ka'anapali beach

At the top of the boys' bucket list for this trip was cliff diving. I was pretty nervous about the whole thing, but willing to check it out because Mike had gone cliff diving off Black Rock when he was here during high school (lo these many years ago). We read that there are a whopping 11 parking spaces reserved for non-resort guests close to Ka'anapali Beach, so we got up early and made the drive up and managed to snag one. The beach was really nice (and the resort was nice enough not to question me when I went inside to use their facilities), but much to the boys' dismay, it turns out that they no longer allow cliff diving there. Oh, darn.

Not to worry! Around Black Rock is also some great snorkeling, so that's what we did instead. I had some concerns after yesterday's spectacular failure (I was still pulling sand out of my hair and ears this morning), but luckily the snorkel worked this time. Mike and I took turns staying on the beach to oversee the boys and our stuff, and I got to snorkel first. Max, Henry, and I went out and swam around for a good amount of time and saw some great fish.

In the beach equipment closet at our condo, we found a folding chair and an umbrella, so once I was done snorkeling I got set up on the beach while Mike and Max went out. Henry stayed right in front of where I was sitting, looking for shells in the shallows (no luck today, plus the surf was too rough for him and he got sand in his drawers, which made him quite cranky), while Liam was busy in the sand behind me. Mike and Max went out way farther than I did, plus Mike the show-off did some diving down to get a better look at the wildlife.

Meanwhile, Liam buried himself in the sand. He managed to get his whole body in there with the exception of his arms and head, and eventually he talked Henry into burying his arms. He stayed that way for probably an hour. The look on his face might say otherwise, but he did this intentionally.

Once Mike and Max came in, tempers started to get a little on the short side among our under-18 crowd, so we decided to call it a morning. We debated stopping somewhere else on the way home, but everyone was wet and cranky, so we decided to just come back to the condo for showers and lunch.