Our Disaster of a Honeymoon

It’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for, y’all!!!!  I’ve mentioned on the blog several times about how Brian’s and my honeymoon was a complete and utter disaster, but I’ve never documented it in its entirety here on the blog.  Well, at the urging of many, I’m here today to share the whole thing from start to finish. 

This is obviously a throwback post as these events transpired in 2007, but thanks to my Type A, OCD self, I kept actual handwritten notes on a little Sheraton Maui hotel notepad on the nightstand in our hotel room as all of the terrible events were unfolding.  And now I’m thanking my past self because past self is the reason that I can document every little catastrophic detail for all of you 16 years later.  It’s like I knew that future me would eventually become a blogger and would be documenting this trip for all of the world to see in 2023!!  ;o)

Before I get into the honeymoon deets, I will say this – our actual wedding was a dream – truly the best day! – so at least we had that going for us.  I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather have a disastrous honeymoon than a disastrous wedding.  Would it have been nice if both of these events could have been a success?  Sure.  But sometimes life doesn’t work out that way…

 * * *

 Brian and I were married on Saturday, December 1, 2007 at 7:30 PM.  If you weren’t following me way back when I documented all of that, you can see all of those posts below… I detailed the whole thing from the showers to the bachelorette party to the rehearsal to the ceremony to the after party and everything in between.

 Planning & Details

Rehearsal & Rehearsal Dinner 

Before the Ceremony

The Ceremony

The Reception

Portraits 

After having a very late wedding + a reception that went into the wee hours of the morning, making flight plans to leave super early the next morning was mistake #1.  Ladies and gentleman, if you’re not married yet and you’re reading this, please listen to me when I say this – LEAVE A WHOLE DAY OF CUSHION BETWEEN YOUR WEDDING DAY AND THE DAY YOU LEAVE FOR YOUR HONEYMOON.  You will be positively exhausted after your wedding (in the best way), and the last thing you will want to do is wake up at 4 AM the next morning to catch a flight… especially if you had only just gone to bed 2-3 hours before your alarm went off.

That said, the morning after our wedding, Brian and I were still riding our wedding high, so waking up at the crack of dawn wasn’t as terrible as it could have been, and we made the drive to Atlanta in our freshly-decorated-for-the-wedding vehicle.  We made it there on time, got our bags checked, breezed through security, and made it on the flight with plenty of time to spare. 

And that was the best part of our whole honeymoon. 

I wish I could say I was joking, but NO REALLY.  Haha.

The flight to Hawaii from Atlanta was long – about 10 hours – and it was the longest flight I’d ever been on.  We ended up arriving late (I don’t remember why, though), and the people at Delta had forgotten to put the agricultural forms on the flight, so we couldn’t fill out our paperwork which meant we had to sit on the tarmac forever waiting for them to get the paperwork on the flight, and waiting for everyone to complete their forms.  (Hawaii has restrictions about the movement of plants and fruits between Hawaii and the mainland, so you have to fill these forms out when entering/exiting the state.)

Because this took so long, we missed our connecting flight from Honolulu to Maui (where we were staying), and they had to put us on standby.  Our standby flight ended up being too full, so we weren’t able to get on that one either which meant that we were waiting in the Honolulu airport for hours upon hours.  If you’ve never been to the Honolulu airport, then you’re not missing anything because it. is. a. dump.  Or at least the terminal we were in back in 2007 was.  I’m hoping that they’ve made some improvements since we were there 16 years ago, though.

The whole airport is open air and there was no air-conditioning (at least not in the area where we were) so it was stifling hot and humid everywhere without any relief.  It was miserable.  The terminal we were in was also super run down and it looked like we were in some kind of depressing government facility like a jail or old courtroom or something like that.  The aesthetics were not pleasing to the eye to say the least.  In addition to that, we hadn’t eaten in forever and there was no food anywhere in our terminal.  None.  So, I was hangry and sweating and tired and stuck in this hot, humid airport for hours upon hours with no sustenance or relief in sight.  Did I mention that my lack of sleep the night before was also catching up with me?  Haha.

We finally caught the second standby flight, and while our luggage was on that flight, one of the airport attendants stomped all over my suitcase, breaking my zipper and my UGA luggage tag, and breaking my curling iron that was inside the suitcase.  How do I know for sure that someone had stomped all over it?  Well, because there were literal boot marks all over it.  It just so happened that the very same day that this happened was the day that it was announced that University of Georgia would be playing Hawaii in the Sugar Bowl (college football), so we highly doubt it was a coincidence that someone in Hawaii had stomped all over the UGA suitcase.  We will obviously never know for sure, but why else would somebody have done that?

Anywayyyy, we finally landed in Maui, and we were able to get our convertible Mustang that we’d rented for the week.  The only problem?  It was pouring down rain so we couldn’t drop the top.

