Aloha

Amanda and I greet you from sunny, somewhat windy Maui, sitting in sight of a beautiful rainbow (which also means a light rain). We have the absolute privilege of being able to leave our kids with our extended family and take a vacation to Hawaii.

We arrived late Friday evening at the Maui airport. We called our rental car agency, Island Car Rentals. We decided that it would be fun to rent a convertible. But, I couldn't justify paying the upgrade fee at one of the national rental agencies. So, we went with a local place and a little older model, which made the price something I could live with.

We called them and they picked us up, then took us deep in a residential area to a small shop. They were nice folks, but it was 11:30pm and the three guys hanging out had started "getting their drink on" with a half-rack of Budweiser. They got us all checked out, gave us some friendly advice, and we were on our way.

We arrived at our condo, the Maui Kai, which is very nice. It is right on the beach and we can look out our lanai onto the Pacific and the migrating whales. We spent today driving around picking up our race numbers, checking out the course, eating lunch, buying groceries, and driving around. We're still a little tired from the late night, travel, and the sun from today. Tonight we're going to cook dinner, take a walk on the beach, and retire early. We need to be down at the race end to catch a shuttle at around 5:30am, so it'll be an early morning.

We'll let you know our results. Both Amanda and I don't feel completely prepared, but we'll see how we do.