What a beautiful island we are on! We went north today, stopping at everything that looked interesting, even Puff the Magic Dragon's Land of Hanalei. We saw some beautiful beaches, lush tropical plantation, a couple of caves...and a lot of chickens. This was funny to us because a year ago when we were in Mexico we spent much of our driving time looking at cows. We took pictures of cows, stopped to moo at them, honked at them, and were just generally enthralled. It wasn't until that last day that Grampy finally spoke up and wondered how he could have possibly raised such a group of city kids. So, chickens are the new cows, and have completely captivated us....Mason in particular. And, we warned him. These are wild Bantam roosters and hens. Yes, they look cute. Yes, that hen with her two chicks were just too cute. He still thought it was fun to chase her. She tried her hardest to ignore him, but he persisted. Finally she flipped a 180 and ran straight toward him. With no delay he turned on his toe and darted toward me. I've never seen him run faster than he did being chased by that chicken. She gave up rather quickly and he broke down in tears. It was a well-deserved lesson and gave the rest of us a good kackle (sorry).

We also went snorkeling for quite a while. I headed out at first with Mason, who was like swimming with an anchor in the shape of an octopus wrapped around my neck. After enough of that, I took Kenzie. We had our fair share of waves, but she kept floating beside me. She put her head down in the water and held my hand as we searched. We went out quite a ways. I even had my processed cheese in tow to bribe them, but we didn't see more than one spotted fish and a dead eel. Emily and Lisa saw puffer fish, and one of the beaches was cleared due to a shark sighting!! But, we're still in search of good snorkeling.

We planned a BBQ down by the pool, but didn't beat the rainstorm, and turned around to eat in our room. It didn't last long, though, and Kenzie and Mason went for a late night swim. I joined them, but only made it as far as the hot tub. Cindy held out for quite a while with two kids jumping on her from pool-side. Both kids are learning, even from yesterday. Mason is actually learning how to swim! He doesn't want to be outdone by his sister, of course.