Monday: Whale Watching at Lahaina

Sorry this is out of order. 

Lahaina is a former whaling town, now a tourist town and the prices were outrageous.  Julie took one look at some prices in one store and decided there would be no shopping there!  We went out on a boat and saw many humpback whales.  Lots of mothers with their babies, escorded by one or more males.  The whales breached a few times (where they go stright up in the air and make a big splash).  Unfortunately my timing was off so I didn't capture any with the camere.

We sat with a delightful couple from England, Ann and Dennis Rowe.

The sun was very hot and Oma and I got some very nice sunburns.  ''

Lots of beautiful sailing vessels at Lahaina.

This was about the best picture I was able to get.

 

Tuesday: Land of Frozen Fire

On Tuesday we went on a tour of Maui where Lava covered an entire housing subdivision.  They tried diverting the lava flow with bulldozers and other equipment but there was just too much.  The people who built the houses knew this could happen but took the risk anyway because the land was so cheap.  The risk didn't pay off!.  The lava flow made new land and a back sand beach.

Lava flows around trees in the 1700's caused these hollow tubes to form.  You can see the tree bark patterns inside the tubes.

Rainbow Falls in Maui

Our Room on the ship

Here are some pictures of our shipboard room.  We are very spoiled!

New Therapy for Katie

Katie and Robert have been looking into a form of cancer therapy called, we think, "Radio Frequency Ablation"(Katie, correct us if that is the wrong name).  It sounds like a really good fit for someone who has a lot of small tumors in the lungs.  We hope you will join us in praying that this treatment might be found appropriate for Katie, that she will be able to get it, and that it will be effective.

Love,
Oma and Opa

Update from Paradise

Well, it is only paradise because Julie is here ;->

Here we are at McDonald's in Lahaina, Maui.  We just finished taking a boat ride where we saw a bunch of whales and whale babies.  It was pretty cool.  I intended to post a bunch of pics but forgot to bring the cable to download them...sorry, we'll do a big post when we can.

Our room on the ship is awesome.  We feel a little embarrassed to have something so ritzy but not enough to downgrade!   The food is really really good and fancy, but is quite heavy.  However, we found out we can do a fruit buffet in the morning and that is more our speed. 

Sunday we took a taxi to the local meetinghouse and arrived just when sacrament meeting was starting.  We had a great time and met many friendly members.  There was also another couple there from the ship, and we had a nice time visiting with them.  The gospel doctrine teacher was very knowledgeable about Abraham, Lot and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. 

One of the families at church gave us a ride back to the ship.   It was a great Sunday.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) we go and see the volcano.  We got a lot of sun today, so will probably need a fair amount of sunscreen tomorrow (think: Opa has a red head).  I get to try out my new walking stick.

Love,

Oma and Opa

Eat Your Heart Out, Ross Dress for Less Fans!

We took a walk before we went to the PCC and ran across this huge two-story Ross store in the swanky Waikiki shopping area.  There had to be a hundred different doggy beds.

Laie Temple

We dressed up a little for the Polynesain Cultural Center because we wanted to visit the Laie Temple and go through a session if we had time.  We were helped by a beautiful young BYU student from Mongolia.  Crystal is a convert to the church and went the extra mile by arranging for the shuttle bus at the PCC to make a special trip just to take us to the Temple.  The PCC is a blessing for the BYU students, who earn their way through school by working there. It has grown to a really big place since I saw it as a missionary in 1972.

We went through a nice session at the temple (which is smaller on the inside than it looks from the outside).  We also met two couples at the PCC who are going on the same cruise as well.

We miss you all!

The scenery to Laie was beautiful.  This is supposed to resemble a boy in legend, similar to the Mount Timpanogos legend.

Crysral, who helped us to the Temple

This guy showed us how to husk coconuys and make coconut milk.  Amd how to start a fire with the husk.  He was really funny.

Aloha!

After a long airplane flight we are now settling into our motel room.  It is right on Waikiki beach.  So far all the arrangements went off without a hitch.  Tomorrow we go to the Polynesian Cultural Center.

We are tired but happy and wishing we could have taken everyone.  We haven't eaten all day (except pretzels) so we will go get a bite to eat.

Thank you, Mary, for taking us to the airport!

ALOHA!

We got a lei and a kiss at the airport.

Ohana East Motel room 530

Start of trip!  It's warmer here in Hawaii!

Internship

As some of you already know I got an internship here in Portland that starts next week (non paying  of course).

Here is a link to the website if anyone wants to see the sort of stuff I'll be working on.

www.lizzbasingerdesigns.com

Today was my first day and it looks like I will be doing a variety of things from pattern grading to sewing and photoshots and fashion shows. It'll be fun!

Nick Dixon's WD40 advertizement

Hi all, this is Opa.  This evening my brother Jim came to dinner and showed a video advertizement his son Nick made for a class assignment at BYU.  The budget was $600.00 and they were asked to advertize a random product, which was WD40.

The video is password protected so we can't put it here but click on the link below and enter the password:
LongLiveLube

Make sure to capitalize all the 'L's.

Nick graduates in filmmaking in April.

https://vimeo.com/80596323

Love,

Opa