Vanessa- figmentfan814 ~ Happily Ever Wedding & 10th Anniversary VR Brunch #1 Added 8-10

[Jennifer48]

Did the stores all close early or were you just out late?

That pizza looks yumm-o!

 

[figmentfan814]

Did the stores all close early or were you just out late?

That pizza looks yumm-o!

Everything on Maui closed pretty early. I had read that in my guidebooks, but didn't really believe it until we got there. Most of the restaurants were all closed by 8 pm. In Lahaina there were a few things open a little later. Definitely not a night life there like there was in Waikiki on Oahu.

 

[dizneyfreak]

I'm baaaaaaaaack! AND GUESS WHAT!!!! My Mom upgraded us to the Grand!!! AND I'M NOT DONE THERE...the cast member in the Grand that checked us in saw that my Mom had upgraded us for my birthday and turned around and upgraded us to a conceirge level room!!!!!!!!! I was so on cloud 9 ! We had such a blast! Our room had the best view and all the free food and drink for the whole week was awesome as well! I think we spent just as much time in our room and on our balcony as we did in the parks! I couldn't wait to tell you!

I caught up on your post as well. That park looked amazing! I am sad to have missed it. I'm sorry about your luck with the food. We always ate early and I never even realized that they closed down so early. I can't wait to see the rest of this leg of the honeymoon.

Anna Marie

 

[figmentfan814]

I'm baaaaaaaaack! AND GUESS WHAT!!!! My Mom upgraded us to the Grand!!! AND I'M NOT DONE THERE...the cast member in the Grand that checked us in saw that my Mom had upgraded us for my birthday and turned around and upgraded us to a conceirge level room!!!!!!!!! I was so on cloud 9 ! We had such a blast! Our room had the best view and all the free food and drink for the whole week was awesome as well! I think we spent just as much time in our room and on our balcony as we did in the parks! I couldn't wait to tell you!

I caught up on your post as well. That park looked amazing! I am sad to have missed it. I'm sorry about your luck with the food. We always ate early and I never even realized that they closed down so early. I can't wait to see the rest of this leg of the honeymoon.

Anna Marie

That is so cool, what a wonderful surprise! I have to admit I'm a little jealous, I only got to stay concierge for the 2 nights right after our wedding! You must PM me with links to some pictures or something because I definitely want to see some of your trip!

I was surprised about Maui too, although maybe if we had gotten back to our resort sooner we would have had better luck. We stayed away from the hotel so much I think that was part of the issue. Only one day left on Maui to talk about before the trip home, so the end is near!

 

[irisbud]

Wow Anna Marie, that is so cool! Congrats!

Vanessa, my parents are going to the big island? and Maui. I told my dad about the mango peach pies at McD's you mentioned and now he is excited. Before he wasn't sure he wanted to go, LOL.

 

[figmentfan814]

Wow Anna Marie, that is so cool! Congrats!

Vanessa, my parents are going to the big island? and Maui. I told my dad about the mango peach pies at McD's you mentioned and now he is excited. Before he wasn't sure he wanted to go, LOL.

The one park on the Big Island is where you can visit the active volcanos. I heard it is really cool to do, there is even a helicopter tour over it. I guess periodically it has to close because of lava flow and while we were there the newspaper said the park was closed.

Too funny about the pies, they were very tasty. Hopefully, they are a staple there that is available all year. Your dad won't be disappointed, of course it doesn't compare to some of the tasty treats at WDW

 

[dizneyfreak]

I will have to figure out how to do the whole picture thing soon so you can see some of the great pics I took! I'm hoping to have much more time to post on here come July. My job now keeps me busy over 60 hours a week becasue I am salary and they expect me to work 10 hour days, 6 days a week. However, the government stepped in and is making my company make us hourly because they say we work too much for what we get paid! Woohoo! That means 2 days off a week and 8 hour work days. Then I can have a life again and maybe, just maybe...do a trip report from my wedding that's like almost 2 years old now! Cross your fingers for me!

I'm very sad to see your trippie coming to and end and I still really wanna keep in touch...so I guess I'll have to start my report soon so we can keep these little conversations of ours up

Anna Marie

 

[figmentfan814]

The next morning we woke up fairly early and I quickly got ready. No need to waste too much time on hair and makeup since we planned to go snorkeling that morning before we had to head for our whale watching tour that afternoon. Since we really wanted to have as much time as possible at the beach, we skipped breakfast at the hotel and headed to the equipment rental shop that was just down the street from our hotel. We had to wait a few minutes for the shop to open and then we went inside to get our rentals. We ended up with the whole thing which included a snorkel set, fish guide, and a handy little guidebook. The rental wasn’t very much, I think around $20 which I thought was fantastic. I also bought a few post cards to mail out that day since we would be leaving that night. Our equipment:

The lady in the shop was really nice and helpful, but warned us that the forecast calle for swells from Tahiti, so we probably wouldn’t have the best of luck. We kind of shrugged this off thinking oh no big deal, but boy were we wrong!

