The birds gathered in the incredible canopy trees below our 8th storey Lanai are chirping and singing for us! A nice change from the symphony of garbage trucks taking out the trash but I guess it is what to expect with the hotels plunked down here between the trees with only a slight view of the hills and maybe if I strain my eyeballs with a telescope between the hotel towers blocking Waikiki Beach I can maybe see the sea. When they say “Partial Ocean View” in the hotel description they really leave a lot of wiggle room on their definition of “View”.

No matter! We are finally on the Hawaiian Islands! After leaving Quebec and driving to Vermont and then flying to New Jersey for a non-stop flight to Honolulu we are bushed, bagged, bent and baked…but the warm humid air perfumed with flowers and sweet ocean surf is intoxicating!!

The flight yesterday was quite a ride that really pressed our asses into pancakes. The flight was an hour and a half late so we were even later in the air but I set my watch immediately to Hawaii time and we settled in….I thought we had booked seats on the window side but we were in the very back row beside a lovely lady from the Philippines who was going to stay in Honolulu for only two days.

The flight was pretty uneventful with no obnoxious people and I played a bit of peekaboo with the little cutie-patootie ahead of me and all the kids on the flight we’re well behaved. There was video games in the seats and we watched some Hawaii Five-O (The episode was “Six Kilos” featuring “Big Chicken” where Steve is undercover…just like us!) And we had some food and basically got stiff legs and finally arrived at around 10 pm at the airport and it was awesome…so many people and we’re walking on this concourse and there are palm trees and the what I thought was the original Honolulu sign I had seen on the original Hawaii Five-O series!

As we walked like kids in a candy store through the open concourse at the Honolulu Airport we were in a sweet cloud that smelled of leis around the necks and happy people coming to the islands! Welcome to Fantasy Island it seemed to say to us with the humidity and the flowers or what we could see of them as it was dark. I had romantically thought that a young Hawaiian girl would bound up to me in the airport and place a Lei around my neck and kiss me on both cheeks and say Aloha but I guess that is only happening in the movies! Isn’t this a movie? It sure feels like it!

DD and I boarded the airport shuttle with a large group and we had to stop at 15 hotels…luckily our Aloha Surf & Spa Hotel wasn’t the last but the driver was fun and we had a nice tour of the Waikiki area…so many people strolling and shopping and even though it was late it was full of activity~!

It was about 11 by the time we got to the hotel Aqua Aloha with the open lobby of lush blue tiles and comfortable furniture and we’re greeted by Angie. She is a big Hawaiian lady with a big smile just as you’d expect…we went up to the room and DD sniffed the pillows to ensure the room was clean, if it fails the sniff test then we have to find another hotel, and we fired up the Air Conditioner and went out to buy some snack s as we were very hungry!

We grabbed some sushi and chips and some Wasabi Macadamia nuts and came back to the room…had a bite and watched some Polynesian Foot Volley Ball game (it looked like a faster and more competitive version of Hake Sack that is played at the Tam Tam Jam in Parc Mt. Royal in Montreal on Sundays) on TV and then drifted off to sleep….we thought we’d sleep past the continental breakfast but the sounds woke us up and so it is now 7 am and DD has had her shower and applied her self-tanning lotion and I’m going to have a shower after my coffee on the lanai and we’ll go and explore the greens bursting into daylight!

Whew it is 7:30 and we’re back at the Aloha Surf and Spa after a gruelling day in Waikiki. We started by heading out into the sunlight after a few sticky buns for our continental…the lobby was full and we had to sit there because all the seats at the breakfast, if you can call it that, we’re taken…we then walked out to the main streets hat were already bustling with people getting an early start to the day.

DD mentioned about having a map so we decided to step into the ABC Store and asked for a map of Waikiki and paid 6.49 plus tax and then half a block later saw a tourist information kiosk where the maps we’re free…D’OH! Anyway we walked along the beach past the Waikiki Zoo and through a small garden area and to some cactus plantation and then up towards the Diamond Head crater park where we wanted to hike up to the top.

A rundown old limo with a scruffy skinny looking biker type asked something likely wanted to get us to take his cab we said no no no and just kept walking then some overly steroid- pumped Gorilla in a 4 x 4 SUV taxi is yelling out the window “Hey you going to Diamond Head?” and I’m like “Yes That’s nice…yeah…we’re going there”… because I didn’t hear exactly the question and anyway prefer not to be asked for a ride from some Taxi driver…back home we like to ask for a ride not to have some “Dude” ask if we want a lift….sheesh I’ll ask you if I want a ride little taxi boy!

