Hawaii One-0

As the title implies this was our first ever real vacation with the kids and also their first trip to Hawaii. It also helps that the year is 2010 and that we hope to take the kids back to Hawaii for more vacations as they grow up. Both Matt and I went to Hawaii with our families when we were young and have many great memories from those trips. We had an action packed trip so I'll just try to cover the main highlights as well as share some of our 250+ pictures from the trip.



The first morning we were in Hawaii the kids woke even before the local birds, which included a large flock of turkeys. Kids have no concept of timezones or of sleeping in... so right on schedule at 4:30 AM Hawaiian time / 6:30 AM Pacific we were up for the day. We stalled as long as possible but at 5:30 we headed out in search of food, it was still dark and McKenzie kept shouting "Sunshine wake up!"  After driving around to kill some time we were the first patrons in the local grocery store at 6:00 sharp.

Here's the kids entertaining themselves indoors before the sunshine woke up!



We went to the pool at our condos three times over the trip, it has a great pool for little kids and then a larger deeper pool and a hot tub so it was great for the kids. They did love playing in that water but what they really loved was the big water as Kenzie called it. When you have a mix of sun, sand and water what's not to love?  Here's Benny heading into the water and he kept right on heading despite the waves and depth of water. It's going to be a busy summer with him.



He also was quite interested in drinking the salt water and kept trying to lap at it like a dog.


Here are the cousins playing in the sand.  I can't wait to see what kinds of fun these three dream up in the next few years.


We went to Stanley Park for our first beach trip and tried to go back for our second trip but the trade winds had really picked up and the sand was "pecking me" according to Kenzie.  We headed to the Hilton that day to use their pool. Matt and I stayed at the Hilton last year when we went on trip for work. We knew it would be a great place for the kids. We managed to find an area sheltered from the wind and while their pool was way too cold for the kids their hot tubs were just warm so we played in those. On our next beach trip we went to a secret beach that Matt had read about in a book where you had to get a pass for one of the 27 reserved parking spots to go to the beach. It was beautiful and great for the kids.  It has a lagoon and a nice sandy beach. Here are McKenzie and Ben working on their sand castle.


Matt and I have been to the Big Island twice before and had great trips but really didn't love the island. After this trip where we were able to explore more on our own and weren't just dropped off by a tour bus or at a resort for a week our opinion has definitely changed a bit. We did some driving around to different areas than we had explored before. We drove through Kona which reminded us a lot of the Wailea area on Maui and we went up to Waimea and saw the most amazing rainbow which made McKenzie's day. We also did a half day trip over to visit a farmers market in Hilo. It is amazing how different that side of the island was and how you could watch the climate change as you drove along.

As we drove along McKenzie was full of questions about the scenery, specifically about the lava.  She kept asking "why dirt? why dirt?" So I tried to explain it was lava and that led to talk about volcanoes and then on to tectonic plates and magma only to end up back at "why dirt?" again. This is another area where Matt and I differ in opinion - I like to explain things to McKenzie when she ask lots of questions. Matt likes to answer a few but then move on once it's over her head. On this trip I too had to give up after the second round of tectonic plates and magma when she became fixated on "why taltano?"  This lead to trying to get her to say things that started with 'v' - lots of quality family time in the car.

Here's Grandma Z not far from our condos posing by a coral sign in the lava that say 'G-MA Z' how appropriate and we didn't even write it!


We did a couple of fun tourist activities with the kids. We visited a Seahorse farm and saw the 'sea-saws' in McKenzie's lingo. It was actually amazing how many seahorses they were raising there and how simply they lived. Ben and I had to go take a snooze in the car for most of that visit but McKenzie had a great time seeing everything and especially enjoyed the touch tanks at the end.


For Matt's birthday, which we were so excited to celebrate in Hawaii, he got a massage with Aunt Jennifer since we also celebrated her birthday there and then went on a dolphin adventure with McKenzie. McKenzie was a little hesitant as first but then warmed right up to the dolphin and told Matt "I want to take dolphin" when it was time to get out.


The other great thing we discovered was an amazing local park in Waikoloa. The community built this huge park which was surrounded by a fence and had all kinds of neat toys to play on. Once we discovered this we were frequent visitors. Here's a view from up on the slide platform. It was pretty close to paradise when traveling with kids.


Ben and me going down the big purple slide.  He wanted to go again and again and....



McKenzie also discovered tire swings on this trip. I think she must have spent over 3 hours of the trip swinging on this one and another one at the condo playground. She loved to watch her shadow follow her round and round. Here's the cousins testing out the swing together.


The playground had something for everyone.  Here are Grandma and Grandpa Z playing a little tether ball. It is a good thing Grandpa Z had the shoulder surgery!


Traveling with family definitely had its perks.  One of those perks was on site baby sitters.  We escaped one night with Jennifer and Chris and went to the Four Seasons for an amazing birthday dinner celebration for Matt and Jennifer. Actually the amazing part is for how much we ate on this trip I only have this one picture of us during a meal.


After dinner we took a little rest in a large clam shell we came across.


And finally heading home... McKenzie decided she wanted to go home in the 'big lunchbox'... such a funny girl.

Sorry for the really long post if you have even made this far - this is the full Hawaii summary so moving on to more fun here at home.