On Wednesday we tried to go to Ka‘anapali Beach, one of the alleged best beaches of Maui, but when we got there, there was no parking! We drove down the coast and finally found some parking about a mile down the way. We walked to the beach by the parking lot, but the beach kind of sucked. The ground under the water was rocky and the waves were weird and unpredictable. After a while Kara and I walked down the coast over to Ka’anapali and the beach was SO much better! The waves were really big, but we were able to get out past the breakers and just float up and down on the waves!
On Thursday we tried to return to Wailea but once again, NO PARKING! We drove down the street again and stopped at Polo Beach. I offered to run down the beach for reconnaissance before we took all of our stuff down. The beach was way too packed and it also looked rocky, so we decided to drive down the coast a bit more. We saw some cars pulled off down the road, so we stopped again and this time my dad ran to check it out. He came back with a thumb up so we brought all of our crap to the beach. This was the most fun day at the beach yet! The waves were HUGE but it stayed shallow for quite a while out. These waves would hit with such power that if you weren’t careful, they’d throw you all around! Once we got out further from the beach, we were able to float over MOST of the waves. Sometimes a super huge wave would come and would break right around where we were. I got rolled by one of those waves, and that was NOT FUN! I was tossed around like a rag doll and got salt water in my mouth and up my nose. After that mistake, I learned how to deal with these waves. When I saw one coming, I’d swim straight for it, and dive straight into it before it broke. Because of the way the water curls, I would get turned underwater and pop straight up out of the ocean behind the wave! It was weird sensation diving horizontally into a wall of water, but this technique worked really well. My dad and I went out many times that day, and I didn’t get rolled again after that first scary time!
On Friday, we decided to take a break from the beach. We had to take our snorkel gear back to Lahaina so that determined which way we were headed. We ended up going to the Whalers Village in Ka’anapali which is a shopping center surrounding a whaler museum. We all looked at shops for a while, and then the girls continued to shop while my dad and I went to check out the museum. I was surprised at how interesting the museum actually was; it described the hellish conditions of a whaler’s life and also went into detail about how they harvested each section of a whale and what each part was used for.
