Sunday, April 18

Still living high on the memory of paddle boarding with dolphins yesterday morning. It was an incredible experience! The beach in front of the Mauna Lani Beach Club was so perfectly calm yesterday morning that Andi and I wanted to take Janie, Tory and Aden there this morning. Aden loves swimming in the ocean, and this is a great spot to do it because the bay is somewhat protected by the beach’s horseshoe shape. It’s not a very big area though, so we knew the beach would get busy later in the day.

Beaches are open to anyone on Hawaii’s Big Island, even if they’re situated in front of a hotel or private property, so even people who aren’t staying at a Mauna Lani property can visit this beach. There are a few lounge chairs and cabanas reserved for hotel guests and villa owners. Fortunately for us, we are renting one of the owner villas so we were able to snag a couple of chairs and spread out.

Aden was dying for someone to snorkel with him, so Tory and I joined him in the water. Right away, we saw lots of colorful fish. The best part about snorkeling for me was watching Aden swim underwater. He’s a little fish himself! He loved diving deep into a school of fish and exploring all the colorful coral reef below the water’s surface.

The kids played in the sand for a while and I took a little nap in the sun. It was the perfect relaxing morning at the beach.

Just when the crowds started to roll in around Noon, we left to go back to the condo. It’s too hot to be at the beach in the afternoon — unless you’re under some shade or in the water, we just about melt laying outside on the sand.

The five of us at lunch and then Janie offered to take Tory and Aden to the pool at Palm Villas. All Tory and Aden want to do is swim, swim, swim. Meanwhile, Andi relaxed and I caught up on some blogging. We joined them there a short time later.

There are cards and poker chips at this airbnb, so Janie has been teaching the kids how to play. Too funny! Janie loves card games and Tory is always willing to learn a new game to play. Aden’s attention span doesn’t hold through for long.