Day Eight: Having a whale of a time!

We finally saw Humpback whales and lots of them! After 'Whale Gate' in Waikiki, we got to a point of wondering if we'd see any at all. Thankfully after locking in this 2 hour cruise yesterday, we had a great time and saw many whales along the way. Whilst the whales don't jump out of the water and attempt tricks like dolphins can, we saw their tails and two breached (jumped up vertically) at the same time. People on the boat were screaming in excitement, it was hilarious! Even the narrator yelled "I've never seen that before!" 

After our brilliant whale tour it was a short drive further along the coast to Lahaina. Gianna had recommended a restaurant right on the beach to eat at called Mala. We'd rocked up about 2:30 and they just happened to be serving breakfast foods till 3pm. It was only one morning in Waikiki that we'd previously been out for an egg style breakfast this trip because we've been content with cereal, toast and fruit, but it was a nice option for lunch today. The drink of the day was the No-Jito. It is exactly the same as a Mojito, but without the alcohol and insanely delicious. We might try this one at home! 

Perusing the map carefully we saw a few more stopping points of interest on the west coast of the island, so with a couple of hours of daylight still in our favour, we journeyed north along the coast. We had our eye on getting to the blowhole on the north coast, which in the end was certainly achievable. Along the way we stopped to snap some ideal views and saw some very 'gnarly' surf spots, which seemed to be occupied by the locals, as these spots would truly be unknown to the bulk majority of tourists. 

Venturing along the very narrow and winding road, we made it very comfortably in the top down convertible. At the site of the blowhole itself, was a very rocky terrain and so as a safety precaution, the pregnant one stayed and snapped pics from a far, whilst Richard Columbus went exploring! The area was peaceful and calm and an opportune time to soak up the serenity. Aaahhhh the serenity. 

Feeling relaxed and ready to move on, we thought we'd come this far, as surely continuing on around the coast in the same direction would be easy and we still had a reasonable amount of daylight ahead of us. It ended up being a gutsy move. We hadn't noticed on the map that we were using that the road was mainly single lane, with big cliff drops. We literally had to crawl along at a slow speed to avoid death! Often there were blind corners and you just had to hope for the best. Apparently it is good practice to toot before taking one of these death corners....well we will know for next time. The concentration required was insane, but clearly we made it out alive...just! It was hairier than a 1970s style moustache! 

Once making it back to normal roads, it was plain sailing to the house to shower up, Skype, blog, have a mandatory Facebook check and get ourselves ready for dinner. We thought that we had hardly seen Matteo, so it was a good idea to eat at their restaurant. The meals were amazing once again and we could not have been happier. We stayed on till stumps, even out staying the staff, which gave us a really good chance to sit down with Matteo when it was quiet.