Today was amazing. We had made plans to visit our good friend Caroline who grew up about a mile from us in Vermont. She was in Sam’s grade and has always been a close friend of our family. After college Caroline moved to NYC and then to LA.. Last time we saw her was in 2019 at our mutual good friend Hannah and Olivier’s wedding in France. we always figured she’d end up living in a city.. so we were surprised to hear that during Covid she moved to a very rural part of Maui. She works for PayPal in a job she can do from anywhere.. so why not from here. ?!?
Around 10:30 we drove across the island to find her. She’s living in a beautiful house she shares with one other woman in Haiku Maui . It is such a beautiful place.. down a dirt road and surrounded by a jungle . She showed us around the house and yard which included some wonderful freuoit trees includign Suriname cherries, banana, lemons and tons of flowers.. it was magical
She drove us towards the coast and then down a private unmarked dirt road.. Where we went has to remain a secret.. because local places like this are getting mobbed by tourists (like us) .
Aside here: Its a story we heard from every local we met.. .. Covid was great when the tourists stopped or slowed down.. even witht he impact to the local economy.. it reminded people who live here what it was like when the island was their own. Now in the somewhat post-covid era tourism is up over 30% from pre-covid days.. and people tourists are overrunning the island. misusing the resources, not respecting the land or the people. ,Its given us quite a bit to think about.. I’ll write about that later..
We drove down the road a bit and then headed down a trail to a small stream. from there we walked up the stream about 1/4 mile to an amazing waterfall (I apologized pictures of little fuzzy… The waterproof case I was using really his fogged up the pictures.. Imagine this… Only 10 times more beautiful 🙂
We had a good long swim there then we hike back down the stream and climbed up to the road, got in the truck and drove up the road a bit more to a great jumping rock with a nice pool and waterfall. We took turns jumping in. About 15 feet so fun and not too scary.… ‘Diane has some good movies of us jumping. I’ll try to share those as well.
We jump back in the truck went all the way down to the end of the dirt road past the house Text Caroline rented when she first moved here. Or destination was Caroline’s boyfriend Kaleo’s house. It was such an amazing place.… Completely off grid. I said buildings right above a beautiful creek with a waterfall a great swimming hole… The creek then runs straight down to the ocean less than a quarter of a mile downstream. We first met Kaleo’s dad Sven who had been living in Maui for 35 years… He’s originally from Germany. Super great guy built all of the stuff by hand. I’ll solarelectric all the water everything is completely up coming from their own land. The place is surrounded with fruit trees. Amazing. And we went down to the house… Well they were actually several houses. There’s a guest house, small “Hale” where Kaleo lived… I cooking house, a bath house and yard where Kaleo’s parents lived. We then met Laeo’s mom ‘Dana who had been in Maui for more than 20 years. She was originally from upstate New York. Both of his parents are so nice. Kaleo showed up just a few minutes after we got there. He’s such a great guy.. he grew up in this totally off grid world… Then recently spent 18 months working in Frankfurt Germany. He’s really smart really nice and very interested in making things. We plan to connect him to our new friend Max in Wailuko who’s a master maker.
We hung around getting to know them a bit a. Caroline Open some fresh coconuts that we had picked up at the neighbor Daniels house… And we had our first fresh coconut water treat.
We then walked a few meters down f to the Stream behind their house. Kaleo, Caroline, Gabe and sam went swimming while ‘Diane, Dana and I watched. It reminded me of something like the swimming holes we have at home like triple buckets those surrounded by tropical plants. Only difference is… This was in their backyard and there was no one else around…
After a bit… Kaleo and ‘Dana showed us the way to walk down to the beach. It was a little bit of a slippery scramble over the creek and longer Rockfence but the walk was so beautiful. More swimming pools, natural slides, amazing plants and fresh fruit. We found these amazing Liliquoi (Jamaican passionfruit)… You bite into the thick yellow skin and suck out the delicious juice and seats. I’ve never had anything like it. We stuffed ourselves on them and brought a whole bunch back
In a few minutes we reach the point where the freshwater stream met the ocean. It was a narrow Rocky Harbour with steep walls. The surf was crashing like crazy… We were surprised to learn that this had once been a shipping port for processed sugar about 100 years ago. It’s hard to imagine any kind of boat getting anywhere near shore with the crashing surf. You could still see some of the hundred year old rusty equipment hanging around.
Diane and I had fun putting 1 foot in the ocean and 1 foot in the freshwater stream…
It was so amazing listening to the surf the rocks on the beach. It made an amazing sound. I recorded some of it click on the thing below and you can hear it
We hung out on the beach for a little bit… And then walked back up the stream towards the house.
We said goodbye to Klezl folks and jumped in Caroline’s truck and headed back to her place to get ready for dinner.… We went to a bar for a drink then to a fantastic sushi restaurant (Nuka) in haiku. The cook there is a good friend of Kaleo’s family so they treated us really well. It was a fantastic meal
Around 930 it was time to head home. We said goodbye to Caroline and Calio. It has been such an amazing day. Truly the best day of our vacation. Mainly because I’ve seen our good friend Caroline here and so happy I’m meeting Calio and his family… But also because during the stay we saw the Maui we remember for 36 years ago.
It was a magical day !
nite all, nite sam
-me