Kaua'i vs. Virus

So I'm very aware that the world is a very strange place for everyone right now, and the Hawkins family is no exception. We started 2020 planning a 10 day trip to China to take Grace to the village where she was born. And then the virus hit.

At the time, we thought our China trip just got an unlucky break, and we'd simply reschedule it for later in the year. We also thought we'd just pick a new place to go for spring break, and it wouldn't be a problem. So we had a little family pow-wow, and to make up for China, it was decided that we'd visit Hawaii.

Since I (Bret) travel so much for work, our vacations are closely tied to places we can stay on my hotel points. With that in mind, we landed on a place on Kaua'i and planned a week long trip for the end of March. And then the virus REALLY hit.

On Thursday, it felt like the world came unglued. March Madness was canceled. School got canceled. All of my work meetings were, for the most part, canceled. At dinner Thursday night, Erin and I had a "what if?" kind of half joking conversation about coming to Hawaii early and just waiting out the virus here. "Wouldn't it be awesome to be quarantined...IN HAWAII?!?"

We also started hearing rumblings of possible domestic travel bans in the future, and Erin and I were in agreement that we were going to Hawaii, one way or the other. We both were REALLY needing a vacation. And with that, we started looking at our calendars, and a plan began to form. I had enough hotel points to cover three weeks of hotels in Hawaii, and Delta was willing to change our flights at no cost. So on Thursday night when Brownsburg decided to close schools on Friday, I called Delta and changed our flights to Friday morning. A complete rebooking of our trip occurred. We had to book into three new hotels over the course of the trip because no one place had enough availability (and we didn't necessarily have the points) to stay in one spot the whole time. But we got it done.

We packed, slept (briefly) and boarded flights on Friday morning at 10am. By 8pm Hawaii time, we were in Kaua'i.

Beat tired, we headed to hotel #1. "Umm... Mr. Hawkins, your reservation doesn't start until tomorrow." Somehow in my haste, I had the first reservation off by a night. Luckily another property nearby had availability, and we crashed.

This morning, the boys and I got haircuts, as this was SUPPOSED to be something we did before going on vacation. Erin and Grace watched the sunrise.
  
The view at pool number one for the day ended up being pretty great.

But then we got over to our REAL hotel for the next 9 days. The view here is spectacular, and we got upgraded to a room overlooking the pool.

Pretty sure we'll be OK for the next couple of weeks. Did I hear it was snowing in Indiana?

Stay safe and healthy, friends. More pictures and adventures to come...