The KULA Nanny: JUNGLE FEVER

So I worked extra, extra a lot last week and was rewarded with two whole days off in a row! Its hard to get two days off when you work 45 hours a week :/ So after an overtime (45+ hours last week) a full weekend off was a well deserved treat. Truly.
I never thought that I- who all throughout college made it a point to schedule classes for three day weekends until my second senior year- would typically only have Sundays off. Some sort of payback for all those nice mornings I slept in. Woof. Either way- 45 hours is a lot and so I usually work 6 days a week.

To treat myself- I hollered over to my adventure buddies Suz and Brad and figured out that the weekend plan was HANA! HANA! HANA!!!!! They had called up April down in Lahaina and she was on board too. JUNGLE ADVENTURE TIME.

I have been trying to get to Hana the entire time I've been here. The aforementioned time constraints make this 2-day trip pretty tough to plan. But I FINALLY FREAKIN DID IT AND IT WAS ABSOLUTELY ALL THAT I HOPED AND SOME!

SO RAD!

The best way to tell this story is through pictures.

It all started with some croissants from La Provence. The most incredible and flaky chocolate and almond croissants made fresh all day by an Up Country Frenchman. I also had some of the plain. I couldn't decide what kind to bring to everyone so I just got them all. The yummiest croissants I've ever tasted in my entire life. No questions asked.

We hit the road a little after 8:30. Because I live in Kula and Suz & Brad live in Keokea we decided to go the 'back way' to Hana. Which I found aboslutely stunning. This is one of the newest lava flows on Maui. Notice the brown-ness and new growth. Brand new soil brand new land. Geologic history IN THE MAKING.

Pictured here is a fairly new wind farm. Suz has driven this way within the past year and said she hadn't seen it. Here is proof that wind farming is gorgeous in the land with the land for the land. So beautiful!

A picture of the road and more of the new-green landscape. You cant feel it, obviously, but all of this grass is dense and pretty dry. It seems like the perfect thing that could grow within 1000 years of a lava flow.

More landscape. This picture describes exactly what the end of our trip was not. Both were breathtaking in their own ways. This picture had to be included though to show the drastic change of scenery from the beginning to the end. A lot of people don't take the 'back way' to Hana and some don't even close the loop- I'm so happy we did because this part of the trip was one of my favorites.

Suess trees at the first beach we stopped at. It was past Kanio and Ulupalakua. There were some fisherman here and I learned that it isn't a good swimming beach. Suz and April told us that the water get super deep super fast, its always pretty rough and there could be sharks!

This is a little tree-dude I met at the Kipuhulu National Forest. I just liked him. It was the beginning of an awesome hike and I felt like he was welcoming me into the forest and reminded of a Sesame Street Martian. Yah? (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eO33o0se_Aw)

This is a Banyan Tree. They are a super Jungley tree and have vines that turn into roots and trunk-contributors.
I love these trees.
I almost knocked the standing man out of his branch because I jumped on a part of a branch he was standing on just about 30 seconds after I took this photo. Oops. I really couldn't tell. And he was totally fine.

KIPAHULU. I improperly tagged these photos as Wainapanapa on Instagram and I'm so embarassed. Total noob mistake.

Check out these rock formations, though! LAVA! RUNNING WATER! It makes for beautiful landforms. If you can't tell, when it rains this would flood and turn into a raging river.

Me with Waimoku falls. Nerdin' out so hard over nature. Here, I'm still hundreds of feet away from that MONSTER of a waterfall. SO MASSIVE. MASSIVE. MASSSSSIIIIVE. There were guava trees and coffee plants everywhere here.

And again. Dweeb.

THIS PICTURE IS SO FUNNY BRADS HEAD IS HUGE
Also, this is where we had our snack. Private little tributary waterfall.

BAMBOO FOREST. They get dark!

Me being a dork in the Bamboo.

We finally got to Hana (way earlier in the day) and I hilariously didn't take many pictures at all when I was actually IN Hana. Nearly a full moon on Hana Bay beach with the adventure buds near some bumpin' bass at a public pavilion.

WOMP WOMP HANA MOON WAAHHMP

RED SANDS BEACH
This was a hop skip and a jump from our hotel. Just down the beach from here, little horseys gallop around and get pet by people leaving the Travassa spa all day. Happy hana horseys. http://www.travaasa.com/hana/hanaphotos/

April really built up this beach, she told us it was the prettiest beach she'd ever seen- she's well traveled and has lived in Hawaii for a while. I was hopin' the beach would live up to her lead-up and it went beyond meeting my expectations. The little reef and the wave pool and the huge red cliff. Red sand.

Woah.

Here is us above red sands.

Suz Brad and April above Red Sands

Me freakin' out. I just swam at the most incredible beach I've ever seen! It kind of reminded me of the red bedrock basalt beach on Superior. I'll have to look up the name. But way different.

Smiley little coral that April found. I love it.

This is at Wainapanapa. So awesome. We hiked on some gnarly volcano flow. Big black pokey crazy lava flow. You can actually see how the lava hardened. The waves were MASSIVE and created little pools. Some of the pools were deceiving because they looked safe and then a gigantic wave would crash into it- we found one that had dry sides (suggesting that it hadn't been smashed into lately) and we hung out for a bit. I loved it. I saw my first sea urchin. I didn't touch it.

Suzy the bad ass buying a coconut from her favorite coconut salesman.

Us, the coconut, and the surroundings. This guy feeds lots of coconuts to his chickens. Unlike many of the coconut stands, he doesn't have big flashy signs and he doesn't sell smiles or jokes- just coconuts. So funny. So real.

We at the meat too using a coconut spoon.

The waterfall we hiked back to on the side of the road. SO COOL. We swam here. So rad. A little chilly but totally refreshing after a hike up a wild mountainside/river

We're just about to jump in.

After we were in and hikin' back down.

Suzy jumped off this cliff with the GoPro. No one got a picture and I was too scared to jump. Lots of unexpected rocks in these lava river pool things.

Someday I'll have the gutz.

Trying to snap a pic of a rainbow eucalyptus. One of my new favorite trees. They don't even look real in real life. They look painted. Lovely smell and beautiful skin.