We headed to our hotel – Sheraton Maui – where we had paid generously for an ocean front room, but they told us that the ocean front rooms were gone, so they were giving us a “free room upgrade.”  Well, the “free room upgrade” ended up being a room on the ground floor on the backside of the hotel away from the beach with a view of a chain link fence.  With two double beds.  For a couple who was on their honeymoon.  Sigh.  We, of course, complained, but they said there was nothing they could do because there were no other rooms left, so we were stuck with this room.

By the time we got all checked in, it was nearing 9 PM Hawaii time (which is 2 AM our time, so we’d been up around 24 hours at this point… almost 48 considering we’d barely slept the night before), but we hadn’t eaten anything for half the day, so we headed out to find food.  Well, since it was so late there was NOTHING open.  We ended up eating dinner at some random place in a shopping center and we were the only ones in there because it was so late.  The food wasn’t all that great, but we were just happy to finally have food.

After dinner, we fell into bed hoping that the next day would be better.  Spoiler alert – it wasn’t.  Haha.

We woke up the next morning hoping to put on our swimsuits and head to the beach, but the weather was awful – rainy, foggy, and freakishly cold.  It poured off and on all day, and we didn’t even have appropriate clothes for the cold weather.  Whoops.  And here is the view that we woke up to from our yucky room.  It may not look that bad, but it was worse than it looks... especially once you see the view we were actually supposed to have later in this post.

For the first couple of hours, we walked around the hotel property to scope it out (since it was just stunning in pictures), and then we had brunch at the hotel.  

Since hanging out at the beach was off the table, we tried to make the most of the day by driving to the top of the highest volcano in Maui, but it was so foggy we could barely see.  We never even made it to the top because a) I got car sick, b) I started having shortness of breath because of the elevation change, and c) the drive was just plain scary in the fog.  I thought for sure we were going to go over the side of the cliff.  

We did have a cool rental car (although we were never once able to drop the top because of the weather – LOL) and we did get to see some silverswords (rare, endangered plants that are only found in Hawaii) and nenes (AKA Hawaiian geese, pronounced nay-nays) so that was a win. 

When we arrived back at the hotel, we checked in with the front desk to see if we could change rooms and they said… NOPE.  So, we were still stuck with the crappy room for another night.

That evening, we decided to go to a cute little open air Italian restaurant (in the pouring rain – sigh), still trying to make the most of the day.  And it was nice… we had to wait forever to be seated, but we enjoyed Mai-Thais while we waited.  And then dinner was pretty good. 

But then later in the middle of the night…

Brian woke up with food poisoning.

We were originally assuming it was a stomach virus but since I never got it, we are thinking it must have been food poisoning.  Sigh. 

He literally threw up all. night. long.

He had never had a stomach virus before, nor had he ever had food poisoning, so we couldn’t believe our bad luck that he’d fallen ill for the first time on our honeymoon!  Haha. 

He was so bad off the next morning, that I had to strap him in the passenger seat and drive him to an acute care doctor right there on the island.  We were told that it was likely a stomach virus that was highly contagious, so I knew that meant it would be coming for me, but thankfully, I never got sick (the silver lining from the trip), hence the reason why we’re just going with food poisoning.  They gave him a shot of something to put him out of his misery, and then he was out cold… for the next two days.  Sigh.

We had a helicopter tour planned for that day, but we obviously had to cancel it since Brian was so sick (and the weather still wasn’t great either).  We were able to reschedule it for later in the week, so we crossed our fingers that it would work out.  Spoiler alert – it didn’t.

Brian was knocked out cold all day from the meds they’d given him, and it was another day of rain, so I couldn’t even go to the beach (not that I would have anyway… I didn’t want to leave Brian in case he needed me), so, I spent the whole day sitting in our crappy little room reading the book I’d brought and eating a Lunchable that I’d bought at the drug store.  And we didn’t even have a nice balcony with a view so I could at least sit outside.  Y’all.  Is that not the saddest thing you’ve ever heard?!  Haha.

Later that day, the hotel informed us that they had our nice, beachfront room available (YAY!), but there was just one problem… Brian was still knocked out from the drugs they’d given him for the food poisoning/stomach virus.  I ended up packing up the room and moving everything myself and then I helped him hobble over to the new room, where he ended up crawling into the new bed and sleeping for the rest of the day and night.  I spent the rest of the day reading since there wasn’t much else to do… but at least I finally had this nice view that we were supposed to have had all along.

We ordered room service for dinner that night, and I think I ended up eating alone because I’m pretty sure that Brian slept through all of that (if my memory serves correctly… that part is a little hazy).  Fun fact, I ordered a grilled cheese sandwich from the kids’ menu and it was $50.  Did I mention that everything costs a gazillion dollars in Hawaii?!  So yeah, not only was this the worst trip ever, we had to pay a ton of money for it.  Haha.

