Friday, March 27

Fishies, up close and personal!

We began our final day in Maui (BOO HOO!) by eating breakfast at Betty's Beach Cafe in Lahaina.  After we filled our tummies with bacon and eggs, we made our way down to Maalaea again... this time, to check out the Maui Ocean Center.  We thought Olivia would love observing all the beautiful Hawaiian fish that we got to see on Thursday as we snorkeled... we were right!

This pond was cool!  Check out the Maalaea wind (again)!

Once indoors, we were able to explore some really interesting tanks and their inhabitants.

Someone using her tippy toes for a better view!

She was so excited to be there!

The sea horses were so interesting!

After you view the inside exhibits, you end up back outside where there are turtles...

and sharks!

What big fish!  Glad they're in the tank and were not around us while we snorkeled!

Once we exhausted the outside aquariums, we headed back inside...

but not before we posed for some pictures!

Or in this case, somewhat posed!

Once our self-guided tour was over, we entered the gift shop full of lots of neat items.  Olivia and Daniel eventually got bored inside, so they had some fun outside waiting for Emily and Karen!

Peek-a-boo!

One last "animal" to say good-bye to!

After we left the Maui Ocean Center, we drove down the coast and ate lunch in Kihei at Pizza Madness.  We kept driving down through Wailea and Makena, as Karen had never seen the beautiful sights down that way.  Olivia took a good nap... when we finally returned to Lahaina Shores, we spent the remainder of the day doing what we loved to include each day... the beach!

One final walk...

that included some coconut tossing!

A view of our condo...

up close!

More final shots of Daddy and O...

and some with all three of us building our "wall!"

Daniel buried Olivia's feet...

after which we headed out to the water for some final splashing and smiling!

We then said good-bye to her birthday beach ball from Foodland (because we thought it would pop on the plane; don't worry, though... we didn't leave it on the beach to pollute the water!  We just hid it in the closet of our condo!)

We bid farewell to our play area...

and to the beautiful beach!

The last picture we took that afternoon (before our final night out on the town!)... of us cleaning out Olivia's beach toys (that we packed and brought home)!

What a perfect ending to a perfect week!