Hawaii Trip - Oahu (Part I)

Wed - Day 1: Get up at the butt-crack before dawn, finish up last minute packing and load the truck. Kyle came over to drive Kim's truck back home, so to thank him, Kim backed into his car and destroyed his fender. Kim's fender is pretty gashed too. Oops! I guess we should've wiped the dew off the morrors and windows. Who says FJ's are hard to see out of, and what happened to the backup assist alarm? It evidently doesn't work for cars off to the side that you cut the wheels into. Kyle groaned, Kim didn't freak out, and we made sure Kyle's car was driveable. After exchanging insurance information, we got on the road.



The five hour flight went pretty fast. I read Latitude 38 and did the airline mag's crossword. Not much to see out there. We landed in Honolulu and met up with Jon, Shelly, Haydon, and Grandpa. Kim got a lei for Shelly, which Haydon promptly turned into mulch. Jon picked us up in the rented minivan and we all went to go check into our three respective hotels (don't ask) on Waikiki beach.

We all got back into the van and ran out to the Punchbowl National Cemetary, which gets its name from being the crater of an extinct volcano. I'll let Kim describe what it's all about, but it's a wonderful memorial to our fallen soldiers, including the bodies recovered from Pearl Harbor and the Challenger disaster.

After that, we ran down to the Waikiki strip and had drinks and dinner at Dukes. The mai tais were excellent as we watched the sun set next to the Royal Hawaiian (where mai tais where invented). We watched the charter catamarans head out for their daily sunset cruise. Kim chatted up the waiter for local things to do, and Grandpa filled up on the salad bar. Jon got a much needed cocktail while Haydon chased birds. All in all, a lovely dinner. Kim and I walked down the strand after dinner while everybody else jumped in the minivan. Our hotel room was really a one bedroom apartment, so we stocked up on staples at one of the two ABC stores on Jon's hotel lobbly (they're on every block) and went up to the room for a nightcap. Because of the two hour time difference (vs. PST) and getting up so early, we were tired early and fell asleep watching cable after trying to figure out the air conditioner.



Thurs - Day 2: We all hopped in the minivan and ran up to the North Shore. O'Neill was having their World Cup surfing competition near the banzai pipeline. We stopped where some guys were warming up on fifteen foot waves. Further up the road, we saw the real spectacle with the custom painted RV's and banners. The North Shore was having spectacular surf for the competition. Shelley wanted authentic Matsumoto's Shave Ice (not shaved) so we stopped where they invented that too. We also stopped at the Dole Plantation. I never knew you could make so much stuff out of pineapple.



Other than t-shirts, the only souvenir I really wanted was an authentic fish hook pendant. We saw a burned out city bus on the side of the road with a "Bone Carving" sign out. We turned back around just to check it out and met a really cool guy who inherited the bus from his dad, so he setup a carving shop/studio in it. He had really nice stuff that he made (cha-ching) and the cheap stuff he bought from China. I agonized over what to get and finally settled on an off white one (they get dark with your skin oil anyway). He customized the length, we shook his hand, and we were off to L&L BBQ for lunch.



We also stopped at the beautiful Byodo-In buddhist temple that was built without a single nail, where Haydon got to chase more birds and Grandpa and I talked about koi ponds. We drove back down to Honolulu/Waikiki and met Mike, the curator of the USS Missiori battleship museum, for dinner at Gordon Biersch. Yumm! I may actually get to like real beer. After that, we all went back to our respective rooms.



Fri - Day 3: We had to get up early because they only hand out so many free passes to the USS Arizona memorial in Pearl Harbor, and Grandpa wanted to be first in line. It was quite touching and all I kept doing was visualizing this beautiful island covered in smoke, fire, death, and destruction. There were many Japanese tourists there that some of the older generation didn't quite cotton to, but I felt it was a wonderful testament to the healing powers of 63 years of forgiveness and cooperation, on both sides.



We then headed over to the USS Missouri, where Grandpa is a rock star, and Jon is the prodigal son returned (Jon works on the USS Iowa, the Missouri's sistership). Grandpa likes to sit in the Officers' lounge and when he comes on the History channel documentary that they play constantly, he looks around to see if anyone recognizes him. He was in a lot of pictures that day. We stopped by the Pacific Aviation museum after eating lunch in their cantina.



We joined Jon on his balcony for a beautiful vantage point overlooking the bay and the Friday night beer can races at the Waikiki Yacht Club. I even saw a whale breach next to a sailboat illuminated by the last vermillion rays of thesetting sun. Kim and I ate pizza from Wolfgang Puck's across the street and Jon and I went to go pick up Mom.

To be continued...

Please check out the rest of our pics here.

Lat/Long:
21D 16' 24.18"N x 157D 49' 16.77"W