Maui Trip - Days 6 & 7

We were checked out of our hotel and on the road by 9:15a.m. We'd heard a lot about the Maui Ocean Center and, since it was on the way to the airport, we decided to check it out. It had tons of cool indoor and outdoor exhibits, including a 750,000 gallon tank with 2000 fish, huge manta rays, and sharks (even a huge tiger shark). We spent about two hours there and thought it was neat to see more of Hawaii's marine life besides what we saw when we went snorkeling.

We grabbed lunch near the aquarium and then we were off to the airport. With plenty of time to spare we got some good reading in before we boarded a little plane (the small ones always make me nervous) that would fly us to the big island for a six hour layover. Initially, we thought it wouldn't be that bad to have that long of a layover. We thought we'd leave the airport for a while, get some dinner, and just extend the vacation a little longer. We were sorely mistaken! It was going to cost us $50 for a round-trip on a shuttle to go just a few miles. We nixed that option immediately and decided to stay put. Well, the Kona airport is pretty much open/outdoors with the majority of the seating located in areas past security. We didn't want to be completley stuck back there for six hours so we stayed out by the road on a grassy hill. To kill as much time as possible before dinner we read, played Rummy, worked on a crossword puzzle, and ate Club Crackers for nearly three hours. It was brutal! The only food option they had was a little restaurant/diner with few menu items. Since we'd had hambugers for lunch, that was the last thing we wanted. So with very few choices we settled on one hot dog each and shared plate of way-too-cheesy nachos. We just laughed at how sick a dinner it was and we could almost feel our arteries clogging as we ate. If that was a long six hours at the airport (and it was!!), we still had a six hour flight left to conquer. We took a red-eye to Phoenix and arrived early Saturday morning. That was brutal and we know why they're called red-eyes - becaus you get practically zero sleep! We just had to remember what a great trip we'd had and that it was worth the long trip home. It was so good to finally get home and it was great to see the kids again.