Hearts in Hawai'i
Our Trip to Maui (2008)--Day 7
3/23/2008
The Gazebo
It seems as though every guide book I've read recommends this restaurant in Napili. It's a breakfast and lunch place, but there is a drawback. Well, two drawbacks, actually. First is that there are only fifteen tables or so. Second is that, because of its popularity, if you're not there by 7:00 (they open for breakfast at 7:30), expect to wait, sometimes for a long time. We got there at 7:15 and there were at least 15-20 groups of people ahead of us. By the time we were seated at 8:15, we were tired of standing.
Was the wait worth it? Patty thinks it was, I'm not convinced. Her banana Mac nut pancakes were wonderful, but my Denver omelette was too heavy on the cheese. Despite a nice view of Napili Bay, the place is crowded. Service is pretty good and your orders arrive quickly, but it's not a place I'm in a rush to return to. The other thing is that we felt slightly pressured to finish eating and pay our bill. Not by the wait staff, they were fine. But while you're eating, you can see the lineup of people outside the restaurant, which only gets longer as the early morning progresses. Maybe it's a subconcious thing.
Back to the hotel for some beach walkin'. Patty wasn't into tanning today so I hit the sun solo for a few hours followed by a shower and a light lunch.
Ocean Quest Cocktail Cruise
We'd tried to avoid doing the same things we'd done in past trips, tried to avoid eating at the same restaurants but there is one tradition which we always enjoy and connect to a Maui visit. This is a sunset cocktail cruise with the Pacific Whale Foundation. A new boat this year, the Ocean Quest, replaced the Manute`a, sold off by the P.W.F. last May right after our last visit. In fact, we were on the final cocktail cruise on the Manute`a, and it hadn't been a particular good experience, marred by a rough ocean and considerable rockyness on the boat. The Ocean Quest is bigger and much more stable. Another advantage to this boat is that there are tables you can sit at both upstairs and downstairs. The food selection is essentially the same type of pupus which are pretty outstanding for that food type. This cruise also introduced me to "POG", which is a non-alcoholic mix of Passion fruit juice, orange juice and guava juice. Tasty! The cruise lasted about two hours and featured a few whale sightings in the distance; not close enough to get on camera or video. We had discounted tickets for this activity through Expedia at $40 each. Rating: 9
Not that I missed having Internet access, but after eight days we decide to send some emails to certain co-workers. You know, just to rub it in a little bit that they're back in Duluth dealing with the snow and the cold and we're not. 
Previous: 3/22/2008--Our Trip to Maui (2008)--Day 6
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