First Days

Arrival

Before we get to Hawaii, there's always the travel. We've never travelled further west than BC, so this was all new. It felt like we were chasing the sun, and after about 12 hours of flight, and 5 hours in the Vancouver airport, we landed in Honolulu about 11 hours after we left. As a side note, if you have to spend time in an airport, Vancouver is one of the nicer ones to spend it in! Unfortunately, we landed in Honolulu just as the sun was setting, so only had a brief glimpse of the scenery, but it looked quite interesting. We grabbed the shuttle to our hotel, and after checking in, took to the streets in search of food. Luckily the rain that started just after we landed ended on the drive. We looked at the menu at the Hyatt, but decided we wanted something way more casual, and spotted this place ( photo from the next day), called "Ruffage", just a hole in the wall salad place. Usually these are the better, more local places anyways, and it was pretty good.

After dinner, we walked along Kalakaua, the main drag by the beach. Even at 9pm it's packed, and the stores are open until 11pm. An interesting array of tacky tourist shops right next door to Stores like Rolex, Omega, and Ferrari. As you walk by every store, there's a nice flood of cold air wafting through the open doors. Now that we've been there, we don't need to go back :-) After this I think we were both beyond tired having been up for nearly 24 hours.

 

Honolulu

The only goals we had for today were to walk up Diamond Head, and go for a walk on Waikiki Beach. Leaving the hotel just after 8am, it was as hot as I expected, not yet unbearably, but still pretty hot. If you aren't familiar with Diamond Head, it's a volcanic cone just south of Waikiki Beach, going up to about 750ft, and entered through a fairly narrow road tunnel. Not a strenuous climb, but the 250 stairs near the top were a good finish. The views are worth the climb, and the water below is just as blue and turquoise as you see in pictures. The only downside is that it's popular, so the trails are busy.

We continued by walking the rest of the way around Diamond Head, stopping near the beginning of the beach for a shaved ice, needed after the hot 13km walk. We then followed this up with lunch looking over the beach, and then a walk along the beach. The water is bathtub warm, and the beach packed (although it doesn't look it in the picture). Again, been there, don't need to go back!

After a bit of down time on a bench, we grabbed our bags from the hotel and headed back to the airport, just as it started to pour, might be the normal afternoon rain here. This was where the real reason for the trip begins, meeting up with Beth's Mom, sister, and her husband who had just flown in for DC. We hopped on the short 20 minute flight to Maui, again, timed perfectly to see the scenery just as it was getting dark. However, this looked spectacular, with towering, deserted looking volcanoes. Diamond Head looked tall from below at just 750ft, but Haleakala absolutely dwarfs it at over 10,000ft! Was hard to tell where it ended and the clouds began in the dark sky. A quick stop for wine and groceries, and a short drive to Lahena, and we are settled in at the beach house. Not sure yet what the week has in store, but Daphne has a bit of a plan, and I don't think we can go to wrong here!