Anyway so he drives by hollering that “it was a yes or no questions and I would have given you a free ride to the park!” and so yeah whatever you say freak! It was a lovely day and walking to Diamond Head isn’t a big long walk and we wanted to see everything! I just couldn’t believe this guy…like harassing tourists on Hawaii can’t be a good business practice.

We walk to the park and through this massive tunnel that goes through the rim of the volcano and then we’re literally walking on the volcano floor and to the park where a lot of tourists are preparing to make the trip up the hill to the top the trail was built in 1908. It was about an hour return trip and we were like ants going on trails the view was cool looking up from below. So many people with no water bottles or heaving or walking in bad shoes…the tunnels and stairs we’re quite tough actually and I’m glad I had been to the gym as my legs enabled me to want to take two steps at a time. One woman was stopped at the edge of the spiral staircase and she was suffering from claustrophobia and asked if it got better…it likely was not the best place for a claustrophobic but anyway at the top after we crawled out the gun turret sights from 1908 we made it to the top and the view was nice but there were too many little bugs the size of “No see-ums” but not biting but just covering us so we stayed about 5 minutes before we came back down.

We had some Wasabi Macadamia nuts and the chips and a Pepsi we had left-over from last night at the hotel…sitting under the bus shelter on the floor of the Volcano. We walked through the tunnel and took the city bus (as if we’d take a taxi now) from the park entrance and came back home..we ate the left over sushi that was in the hotel mini-fridge and laid down for a nap…nothing like a nap after such a long flight and so much walking in the sun!

We slept like baby turtles for an hour at least deep in a rock solid sleep and then woke up a bit dizzy from the long walk we’d taken so we had a coffee and went to buy postcards and do some shopping…so many shops and people trying to sell you stuff…not their fault…they just have to make a living but sometimes the whole downtown Waikiki scene was a little too aggressive for my sensibilities. We bought our postcards and found the post office and visited some clothing stores and a Ukelele store and then went for supper at the Waikiki Cheeseburger place called “Cheeseburger in Paradise” and we had a window seat and spread out the 25 postcards and ordered a burger with Maui pineapple and a guacamole burgers and there were birds at our feet right in the restaurant and then as we sat writing our postcards home we watched a beautiful sunset and we took pictures and then walked over to the hula show and live music and singing at the Waikiki beach.

I got sprayed by a big wave and then we strolled back to buy a dessert piece at the food mart and now we’re finishing the postcards and just relaxing ready for desert and an early night because we have to catch the shuttle to the airport at 9:45.

Pictures of Kauai
Kauai, The Napali Coast, Waimea Canyon, Kapa’a. All our favorite hikes and sights on Hawai’is oldest island.

Pictures of Oahu and Waikiki
Honolulu, Waikiki & the sights we saw on our short trip to Oahu.

Pictures of Hawai’i The Big Island
Volcano, Mauna Kea, Waimea, Kona, Hilo & the incredible Big Island of Hawai’i.

Unusual, odd and strange pictures from Hawaii
Strange and unusual pictures that need a special category. Fun stuff and the beauty of Hawai’i that is hard to define. The artsy side of our trip to Hawai’i!

Here is a picture of DD singing with pleasure at the taste of a hot apple sticky bun because In Hawaii everything tastes so much better! We opened the sliding door of the Lanai and stood out breathing in the warm moist air watching the palm trees across from the canal. There were birds singing in the air and it was a perfect time for a morning coffee. Oh No! There was no coffee in the hotel room!

There was only one of those small packets of decaf coffee that hotels supply with the tiny machine left in the hotel room so I had to use a little ingenuity to make a morning coffee. I removed the gauze circular coffee pocket, made a small slit with my pocket-knife, carefully dumped out the offensive decaffeinated evilness and then surgically stuffed the filter with some of our fresh ground coffee. I then ran the mini-machine with my custom filter bag and while it still isn’t as good as right now as we sit here in the Airport waiting for our flight to Kauai.

Finally having a good cuppa coffee at the Starbucks in the airport. We were up early at around 6am with the chorus of “beep beep beep” from the backing up garbage trucks that seem to descend on Waikiki and wind between the hotels every morning. At least we were high up in the Aqua Aloha Spa that it wasn’t too bad but no matter….we were in Hawaii and still had a fairly good sleep after our busy day of hiking up to Diamond Head and getting used to time change.

