On 2/07/2004, my wife and I traveled to Maui, Hawaii for 7 days, where we met some old friends from Phoenix.

We stayed at the Maui Sunset condo, 1032 S. Kihei Rd in Kihei. Our condo had a complete kitchen with stove, refrigerator and microwave.

I am the only Celiac in the group. I brought with me a muffin-top pan and two packages of bread mix I measured out at home and sealed with a seal-a-meal.

I was prepared to cope with what I brought along, and with what else I might find on the island. I was not disappointed. There were "Down to Earth" health food stores in Kihei, Kahului, and Lahaina. They had GF cookies and mixes. I did not see any prepared GF bread or rolls, either fresh or frozen, so I made 8 rolls from the mixes and muffin-top pans I brought from home. There also was a Star market and a Safeway within about 1 mile from the condo. They had all of the food I needed to complete my diet, plus the eggs, oil and milk to complete my bread mixes. The Safeway Club card we got there saved us about $40 on our groceries that week.

We ate all breakfasts in the condo. I found McCann's oatmeal at Star Market. Lunches were about half in the condo and half eating out. We ate out five evenings, and cooked steaks and pork chops on the public-use gas grills at the condo for two of our evening meals. I had no gluten reaction at all during the entire week.

Specific restaurants and entrees I ordered are:

• I did not order a special entree for my Continental Airlines flight. The standard fare was gluten-laced, although I was able to eat the separately-packaged cole slaw.
• I had Mahi Mahi and vegetables at Marco's in Kihei. Someone in the kitchen messed up my order, and I received my food when the others were almost finished eating.
• We dined at the evening luau at the Royal Hawaiian in Lahaina. I sampled nearly everything on the buffet, except the dishes with obvious gluten. I later spoke with the chef, who said there was no flour in the coconut pudding dessert (I ate two servings). All of the food was so good, I ate too much.
• We had lunch at Cool Cat Cafe. I ordered the 12-oz burger (no bun). It was delicious.
• I had an omelet and potatoes at Kula Lodge for breakfast, after seeing a marvelous sunrise at Mt. Haleakala.
• I had a steak, garlic mashed potatoes and salad at Dave's Billiards in Kihei. This place has almost no atmosphere, but the food was very good and relatively cheap in comparison to other restaurants on Maui.
• We took the Pacific Whale Foundation dinner cruise, out of Lahaina. I avoided the salad and pasta, but ate the mixed vegetables and two kinds of meat. It was so good, I ate too much. We saw about a dozen whales during our two-hour cruise.
• We dined at Longhi's in Lahaina. Everything was ala carte and quite expensive. I had a salad and filet.
• We had lunch at Ruby's in Kahului. I had a burger (no bun) and salad. This is a fun, 1950's-atmosphere restaurant. It was so busy we waited 20 minutes for a table, but it was worth the wait.