Tag Archives: napili maui

Honolua Bay, Kapulua Beach, & Nakalele Blowhole

This morning I had some coffee on the lanai and it was so nice.

We packed up some food and drinks in a cooler and then we attempted to try this breakfast place called The Gazebo at the resort South of us but the line was ridiculously long. I would recommend trying to get into this place because we heard it’s great but get there like at 5 am I guess because they can seat like 10 people. The view from this resort is really cool though so if you can’t get food check out the view.

After taking a lot of pictures near The Gazebo we decided to try a breakfast place we saw called Slappy Cakes. This place also gets crowded but if you can sit at the bar. This place was amazing–so, so good–I really don’t know how The Gazebo could beat it. Don had the Slappy Moco and I had the Carnitas Benedict. It was so delicious, thinking about it right now is killing me! We would highly recommend Slappy Cakes.

After breakfast we made our way to Honolua Bay. There is no parking for Honolua Bay; you just have to find a spot on the side of the road and hike down. The hike is easy and maybe 5 minutes. The bay is all big, round rocks, so it was a little challenging getting down into the water because it was slippery. The water was also kind of cold at first but it warmed up. We started on the left side of the bay and we went pretty far out, pretty much to where the bay opened up. On the way out the dull rocks changed to beautiful coral.

We saw a big green eel and a large school of fish, that was pretty cool. After the school of fish I spotted our second turtle in Maui! So cool, how did we get lucky enough to see a turtle again?!

I got a crazy cramp in my foot and had to stretch it out in the water for a good 10 minutes. Once I was good we decided to swim over to the right side of the bay. On our way we saw another turtle, although it could have been the same one.

The right side of the bay was awesome, lots of colorful fish and coral. We saw a huge sea turtle and it was eating. It didn’t care about us or anyone around it at all. We watched that turtle for a long time. We saw a lot of turtles here, maybe 6 different ones. It was amazing. We even saw an octopus! It was scurrying along the sea floor and once it reached a rock it changed colors instantly to camouflage itself. It was amazing and so quick! We also saw a small, almost iridescent sea snake. The snorkeling at Honolua Bay was amazing and by far the best snorkeling we have done in Hawaii so far.

Octopus!

After Honolua Bay we made our way to Kapalua Beach. Kapalua Beach is the beach just North of Napili Bay (our beach). There is a parking lot for this beach near the golf course. The beach had a lot of pretty coral and fish. There were even a few schools of fish, but no turtles. It was sandy and rocky and pretty good for snorkeling. We saw another small eel. So far snorkeling in Hawaii is in this order: Honolua, Napili, Kapalua, then Hanauma.

We didn’t spend as long here and  it was getting late in the afternoon so we decided to get back to our room. We got cleaned up and decided to try to see the Nakalele Blowhole. I was really nervous about driving here because the road looked a little crazy on the map. The drive was a bit crazy because it was near a cliff and curvy. There were some awesome views and when we got to the blowhole it was a pretty crazy hike down to it. I wasn’t really expecting a hike and I was getting worried it was going to get dark soon, but we decided to do it. There were a lot of other people making their way down also. The views everywhere were spectacular and the blowhole was pretty cool. Don drove on the way back so I could take in the views. We stopped at a view point and realized we were looking down on where we snorkeled earlier at Honolua Bay. Once we got back to town we ate at China Boat, most places were closing. It was pretty good Chinese.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 3: Oahu to Maui

This morning we were up early again for our 8 am flight to Maui. We took a cab to the airport after raiding leftovers in our hotel fridge. Our flight with Hawaiian Airlines was on time and it was so short!  I couldn’t believe we were served drinks on this flight because it was seriously like 20 minutes. We were up in the air at 8 am and landing around 8:20. The views on the flight were awesome.

Once we landed we had to pick up our rental car. The lady at Hertz wasn’t very helpful and she was kind of rude but we were in and out of there quickly. We had planned to drive straight to our condo in Napili and find something to eat along the way. About 10-15 minutes into our drive a light came on in our Nissan Sentra. The light was something about the emergency braking system, so Don called Hertz to ask if we should come back and they told us to. Once again we were in and out of Hertz quickly and our help there was a lot nicer. We went from a Nissan Sentra to a Nissan Altima, both felt like giant boats.

Since places were now starting to open for lunch I decided we should try a place that was recommended to me by Julia called Tin Roof. It was really busy and really nowhere to sit. We ended up sitting outside on a parking curb because that’s where other people were. I ordered the steak bowl and Don got the chicken bowl. We had a side of the pork belly. Everything was really good and I would recommend checking it out if you need a good place to eat near the airport.

After eating we started driving. I was surprised by the landscape; Hawaii seemed a lot more dry than I had expected, but it was beautiful. We arrived at our condo around noon and we were able to check in early. We are staying at Napili Sunset, which is in Napili Bay. The place seems nice, a little overcrowded with a lot of furniture but nice.

After settling for a bit we decided to check out our beach. We had to walk across the street but it was only about a 5 minute walk, if that. The beach was beautiful. There were a lot of people snorkeling, swimming, and boogie boarding. We decided to snorkel and we went pretty far out. There were a lot of cool rock formations and schools of fish. We were on the left side of the bay looking at the rocks when a giant wave crashed into us. It startled us a bit and we swam quickly away. When we got to calmer water we saw a turtle! I had read that you’re very likely to see turtles while snorkeling in Maui but I didn’t think we would be lucky enough to see one on our first day! It was cool, but it didn’t stay around for long. After this we decided to just relax in the water for awhile and float around. Then we came back to our place and checked out the pool. The water was extremely warm.

First Turtle! Napili Bay

After the pool we were getting hungry so we decided to check out Teddy’s Bigger Burgers in Lahaina. We had seen this place on a guy’s YouTube video about affordable, good places to eat in Maui. The menu at Teddy’s was a bit confusing because they have a lot of options.  We each tried a burger and after ordering one of their special ones I saw I could have just had an original one. That was a bit disappointing because it felt like they were pushing you to pay more and try one of their specialty burgers. The burger was good. We also tried fried pickles. Everything was good here and I would go again but just try their straight up burger. I can’t even remember which ones we ordered, but since we ordered a specialty burger it felt expensive.

After dinner we wanted to pick up some food for the condo so we went to a Safeway but we couldn’t find everything we wanted because it was under construction, so we went to a Food Land and a Walgreens. After getting some stuff we drove around to try to get a view of the mountains in the area. We did take a few pictures and the GPS took us through a neighborhood, which was kind of weird. Overall it was a pretty good first day in Maui.