Lanai...Sring Break 2016 Part 1

I've really had a desire to do more blog posts lately. We live on this incredible island and we have such amazing adventures. My kids are all in such fun stages (and frusterating at times) in their lifes. I take pictures like I'm a regular blogger, but I have a hard time getting them posted in a timely fashion.
And you know what they say about setting goals, you have to write them down, put them somewhere you can see them, and tell someone about them so that you can accomplish them. I want to set a realistic goal so that it will happen.  My goal for right now is two posts a month, then hopefully get up to once a week. And I am pretty far behind on our adventures, so I'm going to start with the Big ones and work toward the everyday ones.

So here goes...

For Spring Break last year (March 2016), we wanted to take the kids off island.
Because we live on a island and it's so expensive to go anywhere, we thought that this would be a real treat. And it was!
With our Kamina discount, it was super affordable to ride the ferry to Lania, so we didn't have to break the bank. (Only $180 round trip for an hour ferry ride for all six of us. Can't get better than that.)
We invited a few friends to join us because lets face it, its always funner with friends!

Nice smile Afton and Brin! I swear I'm not going to have any good pictures for the next few years. Afton thinks its so funny and Brin is following in her footsteps.
They are both just hilarious!

We had to wake up super early to drive to Lahinia to catch the 6:45am ferry. That's why Emery is still in her jammies. We pulled her out of bed at 5:30am and put her in the car. The earlier you go in the morning, the calmer it is, usually. For us it was so calm, thank goodness!

The sunrise was quite spectacular. Pictures try, but never really do justice.

As we got closer to Lanai, it was so interesting to see the geography of the island. I wonder how these cliffs were formed. It looks as though someone took a knife and just cut it off.

Greg was so glad that he didn't get sick. He gets motion sickness at the drop of a hat, but I'm sure by the time we leave Hawaii (if ever!), he'll be all healed of that.
We all put this motion sickness oil right behind our ears and it must work because, wala... no sickies.
And here is our beautiful vessel in Lanai Harbor.
I stood on the upper deck rail almost the whole way. I was told that there are dolphins that often escort the ferry into the harbor and I so wanted to see it, but sadly they didn't escort us.
I'll just have to go again, I guess.

These boys are so boys!
We got into the bay where we would be spending the day and they must have thought, oh look at the huge sand hill, let's run up and down as fast as we can and as many times as we can for FUN.
And that's what they did!
I guess when you have as much energy as these boys have, why not?!
If you look close at the bottom of the trees, is where we were setting up our day camp...aka our cooler and our hammock.

The hammock was a huge hit with everyone. We actually bought another one when we got home from this trip because one is just not enough. Now we have one for the kids to play in while the adults can relax in the other one.

I just love this little poser so much! She was dancing and laughing and in pure Beach Heaven!

I think that I need to make a big picture of this one and hang it up in my house. I love it!

These Kintaro boys are such good boys. They love to laugh and I'm so glad they are Koa's friends!

This is Afton's good friend T.J. they swim together and challenge each other.
They are both such fast fish!

And what is better than a couch on the beach...well, NOTHING!!, except your older sister digging it for you and all you have to do is sit in it and be cute!

 After some fun at the bay, we decided to hike around all the tide pools to Sweetheart Rock.

 There were these huge tide pools with all sorts of living organisms. The kids had fun catching little fish. Our little friend brought his atrium to fill up and before we left, he let everything go back into the tide pools.




I don't even know what all these things are, but the kids kept saying, "look at what I found."
Actually, my friend, CarolAnn is a scuba diver and she used to do dive tours, so she knew what everything was and if it was ok to touch or not. We were lucky to have her with us!


As, we were exploring the tide pools, we had to climb up the side of the rock to get up on top to get all the way over to Pu'u Pehe, otherwise known as Sweetheart Rock...it was so adventurous!


The dads fished a little while we were over there, but nothing was biting their bait. It's still fun to cast though, I guess.

 I absolutely LOVE this Rock!
This rock was so perfectly shaped like a heart and we all took our pictures in it.
I thought that this was Sweetheart Rock, but I found out that it's not.
And I didn't get a picture of the actual Sweetheart rock, but it is a single rock out 150(ish) yards off shore that looks like a huge skyscraper (80 ft. tall) in the middle of the ocean.
(If you look in the picture above, in the right corner in the background of the heart you can see a part of Sweetheart Rock.)
It's actual name is Pu'u Pehe after the Princess in the Legend.
Hawaii has many stories and legends about each of the different islands.
The legend of Sweetheart Rock is that of a young princess from Maui who was captured by a young warrior from Lanai.  She was so beautiful that he didn't want other men to see her so he made her live in a sea cave near the rock.
One day, as the warrior was away the weather changed and the high surf began to pound the side of the island where the cave was.
The warrior rushed back to the cave, but it was too late. His beloved, Pu'u Pehe had drowned. He was heartbroken. He retrieved her body, and climbed the steep rock island where he buried her in a tomb. Then, he plummeted to his own death.
So sad, I know. But most of the Hawaii Legends are sad.

We had such a great time over on these rock and tide pools. We even jumped into the water and swam over to a small beach, again and again. Until we went back to the Bay for more snorkeling, a late lunch, and some rain!
But that'll have to wait for the Part 2 post...