19th March, 2016

Yes, you’ve guessed it, we are in….Alaska!! No, only kidding it is indeed, Hawaii, more specifically Honolulu and more specifically still, Waikiki.

Getting here was fine in so far as we had an evening flight with Qantas from Sydney that took about 9.5 hours. I have to say I was not that impressed with the plane, the service or the food – and this is from someone who actually likes airline food. I usually eat Val’s as well as my own. I suppose we have been spoiled somewhat and, as Caroline likes to comment, ‘first world problems, eh?’

What is really weird is, of course, arriving before you have left. We left Sydney at 7.45 on Saturday evening and arrived in Honolulu at 8.00 on Saturday morning. Having just spent the last two months getting up to speed with the time differences back home, especially when it comes to sports results, I am really thrown as everything is now ahead of us. Ah well….

Speedi Shuttle kindly dropped us off at our boutique hotel Vive Waikiki. That is Vive as in ‘revive’ and not Vive as in ‘vive la France’. It is very chic and boutiquey which largely translates as small, but it is well situated with only about a 4 minute walk to the famous Waikiki Beach. OK, I know you are desperate to see the room… The views are quite good as we are on the 15th floor (14th in UK) (13th in fact as they don’t have a 13th floor!).If you press your face up to the window and squint, you can see the sea (top right-hand pic). In the words of Basil Fawlty, it is there, between the land and the sky.

We had a bit of a snooze and then went for a walk down to the beach. Wow, what a lot of people! We then walked east, which was a bit of a mistake as we were looking for a restaurant for a snack and there did not seem to be any – or, at least, none that looked like the sort of snack we had in mind. Our fault as, if you go west it is chock full of shops and restaurants. The end result was a rather indifferent and expensive meal at a restaurant we read about in one of the free hand-out magazines. Still, they did have cocktails and a hula dancer! The evening ended with a brief glimpse of the Beach at night.

20th March, 2016

We had a bit of a lie in, but then decided we needed to get out and see what Hawaii was all about. So off we went via the No 2 bus to Diamond Head. This is the crater of an extinct volcano that the US Army used as an artillery location (firing mortars out to sea, in case you were wondering, like me, how they could fire from inside a crater), though it was never used in war.The bus dropped us off at the bottom of the road going up the hill to the crater, so we set off and, via a tunnel, arrived in the crater. It was then a stiff climb to the viewing platform from which fantastic views were available, including all the way back to Honolulu and Waikiki. Hot and tiring, but very well worth it (though we did take a taxi back!).

Another rather indifferent (and expensive) meal that evening, though at least we were consoled by another cocktail and some nice surroundings. I do look as though I am practising to play the bagpipes, though….

21st March, 2016

An early start for our round-island tour with Discover Hawaii Tours. An 8.10 am pick-up saw us join a very international passenger list for a long day of touring with about 140 miles and 10 or so stops before being dropped off again at 6.00 pm.

Fist stop was a coffee plantation (with a nicely decorated gift shop and free coffee) prior to the main event (we were early and it was not open yet), the Dole pineapple plantation. Founded in about 1900 it is very big and at one point Hawaii accounted for 2/3 of all canned pineapples in the world. I can tell you also that the gift shop has more pineapple-related items than you can possibly imagine! Nice photo of Val, don’t you think?

Next we went to a really lovely botanical garden called Waimea Valley. The main aim was to swim in the pool fed by a waterfall, but the gardens/valley were worth a visit in themselves as they were very well marked up as to what was what with an excellent variety of trees and flowers affording, of course, an excellent opportunity to snap a few pictures. I particularly like the pretty blue flower!! I did manage a swim though it was painful clambering over some quite sharp and slimy rocks to get in, so only Val’s feet managed to experience the ‘refreshing’ (aka ‘cold’) waters of the pool. We were all equipped with compulsory life vests, for all those of my ex-colleagues who enjoy risk assessment and Health & Safety!

On we went, our fellow bus passengers now bonding with each other at each stop, guided by the charming Rick, our guide. Lots of beaches and the chance of another swim (after a short boat ride to a ‘secret’ beach – see our VERY impressive guide below) as we crawled along the North Shore (the traffic is dreadful). Lots of the island has been the location for countless films and TV shows including Lost, Pirates of the Carribean, From Here to Eternity, Blue Hawaii, the Deep, Pearl Harbour (of course) and Jurassic Park to name just a few. The beach where the famous kissing scene in From Here to Eternity was shot is pictured below too (the big one near the bottom). The mountains are really impressive and I fear my photographic attempts do not capture their majesty. One of the stops was to a replica of a temple from Japan that was built to commemorate the first Japanese to arrive in Hawaii 100 years before. It gave Val a chance to hug a tree too! One unusual feature of the island is the abundance of mongooses (yes, that is the right plural!). I squeezed in one bird photo in case anyone was feeling deprived.

A long day so we decided to go to a food court we had found, which meant that Val could have Asian and I could have a (very good) burger – at a fraction of the cost of our other two dinners in Waikiki.

Ok, more soon…..