It was 10 bucks for these 2 coffee and a bottled water but since I had to surrender my two Pepsis and my water that I had in my carry-on as they are not allowed through the airport security. Ahh we now could sit down and watch the tourists come and go and watch the planes land and takeoff from the observation gallery of the Honolulu airport. I had time to open my laptop and write more in this diary and could think back to this morning as we had our continental breakfast on the lanai with the little red headed birdies who wanted to get at my apple buns. The continental breakfast is served down near the pool of the hotel and was mostly sweets with fruits and juices but the little apple puffy buns were a nice treat and those birds sure seemed ready to do tricks for them!

The pineapple juice was tasty and as we puttered about the hotel packing we watched a bit of the Hawaiian visitor TV channel which gives a nice presentation of the sights and sounds of Waikiki. In the morning newpaper we read about the lava flows that had been progressing over a mile and a half towards two lone residents who have stayed in their deserted subdivision on the big island. Apparently this entire neighbourhood had been abandoned several years now except for a few hold-outs who preferred to stay in the danger zone confronting the risk of a lava eruption instead of moving out. One guy ran a bed and breakfast from his home and he said that now people only fly in by helicopter and stay for lunch! Since every night the sky is glowing red from the encroaching lava flows it’s no wonder! Cool!

This picture is DD and some happy tourists smiling away during the early morning continental breakfast. The lobby had no real walls and we were all sitting in the comfortable warmth of a beautiful Hawaiian morning! Anyway,back upstairs we had a shower and then DD told me how some of the toiletries in the hotel smelled a little foul! Hmmm…like “poo” I wondered? Well, I don’t have the same sensitive odour detecting abilities as DD but when it comes to determining the cleanliness of a hotel; she is one of the best so, if there was any chance that there was some yucky bumster juice clinging to any surfaces then she would be the first to spot it!

I admit that I didn’t see or smell anything but I am so excited about being in Hawaii and thought the hotel was fairly clean given the steady stream of tourists who must pour into Waikiki every year. But I wasn’t going to investigate any further as I wanted to enjoy this fleeting moment and not pin-point the bad parts of the hotel, so I went back to the lanai with the birds. Oh well, I thought…this room has a non-stop heavy flow of tourists and I’m sure many of them are not as clean as us…I mean DD found an old receipt under the bed which verified beyond a reasonable doubt the receipt had been there since December 29th and so there was likely no vacuum under the bed since then! She would be a good CSI Agent!! Watch out Horatio!

We got a phone call from the front desk because our Airport Shuttle was actually early so we had to hustle down to the lobby and check out in a hurry. We didn’t have much time to take a final look around the lobby and the open air seating area and rich blue tiles behind the wooden front desk. There is a flat screen tv above the eleavators and they keep playing this same old surfer movie not exactly sure what it was but it was vintage surfers and huge curling surf! So the airport bus ride was like a mini tour past the shops we had visited and the marina and it was bustling with people early as usual. It was great to see everyone from the vantage of the bus…we had been walking everywhere so it was nice to have this “roral” tour of Waikiki! The return trip from the airport cost about $15 per person return so it was much cheaper than a taxi! We got to the airport and made our checkout relatively easy since even the airport staff are working with the Aloha Spirit!

The airport security folks are much friendlier here than on the continent: The Hawaiian Security Agent wanted me to tell him when all my belongs had entered into the x-ray machine so I didn’t suffer any separation anxiety! At least they have a sense of humour! I guess I was still a bit anxious about my two Pepsis that had been confiscated because now I have a half bag of last nights microwave popcorn that we brought from Newark, New Jersey and nothing to wash it down with!

As we sit here waiting for our flight to board there was just an announcement on the Public Address system because someone had forgotten there shoes at the security check-through! They forgot their shoes?!I mean you can tell it`s Hawaii when someone goes through security and is so darned comfortable she forgets that they had taken their shoes off! Aaahh… the easy life in Hawaii, where even shoes are just a second thought! Five minutes later there was another announcement that one poor fellow had forgot his fishing rod!

They just announced our flight is ready to board…so we pack up our stuff and slowly make our way to our Hawaiian Airlines flight to the Island of Kauai.

Pictures of Kauai
Kauai, The Napali Coast, Waimea Canyon, Kapa’a. All our favorite hikes and sights on Hawai’is oldest island.

Pictures of Oahu and Waikiki
Honolulu, Waikiki & the sights we saw on our short trip to Oahu.

Pictures of Hawai’i The Big Island
Volcano, Mauna Kea, Waimea, Kona, Hilo & the incredible Big Island of Hawai’i.

Unusual, odd and strange pictures from Hawaii
Strange and unusual pictures that need a special category. Fun stuff and the beauty of Hawai’i that is hard to define. The artsy side of our trip to Hawai’i!