We were hoping things would start looking up after that day, but…

That night, we were awakened at 2 AM to the sound of hurricane-force winds, torrential rains, and the building shuddering because there was a typhoon blowing through.  The horrible weather continued all day long and it was pitch black outside for most of the day.  I have videos that I took of the palm trees literally blowing sideways because it was so bad.  This picture was taken in the middle of the morning when it was supposed to be light outside... but it was PITCH BLACK.

 

If that wasn’t scary enough, mid-morning, the hotel alarms started going off and hotel management came on over the loudspeakers telling everyone that we had to evacuate the hotel… into the 70 mph winds and torrential rains. 

Like… what?

We gathered up our valuables and headed out of our room to a hallway full of confused guests.  Nobody knew what to do or where exactly we were supposed to go, and we had just made it downstairs to the ground level when we were told that it was a false alarm and to go back to our rooms.

Well, the weather was horrendous for the rest of the day, so again, we stayed in our hotel room the rest of the day eating expensive room service and watching the local weather coverage.  Brian also slept off and on because he still wasn’t feeling 100%.  That was the day that our helicopter tour was supposed to have been rescheduled, but we obviously ended up having to cancel that again.

Brian did end up feeling decent enough later that day, so after everything blew through, we were able to get out of our room and walk down to the beach for the first time on the whole trip.  It was still super yucky out and the waves were MASSIVE, so it was a short stroll, and we didn’t even put on our swimsuits.  As a matter of fact, it was coooold again that day.

 

At that point, we looked at the forecast for the rest of the trip and the weather looked AWFUL, so we decided to cut our losses and throw in the towel.  At that point, I had already called my parents crying multiple times, and since the weather was looking grim, we knew there was no point in dragging out our misery. We immediately got on the phone with Delta and got our flights changed, and we took the red-eye home the next night. 

Thankfully, that flight home went smoothly.  I couldn’t sleep on the plane, and I was literally awake THE WHOLE NIGHT, but after what we’d already been through, that was just another drop in the bucket.  I was just relieved to be on my way back home.  I ended up watching movies alone all night since I was the only one awake on the whole plane aside from the flight crew. 

We got home in the wee hours of the morning Friday, December 7, (just five days after we had left) and I don’t think I have ever been so grateful to be home.  I was just relieved that the plane hadn’t crashed on the way home because after all of the bad luck we’d had, I was convinced that was going to happen.  Haha.

Back at home, Brian and I immediately got into pajamas, closed the blinds to shut out the daylight, and we slept until mid-afternoon. 

Whew.

What. A. Trip. 

To recap,

We couldn’t deplane in Honolulu since Delta failed to have forms.

We missed our connecting flight to Maui because of that.

We couldn’t board our standby flight because it was too full.

We had to sit in the hot, sticky Honolulu airport for hours with no food.

My suitcase was stomped on and broken, along with some of the contents inside.

We got stuck with a crappy room with two double beds and a terrible view.

We were up for 24 hours with little food that first travel day.

We were stuck eating crap food since the restaurants were all closed when we arrived.

The weather was awful the whole trip.

It was unseasonably cold for the whole trip, so we didn’t have the proper clothes.

Our drive up the volcano was a bust because it was scary and foggy and I got sick.

Brian got food poisoning.

The medicine the doctor gave him knocked him out, so I was on my own for two days.

But it rained the whole time so I couldn’t even leave the room to go to the pool or beach.

We had to pay $50 for one dinky room service grilled cheese sandwich.  Lol.

A typhoon blew through, and it was terrifying.

The hotel alarms went off telling us to evacuate out into the typhoon.

We left early and forfeited three days of our trip.

I couldn’t sleep the entire 10-hour redeye flight home.

Our helicopter tour was cancelled… twice.

Brian slept for half of the trip from his illness.

We never once had a good dinner together (that didn't cause food poisoning).

We never once got to do anything touristy (aside from the yucky volcano trip).

And we never once even put on a swimsuit for the entire trip.

That is quite a series of unfortunate events, y’all.  Lol.

All that to say, we do look back on this trip now and laugh.  It took us a while, but we eventually got there. 

And we did do a honeymoon redo in Las Vegas the following summer, where we stayed at the Bellagio and they gave us our fountain view room as they were supposed to (with a gorgeous room and bathroom, turndown service, and chocolate covered strawberries and other treats nightly), so that did ease the sting a little.  ;o)

And funnily/oddly/crazily enough, we ended up naming our first baby (our Yorkipoo) Maui.  Why?  I have no clue, but she has definitely been the best thing to ever have been associated with Hawaii for us.  Hahahaha.   

That was the first time that Brian or I had ever been to Hawaii, and it was also the last time that either of us had been.  I’m not saying that either of us are opposed to ever going back, but let’s just say that it’s not high on our list. 

Been there.

Done that. 

Barely survived it. 

But at least now we have a story to tell.

Happy Monday, y’all!