We then got back in the rental car and headed a few miles down the road to the Sheraton Maui where we parked in their parking garage then made our way across the grounds to the beach area. This is what the area typically looks like near Black Rock, so calm and inviting

Once we arrived we immediately saw what the clerk at the store was talking about with the swells. The waves were gigantic!!!

We said, what the heck it couldn’t be that bad, we would just stay close to the rock and after all since this was our last day on the islands there wouldn’t be another opportunity. Let’s just say we walked out about 5 feet and then attempted to put our heads under water before we turned around and headed back on the beach! There were a couple of other mainlanders like us that were stupid enough to try this feat, but within minutes they all declared a loss to the swells of Tahiti too. So, in the end we decided to just enjoy our time on the beach and to catch some of the waves.

Our footprints:

I decided to recreate what Kris did during our engagement shoot at the Polynesian, which turned out a little better here because of the moist sand:

Engagement shot:

We talked to a couple of guys who said that the snorkeling was awesome the day before and that they had seen several large turtles by the rock area. I guess there’s also beautiful coral there too. I had even brought an underwater disposable camera for the occasion. I loved when I went snorkeling at Castaway Cay several years before and had wanted to share this awesome experience with Kris. I still got some cool pictures of the waves and us enjoying them. Self-portrait:

Kris ventured out a lot further than I was willing to go. Just going out a little ways you could feel the undertow of the water. I finally understood what they were talking about when you hear about people getting swept away. It is so powerful!!!

We found the best way to catch the wave was to run parallel to it like Kris is doing in this picture:

Kris is actually standing up in this picture; look how tall the wave is next to him. Granted he is only 5’8, but that is still one huge wave of water! Notice you can't even see the boats in the background anymore.

Kris as superman in this picture, flying through the air on a wave.

The best part for me was sitting in the shallow water near the shore. Since the waves were coming in so fast, they would spin you in a circle like a top. Let’s just say I didn’t realize the downside of this until we were on our way and I discovered all the massive amount of sand that had made its way into the bottom of my swimsuit!

The area really was beautiful and is suppose to be some of the best easy access snorkeling on Maui. In this shot you can see some more of the rock formations.

Looking down the beach towards the other hotels:

Time to head back to the hotel

Up next we check out of our hotel and head out for whale watching.

Tonight is one year since our at-home reception, so we've had our top layer of the cake unthawing in refrigerator for the last couple of days. We decided to save that one since we didn't have any left from the wedding; I'm excited to see if it turned out okay after following careful instructions online.

 

[Jennifer48]

bummer about snorkeling! It was still a beautiful area.

Can't wait to hear how your cake turns out!

 

[figmentfan814]

I will have to figure out how to do the whole picture thing soon so you can see some of the great pics I took! I'm hoping to have much more time to post on here come July. My job now keeps me busy over 60 hours a week becasue I am salary and they expect me to work 10 hour days, 6 days a week. However, the government stepped in and is making my company make us hourly because they say we work too much for what we get paid! Woohoo! That means 2 days off a week and 8 hour work days. Then I can have a life again and maybe, just maybe...do a trip report from my wedding that's like almost 2 years old now! Cross your fingers for me!

I'm very sad to see your trippie coming to and end and I still really wanna keep in touch...so I guess I'll have to start my report soon so we can keep these little conversations of ours up

Anna Marie

That definitely sounds like good news on your job, you need the well-deserved break! If you're on Facebook, PM me and we could share some pictures, etc. that way too! I hope that you can still do a report on your wedding because we would all love to hear about it

bummer about snorkeling! It was still a beautiful area.

Can't wait to hear how your cake turns out!

I know it was pretty disappointing, but I told Kris that's an excuse to go back again some day I'll definitely let everyone know about the cake. I took pictures when we packaged it up a year ago, so I can share all the shots

 

[irisbud]

Too bad you didn't get to snorkle, I bet it would have been beautiful. Seeing all of the turtles would be cool too. Like you said, an excuse to go back!

Hope your cake still tastes good!

 

[figmentfan814]

Too bad you didn't get to snorkle, I bet it would have been beautiful. Seeing all of the turtles would be cool too. Like you said, an excuse to go back!

Hope your cake still tastes good!

It was disappointing not to get to snorkel, but at least we still had a lot of fun with the waves. I guess that's not something that you get to do all the time on a trip to Hawaii

Kris doesn't even want to taste it, but I told him he has to anyways I said we at least need a couple of pictures for the scrapbook!

