Hawai'i 01: in which we once again run away from Portland in Springtime

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Dave and my first trip together was in March of 1999, to Maui. Back then we went primarily to escape the gloom that had descended on Portland the previous October. We stayed with friends in Lahaina, then camped in Hana, and generally had a great time. Five years later we met friends in Kauai for a week, staying at massively luxurious lodgings provided by Mrs. Lipski, celebrated my 35th birthday there, and then spent a week on Hawai'i (the big island). I'd never been there before, and booked us into places that were interesting (a treehouse in the wilds of Puna, a Macadamia Nut farm near the black sand beaches), but situated on the wet and windy side of the island. We saw lots of cool stuff, but I vowed that next time we came we'd stay on the sunny, warm Kona coast, as we are primarily beach people. This year we both have big birthdays again--Dave turns 35, I turn 40. We wanted to do something suitably celebratory, and found out we had *exactly* enough frequent flier miles to go to Hawai'i, and returning 10 years after our first trip seemed very appropriate. We cleaned the house, arranged with many wonderful friends to take care of the cats, and packed for a temperature I couldn't even remember, it being about 30 degrees warmer in Hawai'i than it had been in Portland since October.