ones managed to somehow slip off. I fought hard against this but in the end it was kind of fun to pick out fake wedding bands that would calm Nathan's fears. Silly boy.

On our way back on the snorkeling trip. Such a fun day!

We found a Chinese history museum (of all things) in nearby Lahaina and had a great time looking around. I am really sunburned by this time.

Apparently going to Star Noodle was a "must" on our trip. Nathan and I thought it was pretty darn good!

We took many naps on this trip. I want to point out that this is a king sized bed and Nathan is managing to take up the whole thing.

Nathan made dinner while I drank wine and wrote him poems on the margins of a newspaper.

Our delicious mahi mahi dinner with salad and asparagus! My favorite meal of the trip.

Outside on our wraparound deck. We had a view of both the mountains and the beach and could see about 2/3 of the sunset. We loved this condo.

Mm mm, SUCH a nice view! ;)

At Burger in Paradise at the tourist trap that is Lahaina. I loved Lahaina.

You can't see in this photo, but we're right by the water.

Getting a piece of honeymoon art commissioned, we picked it up later in the week.

We went to what was definitely the most hole in the wall "gallery" in Lahaina. It's the tiny spot directly to the right of the big tickets sign and to the left of the two story building. Yeah, it was small.

We decided to take a scenic drive up north and I said I wanted to drive out to that big point in the distance.

This is what we soon faced on the way. Apparently this is still a two lane road ... very scary, especially with all the blind turns!

This is how close to my point we ended up getting. Large landmarks are always further away than they seem.

Nathan is so strong!

Oh wait, maybe it's me that's the strong one

Scenic smooch

Hanging loose on the car ride back. Also, note my fancy chocolate pearl necklace, Nathan got it for me as a wedding present! Absolutely love it, I wear it all the time. Nathan got a 9mm Ruger SR-9 for his wedding present but he didn't get that until a few weeks later when we had returned to Washington. He loves his present as well, there have been a number of trips to the gun range since we returned.

Just chilling on the beach. Who's a tourist?

Getting a honeymoon tattoo of the temporary variety

Nathan is so brave

Hurray, honeymoon tattoos! Mine says "Property of Nathan" and Nathan's says "Anne's Bitch." So the story is, we had walked by the temporary tattoo place a couple days before and Nathan had said "Hey, we should get something!" I said, "Haha, I could get a tramp stamp that says Property of Nathan." Nathan thought this was a good idea, but I didn't really want to do this. Then I said, "Okay, I'll do it if you get a tattoo that says Anne's Bitch." He said yes ... so much for trying to pick something that would be too ridiculous for him to say yes to. This isn't the first time I've done something like this to Nathan and it's backfired on me. Darn boy!

Heading over to Kauai for Nathan's friend's wedding. Yes, we planned our trip so we'd be able to make their wedding.

This is travel chic, for the record.

Restaurant on Kauai with indoor Koi pond

Mai tais were definitely the drink of the trip

Nathan made fun of me - a lot - for getting really cold by the pool at our hotel and layering up with towels

At the wedding reception for Nathan friend's wedding. Look at all the drinks!

Oh no, no more drinks!

Nathan's friend Pat, who was getting married. They share a special connection.

Not gonna lie, I was not always my husband's #1 priority on our honeymoon. Just look at this man love.

Gorgeous Shayna walking down her "aisle"

Shayna and Pat's wedding

It was right outside our hotel. I'd say the view was okay.

A few shots of the posh setup of the hotel pool that we took right before leaving

The pool was ridiculous, wish we had taken more photos. It went around in a big loop, there was a bridge out to the center where you could have fancy cabanas by the water.

On our way back to Maui!

On the Road to Hana - we stopped for smoothies!

The people built their stand right by their houses, very convenient

They grew their coconuts on trees right by the stand

At the Seven Sacred Pools - the unofficial end to the Road to Hana. Nathan is thinking this might be a good place to explore ...

A banyan tree! These things get huge.

Nathan showing me the way to the bamboo forest!

Trapped in the bamboo forest!

Some nice people took our photo. It was REALLY hot on this walk, you can see how much we're sweating if you look closely at this picture.

We made it to the uppermost falls!

At the end of our hike!

Nathan is so proud of us

Many people asked us if this was our honeymoon and seemed delighted to find out it was. Also, please note my glorious sunburn, compliments of falling asleep under a palm tree on an overcast afternoon on Kauai.

Back down at the bottom of the falls. We swam here. It was quite cold.

On our way back home we made a stop at a red sand beach! Apparently it's just a black sand beach with iron deposits that make the sand rust and turn red. Crazy!

Nathan shows off a red rock. Great view.

We were the only ones here, it was quite fun and a little scary

Scary because this is what we climbed down to get to the beach. I wish I had thrown my bag over there for scale, it was extremely steep and slippery to get back up. And I'd say it was at least a 30 foot climb. I would have had a lot more trouble getting up and down if it wasn't for Nathan.

This was about the extent of the red sand beach we went to. Around the corner it opened up to a pretty big beach, but you had to climb over a cliff edge to get there - except I don't know where you were supposed to put your feet, it was a straight drop down from the path above from where I could see when we were on the upper path. So this was the "easy" beach to get to.

Getting some necessary nourishment after Road to Hana

Maui Tacos is in a mall and was a pain to find, but I'll be darned if it wasn't delicious!

I clean up good, especially when fed all this food

Picking up our completed work of art. Beautiful!

Nathan was VERY excited to find out that Maui Brewing Company was just a 10 minute drive from our condo on Kaanapali

Beer menu

We each had about the equivalent of a beer each after sharing all of the sampler beers. Very fun. And we were joined by my lovely college roommate Jessica and her friend Genevieve at this point on the honeymoon!

At our first luau! If you look closely, you can see we're wearing matching Hawaiian dress and shirt. We thought this would be HILARIOUS to do since we saw groups of people doing it all other. But we took it up a notch with the dress and shirt combo ... Nathan talked me into wearing these out in public not once, but twice over the course of the honeymoon.

Me and Jess at luau. Awwww.

Our friends Serena and Monkey also happened to be honeymooning in Maui while we were there and joined us for the luau! So fun!

Getting our pig ready for dinner

My sexy husband liked all his necklaces

Luau dancing! I chose this luau specifically because it was non-authentic and later featured fire dancing. So awesome.

Nathan giving me his sexy sneer after we've returned to our favorite barefoot restaurant, the Hula Grill.

Jess and Genevieve also brought the sexy to the Hula Grill.

Sunset kiss

And then I spilled his drink ...

Jessica and Genevieve also wanted to have a sexy sunset kiss

Which also ended in disaster

The view on the beach directly in front of The Whaler

Nathan enjoying one of the many public hammocks on the walkway along the Kaanapali Beach. I joined him after taking this picture.

Delicious goodbye breakfast prepared by our friends Serena and Monkey at Monkey's parents' house near the Maui airport.

Nathan thought it was pretty okay

With all my gear after a marvelous trip to paradise with the man I love!

We had SUCH a great time. It was perfect to get to go to tropical paradise together as our honeymoon, and it was a great bonus to see friends while we were there. A perfect way to celebrate the beginning of married life together!