We stayed at the Grand Wailea once and fell in love with the resort. This resort is basically divided into two parts. One part is the villas, where the resort manages and rents out individually owned condos. And the other part is the hotel. The first time we were there, we stayed at the villas. It was a fantastic, incredibly spacious condo. You literally feel like you're in paradise as you look out from the lanai. The only drawbacks are that there is no room service, and the beach and amazing pool facilities are all on the hotel side, so we had to drive across the street everyday.
This time we chose to stay on the hotel side. We had a suite and a connecting bedroom. The resort was so nice, since our wedding anniversary falls on the 4th of July, they sent us a huge arrangement of tropical flowers and assorted snacks, on top of that, they gave us a box of gourmet cookies and chocolate covered strawberries.
We spent most of our time at the beach; we can stay up to 6 hours a day just lounging and playing. The resort will set up lawn chairs and umbrellas for you, and if you're hungry, you can go to the resort cafe and take boxed up food to the beach. We probably only spent a day at the pools, but the pools are incredibly amazing. Each pool has a distinct feature to them. There are kiddie pools, an adults only pool, slides connected to pools, a lazy river, scuba diving pools, and a pool where there's a rope where you can hang on and jump into. The lazy river doesn't provide large floaties, you'll have to purchase them at the pool-side shop, but they're not insanely expensive, and they're pretty well-made, so we purchased 2. They're not absolutely necessary, as most of the pools are only 3-4 feet deep.
There are quite a few restaurants on resort property, but we like exploring the island and try different things. One of the best restaurants we've tried this week is located at the nearby Andaz resort, the Morimoto Maui. Their omakase is very pricey, but absolutely delicious. We weren't able to go this time, but Star Noodle in Lahaina is a must. Their Hapa Ramen is made with a broth that's made with the Lahaina Luau pork bone, cooked for about 12 hours. The flavor is to-die-for. Another good restaurant to try is Mama's Fish House. They are on the pricey end, and reservations are recommended at least a week in advance, but the seafood is fresh, and the dessert called Black Pearl is among one of my favorites, ever. Another good restaurant is called Sansei. When we drove up, my husband and I thought this place looked vaguely familiar. Then I remembered that we were here 10 years ago on our first wedding anniversary trip to Maui! Only the strip mall a decade ago wasn't as lively as it is now. Food was still amazing though! And how can you leave Hawaii without having shaved ice? The stand where we had ours was called Surfing Monkey Shaved Ice. It was only steps away from Sansei. They're not like your regular shaved ice stand. They offer syrup flavors like Kona coffee made with real Kona coffee, cream, and sugar, real lemonade, or combinations of different flavors making up new flavors like Tiger's Blood (ha!). They have options where you can put a scoop of vanilla ice cream inside the shaved ice, or sweetened azuki red beans, or ling hui mui powder (a type of dried Chinese plum), you name it, they have it. The owner is a British guy who came to Maui and decided he never wanted to return to London. And it was fun being able to chat with him.
One of my husband's cousins had their family photo taken in Maui just not long ago. And I loved that idea. What better backdrop is there than the blue waters and the gorgeous white sand? So I did a little research on Yelp, and found a fantastic local photographer to do our family portraits. Turned out, she was the one that my husband's cousin used as well! Small world! Her name is Angela Nelson, and we honestly couldn't be happier with her work. She was so good with the kids. Captured their innocence perfectly, and did fantastically with all the candids. I don't know about you, but I'm not a big fan of posed photos. She did mostly candids, and even her posed photos were amazing. You'll see for yourself!
xoxo,
Lin
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