Hawaii Trip - Oahu (Part II)

Sat - Day 4: This was the first day with Mom, so we did some shopping. We hit Hilo Hattie (which was pretty cool), bought chow family-style at Costco, and hit a giant Asian owned grocery store called Don Quijote which had tons of cheesey Hawaiian stuff. I of course found some Captain Morgan board shorts I couldn't live without for $9. Kim and Shelley spent half an hour going through all of the Hawaiian Christmas ornaments. Grandpa waited outside and made a comment about being in there long enough to buy the whole store. Shelley found a hotel with sharks, so we went over there for a drink. It was really cool. They had several hammerheads that caused a ruckus and I got splashed. We watched the fish while sipping mai tais served in frozen pineapples. Otherwise, we just kind of chilled that day, as all of the other days had been so jam packed. Jon was our driver throughout the week, and the construction on the strip made it a rather long trip between Grandpa's hotel and ours.





Sun - Day 5: Pearl Harbor Day! Grandpa wanted to be there early, so we left Waikiki around 6am and boogied over to Pearl Harbor. Grandpa had a VIP pass, so we got good parking and walked under the covered hangar where the ceremony was to take place. It was a long and drawn out, somber affair, appropriate for the occasion. Grandpa got to sit behind the Pearl Harbor survivors as a member of the USS Tennessee and Missouri and a survior of WWII. There were some really nice native Hawaiian touches. There was of course a lot of brass present and accounted for. One of Doolittle's Raiders was the keynote speaker(Doolie & Co. pulled off the almost impossible raid on Japan immortalized in the film "30 Seconds Over Tokyo"). Oh yeah, Alec Baldwin played Doolittle in "Pearl Harbor". The first successful offense against Japan by the US after Pearl Harbor, and an incalculable boon to the morale of the Americans all over the country. After the proceedings, we did another stint on the USS Missouri, where Jon gave Kim and me a behind the scenes tour of the battleship. We were also lucky enough to be invited to the opening of a new wing of the museum because Grandpa had donated so many cool things (e.g. a ring filed out of a stainless nut).



We also toured the very well done USS Oklahoma memorial which is a stylized representation in steel and marble of sailors lining the railing of a battleship as they pass the USS Arizona memorial. Since we had the VIP pass, we were able to get into areas of Ford Island that are normally off limits to civilians. We drove past the rusting hulk of the Utah, but they were having a service there for a lady whose father had died on the Utah while trying to deliver her twin's ashes to US soil. She had two loved ones' remains to mourn on the Utah, so we respected her privacy and came back after lunch. The ironic thing was that the shuttle bus driver told us about the twin on Friday, and she was sitting right in front of us at the ceremony a few hours earlier.





Kim found the last authentic Tiki bar on Oahu, which also happens to be attached to a marina. La Mariana Sailing Club is nestled between several boat yards and across the street from the only West Marine on the island, so of course we had to check it out. The owner recently passed away, and the whole kit and kaboodle was for sale temporarily for $3M. We inquired within, and it was evidently willed to the estate. The good news is that it's going to remain operational. They made wicked good mai tais. Jon joined us for a zombie before we headed back to the hotel(s). We of course bought t-shirts.



We fired up frozen pizzas in our room that night as part of a Sunday night family tradition. Everyone retired early to pack, as most of us were heading for Big Island in the morning.

To be continued...

Please check out all of our pics here.