Photos from 2002 September 17
So here I am on Maui. Maui consists of two main mountain peaks, connected by a low plain. This is the view out the backyard of my friend's house, which is a good chunk of the way up the bigger mountain, Haleakala. The photo is looking out over the plain to the Northwest towards the other peak. I was struck by the fact that from the highway down, you can see the ocean on both sides of the plain. I'll try to get a photo of that later. I was also struck by the way the clouds just stuck to the mountain peaks as if they were velcroed on. Once they were there, they never moved. Mornings were often clear, but by the time 11 am rolled around, cloud cover on the mountain. The hotel where the convention is is down on the beach just off the left side of the photo, but to get there, I have to drive all the way to the right to get down to the plain, and then follow the coast back to the left. It takes about 45-55 minutes.	The view out the back of the hotel, again looking to the Northwest at the same mountain. That's probably a returning snorkel tour boat.	Same mountain, same direction, just closer to the water. The coast here alternates between this really cool-looking lava rock and beautiful sandy beaches. A lot of boring swanky resorts here, though. Not very crowded, at least.	View to the West toward Lanaii, with the half-crater cresent of Molokini (somewhat darker) in the foreground. I'm going snorkeling there on Thursday. It's the most crowded snorkel spot on the island, but the cresent of the volcano provides a shelter that attracts tons and tons of marine life, I'm told. Which is, of course, *why* it's the most popular tourist site. I'm going to try a tour that only takes 20 people on a raft and specializes in avoiding the crowds. We'll see how it is.
Overexposed picture of the northwest mountain of Maui, again.	Behind the hotel, looking out toward Molokini. I liked the composition of this shot, with the bent tree.	Combination of rock and sandy beach, looking Northwest. I did take a lot of pictures of that mountain, didn't I?	Molokini on the far left, but the main reason I took this photo was to see if the camera could catch the bright color of the windsurfer sail against the steel-grey/blue of the sky and sea. I think it did quite well, although you'll likely have to zoom in to find it.
Interesting bird. I have no idea what kind of bird it was, but they seemed common along the shore. I'm afraid this one was injured, by the way it was holding its leg. I haven't seen much else that you would call local wildlife yet. A lot of sparrows and starlings. A few other birds I didn't recognize.	Again, interesting rock formations. I'm pretty sure someone piled those white rocks there on purpose, but I still liked the effect of the contrast.	Front entrance to the hotel where the conference was. All landscaped, of course, but I liked the trees. You can see the convention area in the back on the right.	View of Haleakala to the Southeast from the Northwest island. The sun was setting, and the mountain was just spectacular. This image doesn't quite capture the way it disappears up into the clouds. Tomorrow I'll try to make a panorama photo and see how that works.
Same view, this time I was trying to see if the camera could capture an image of the rising moon behind the volcano at sunset. Pretty cool, huh?
		Go to 2002 September 18