Mahalo Hawaii

For all of you Hawaii impaired, 'mahalo' means thank you. :) :) I'm partly making fun of my bro-in-law, Dave, who used it all the time and mostly sometimes wrong. It was really funny. By the end of the trip he was using it correctly, but for the first day or two he was using it as 'Hi'...so funny. 

So we are back from paradise. It was such a great experience. I was scared to death to fly over water and, just like my luck, the first 1.5 hours of flying there was totally rocky and I started to cry. Yes, you read that right, I cried. I was SO nervous. I was VERY happy to see Hawaii and all the islands. It was beautiful there...our house was fabulous--not to mention we had a great view. We were there with Jeff's WHOLE family celebrating Lyle's retirement. I really loved it. We stayed up late most nights {8:30pm ha ha} and laughed a lot and talked so much. It was especially nice for me since I was the last to be married into the family and I felt that I didn't know everyone as well. 

My favorite beach was Mauna Kea {not sure if that's the beach name, but that was the hotel}. The softest sand, most turquoise water I've ever seen, pretty good snorkeling AND just a beautiful view. On Sunday, we went to church and were welcomed with open arms. They really are the nicest people in the world! The kissed us many times...and sang to us. The singing part was actually emotional, I don't know what it was!! 

The BEST part of the whole trip was swimming with the dolphins in the middle of the ocean. We kayaked to Captain Cook's monument and that's where we saw the dolphins. I didn't bring my camera, but my brother-in-law did so I'll post those when he emails them to me. :) There were SOO many dolphins. We got out of our kayaks in the prettiest blue water and swam with them. When I say 'we' I mostly mean the other guys because I didn't feel 100% comfortable swimming in the ocean. I did get out tho! My favorite part was the baby ADD dolphin. He kept jumping out of the water and spinning every direction! Cutest thing I've ever seen. The adult dolphins were also jumping out of the water, too. That was seriously soo cool. 

Other days we went to the wet side of the island and saw beautiful lush green trees--saw some surfers, ate at a fun local sandwich place...and of course, lounged on the beach. The last day I got WAY too much sun and had kind of a heat stroke at the airport--that really was the worst. It was also so nice to spend alone time with Jeff as well. Every couple needs it!! I was very, VERY happy to see Boston tho. He was so good for Grandma and once he saw me he wanted to come home!!! Enjoy the pictures!!!!!

Mauna Kea

Playing football on the beach. :)

Big Island Candy Co.

Akaka Falls...so beautiful.

Oh we also took family pictures...they turned out great, too! These were a couple I snapped with my camera, but we'll have more later.

Captain Cook's Monument...this is where we saw the Dolphins.

Jeff took this picture, how nice right?? I was exhausted...and of course I was eating before bed. Pretty funny.

The Gertsch Family

The gals!! This was our last day...where I'm pretty sure I got sun poisoning. You can probably tell by our red bodies...:) Oh we also did races this day! So funny. The Gertsch brothers had to race to see who was fastest. They are so funny. Then the girls/boys had relays. Jeff was the fastest boy, Staci for girls, BUT Jeff and I won the relay. :) :) AND we raced in the ocean, that one did not work out so well...and we had some causalities during the girls race...

Men of the Gertsch family {minus Adam, who Kristy forgot wasn't there}

That was a SUPER long post but it was Hawaii so it had to be! We owe a HUGE thanks to Lyle and Nola--happy retirement Lyle! We had such a blast...

And this was how happy Boston was when we returned home.