 

[ariel1025]

Too bad about the snorkeling But, it looks like you guys made the best of the situation and Kris looks like he was having a blast "riding the waves"

Curious to hear how your top layer ends up tasting. We still haven't had the top layer of our cake since we were in CA for our Anniversary. We are planning on making it a mini-celebration this weekend, but I am sort of scared

 

[figmentfan814]

Too bad about the snorkeling But, it looks like you guys made the best of the situation and Kris looks like he was having a blast "riding the waves"

Curious to hear how your top layer ends up tasting. We still haven't had the top layer of our cake since we were in CA for our Anniversary. We are planning on making it a mini-celebration this weekend, but I am sort of scared

The waves were pretty awesome, although some of them scared me a little

The cake tasted really yummy! We were both shocked; Kris didn't even want to try it, but in the end we ended up eating all of it We didn't have the whole layer since we only technically had one cake at our at-home reception, so there was about 1/4 of it left. The majority of our cake at the reception was in cupcake form

To freeze it last year I followed some directions I found online.
1. I put in on a plate and placed it in the freezer for a few hours to firm up.
2. I took it out then wrapped it in saran wrap.
3. Then I wrapped it in foil and put it in a sealed plastic bag.

To unthaw 1 year later:
1. Removed from the freezer and put in refrigerator two days ago.
2. Took out of refrigerator and placed on counter for two hours before eating.

Kris is nervous about trying it:

Yummy, it still tastes fresh!

 

[irisbud]

Glad your cake was still good. I love the look on Kris's face. Hilarious!

 

[Jennifer48]

How cool! Thanks for the instructions. I'm going to use them on my wedding cake

 

[dizneyfreak]

YUMMO! It looked aweful good for being a year old! I wonder if that works if you wait two years??? I was very sick on our first anniversary last year and we decided to wait until this year for our second anniversary so that I could enjoy the cake. Cross your fingers for me. I still have a few months to go.

Unfortunately, I am not on facebook. My husband is though and I think he may have some of our wedding pictures up on there. PM me your info and I'll see if he can find you. I still want to do a trip report so badly. I will get the time one of these days. Maybe if I keep telling myself that I can will it into actually happening!

Anna Marie

 

[princess22]

Oh, I have been MIA lately and I've missed a bit on your report. But I'm all caught up now. I like looking through your pics cause it's getting me excited about my honeymoon!

Does the ferry you mentioned go to all the islands?

I'm sad your TR is coming to an end.

 

[figmentfan814]

I'm sorry that I've been MIA ladies. My laptop died on me at the end of last week after I had already been sick a couple of days earlier in the week, so I just got a chance to get on here. Its just been a crazy the last couple of weeks.

Glad your cake was still good. I love the look on Kris's face. Hilarious!

I know, I think that's one that should be framed

How cool! Thanks for the instructions. I'm going to use them on my wedding cake

It really worked well, which was shocking to me! I hope your cake is just as yummy as ours was a year later.

YUMMO! It looked aweful good for being a year old! I wonder if that works if you wait two years??? I was very sick on our first anniversary last year and we decided to wait until this year for our second anniversary so that I could enjoy the cake. Cross your fingers for me. I still have a few months to go.

Unfortunately, I am not on facebook. My husband is though and I think he may have some of our wedding pictures up on there. PM me your info and I'll see if he can find you. I still want to do a trip report so badly. I will get the time one of these days. Maybe if I keep telling myself that I can will it into actually happening!

Anna Marie

I would hope that your cake should still taste okay and if it doesn't at least you still tried it We didn't technically do it on our 1st anniversary either, so I think it will be cool to see how yours turns out. I will definitely send you a PM with the info because I would love to see some of your wedding shots.

Oh, I have been MIA lately and I've missed a bit on your report. But I'm all caught up now. I like looking through your pics cause it's getting me excited about my honeymoon!

Does the ferry you mentioned go to all the islands?

I'm sad your TR is coming to an end.

I can't wait to hear about your honeymoon once it happens because it will give me a chance to relive our beautiful memories from Hawaii. Wow, check this out about the SuperFerry. They have suspended it again because of the environmental issues.
http://www.hawaiiinterislandsuperferry.com/

Welcome to the Hawaii Superferry information and discussion forums, here to help bring light to the interisland ferry of the Hawaiian Islands. The Hawaii interisland superferry began running interisland ferry service on December 13th, 2007 and has shut down service effective March 19th, 2009. The Hawaii Superferry had planned on runnning routes between Oahu, Maui, Big Island and Kauai. For the present time, the Hawaii Superferry will no longer offer service in Hawaii due to a Hawaii Supreme Court ruling that struck down a new law allowing service without an Environmental Impact Report.

That's unfortunate because it seems like the service was really liked and it offered a much more affordable option compared to the flights.

I can't believe my TR is coming to an end either, although most people don't drag their feet on finishing like I have I plan to post pictures from my at-home reception, but won't do a detailed report of it.

Also for finishing up my report I have part of it written and all the photos uploaded so I promise to be back soon! It will probably be after I get my laptop back though since Kris doesn't like to share his at home

 

[princess22]

That's a shame about the ferry. It seems like the perfect way to travel from island to island. Bummer. Thanks though.

I can't wait until I can post my TR, although, that would mean that it is over, not sure if I want that!