Dave Viner's Weblog

Reflections on a vacation

Over the holidays, Diana, Aurelia and I went on a vacation. This was the first big, planned, extended vacation that we've taken all together. So, to make it good, we went to Maui for 2 weeks. And it was completely awesome. We stayed in a little town called Paia in north central Maui. Instead of going to a hotel, we rented a house. We thought this would be better with Aurelia, since she goes to sleep between 6 and 7 every day. So, if we had a hotel room, at least one of us would have to stay in the room from 6 or 7 on. That didn't seem like too much fun for either of us. In addition, we didn't want to worry about bothering other guests if Aurelia screamed or had trouble sleeping. She normally is incredibly well behaved, but we just didn't want to worry about it on our vacation.

So, we rented this house in Paia. If you don't know Paia, it's a very non-touristy town. Most of the people who live there are *very* hippy - lots of organic, whole grain, surfer types. But this was perfect for us. The pace of life there is very mellow. Think of how much more laid back LA is than New York. Hawaii is that much more laid back than LA. Yeah, it's unreal. It's like everyone is fully relaxed all the time. In Paia, one of the small restaurants had a sign in the window listing the hours... 9.30 - 4. Below that was a second sign saying "If we're late to open, don't blame us. The surf must be awesome." That's pretty much how everything was there. Surfers filled the waters every day. And most folks seemed to either surf or watch the surfers. It was unbelieveably relaxing.

Speaking of the restaurants, all of them were terrific. They were all small, like 5 to 10 tables each. Every one was just spectacular. Not expensive or fancy. Just plain good. The kind of restaurants that you look at and think you could probably make the same food in your own kitchen. But every time, we were blown away. The food was awesome. Spicy when it should be. Sweet when it should be. Complex but not fancy-restaurant-foo-foo. I was really pleasantly suprised every time.

Another cool thing was celebrity sightings. I didn't expect to see any, but we had lunch at a table next to Matt Perry, Kevin Pollack, and Hank Azaria at the Ritz Carlton in Kapalua. They seem like pretty normal guys. Hank talked nearly the whole time. And he really is good at doing voices. As if that wasn't enough, we ran into Willie Nelson and Bonnie Ratt at Charley's in Paia. The funny thing about that is that we almost didn't go in. It was our last day, and we were just trying to waste some time before going to the airport. So we went in for breakfast. And there they were. Just having breakfast. And occasionally getting interrupted by someone asking for a photograph. Apparently, Willie lives in Sprekelsville, which is just down the street from Paia. I always figured he lived in Texas or something like that. Goes to show you what I know....

Overall, I totally loved Paia. It really made a great impression on me. It was relaxing, happy, and a lot of fun. After our last trip to Maui (where we stayed in west Maui), I was a bit turned off of Hawaii. It seemed really touristy. Not bad, just like a regular touristy area. But Paia changed that. I was love to live in Paia. Or retire there. It was just fantastic.