Aloha, Honolulu

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Our plane left at 10:00 p.m., but we had to be out of the beach house by noon. So, we had a bunch of time, and couldn't really spend it lounging at the beach, as we had nowhere to get all the sand off after noon. So, I poked around in all the little glossy books we picked up here and there for something for us to do. We could take a helicopter tour of the island (too expensive) or a 1-hour jungle tour in a big SUV (skeptical, what can you see in an hour?) or we could go sail on a catamaran. We opted for the catamaran and made a reservation for 1:00 p.m.

It seemed like we had all the time in the world, but packing took longer than I thought it would, and loading the van took longer than I thought it would, and driving to Waikiki took much longer than I thought it would, and by the time we got there and found parking, we were running right up on 1:00 p.m. We had time for a quick snack, though, so we grabbed some food at the Waikiki Sheraton's snack bar and then went to find our catamaran, which we did, and they checked us in, and then we had to wait a bit. When it was time to go, they informed us that we needed to take our shoes off, so we did that, and then they took our picture, and then we climbed aboard the Maita'i Catamaran for a 1-1/2 hour tour. (Greg's rule number 27: Never ever go on a 3-hour tour from any place in Hawai'i.)

The catamaran was pretty cool, and once we got away from the beach and got the sails up, it was pretty darn fast, too. The captain took us out far enough where the waves were pretty big, and then spent most of the trip finding good waves and skewering them to get the people on the boat good and soaked. We all had mai-tais, except Laura, who had some kind of fruit juice. I got some pictures on the first part of the trip, but put my camera away before we started hitting the waves since saltwater and expensive electronics don't usually go well together.

We all enjoyed the boat ride; I think Laura especially liked it. She never really did hang on for dear life and by about halfway through, she had cultivated some sea legs and was up and walking around, which was pretty cool, since she's usually timid about such things. Thanks to some SPF-45 sunscreen, none of us added to our sunburns, which was a good thing. I, for one, did not need any more sunburn. We were supposed to see dolphins and flying fish, and I heard tell that some saw them, but I never did. I guess I wasn't looking in the right direction at the right time.

The 1.5 hours went by pretty quickly, and pretty soon we were headed back in to the beach. They kicked us off the boat and had our picture waiting for us, which we purchased, and then we went on to part 2 of the plan for the day: Shopping in Waikiki.

First, though, we needed some actual lunch, so found a sit-down restaurant in one of the many shopping centers, and it was here that, finally, after a week in Hawai'i, I finally had my very first tropical drink with an umbrella in it. As a matter of fact, we all had drinks with umbrellas, even Laura, who had the local cream soda. I had a blue Hawai'ian and a mai-tai, Barb had a mai-tai and a pina colada, and Cheryl had a pina colada and a mai-tai. We also had some lunch, but I don't remember what that was. I'm happy to report that the umbrella makes the drink taste better.

Then, shopping. There was the place call Big Kahuna's that we wanted to look at because all the little glossy books had pages and pages of ads for the place. Boy, were we disappointed. It turns out that it's just a big collection of kiosks. Kiosks which sell a bunch of crap which nobody wants. Well, somebody must want it, because they wouldn't be selling it if nobody bought it. And, yet, we did buy a couple of things.

Then we wandered around this particular shopping center for a while, but didn't really see anything interesting, so we went to the ABC store. ABC stores are as ubiquitous in Hawai'i as Starbucks are in the pacific northwest. They sell a little of everything, including all the kitschy Hawai'i stuff you could ever want. They also sell piles of macadamia nut stuff. It was a pretty crowded store and the checkout lines were slow, so, for me, not the greatest shopping experience of my life. I think Laura and Barb and Cheryl liked looking at all the stuff, though.

We did some more shopping, but frankly, general shopping isn't my thing, so I couldn't tell you where all we went, just that it was a lot of places. There was this one place with an aquarium with a staircase in a plexiglass tube so you could walk through the aquarium. That was pretty cool. The rest of it was just more shopping.

Finally, we were all tired and it was time to head for the airport, so that's what we did. After dropping off the rental car and checking in, we headed for our gate. Honolulu Airport is a product of another time. It's clear that at some point in the past, you could drive right up to the gate, but not any more. Our gate was like a ghost town. It had an abandoned snack bar, and enough infrastructure to support lots of people seeing off travelers, but when we were there it was deserted, and it was pretty clear that a lot of that stuff hadn't been used in a very long time.

They had the air conditioning cranked up pretty high, and it was downright cold at the gate, so I was kinda bummed I'd opted to put my jacket in the suitcase. I mean, who needs a jacket in Hawai'i? (Answer: I guarantee my Mom needs a jacket in Hawai'i. Hi, Mom!)

Finally, it was time to board. We had jockeyed to be at the front of the line, and were standing there waiting, when one of the airline guys says "Oh, you have a kid, you can go ahead and pre-board." I originally thought that was pretty good because we'd get to settle into an empty aircraft. Unfortunately, it also means you get hit in the head with more carry-on luggage. One funny thing did happen, though. Apparently, some people got onto the wrong plane, and it seemed like we had three people in a particular seat, and it was interesting to see how all that got handled. I wonder if those folks made the plane.

The plane ride was mostly uneventful, except at one point I got a whiff of something that smelled like burning hydraulic fluid of some sort, and a bunch of turbulence started, and then the plane started losing altitude. That was a little dicey. I don't know what the smell was, but the losing altitude bit must have been to get us out of the turbulence, because the rest of the trip was fine. The movie was "The Lake House", which was a very weird movie that I can't describe. Then Laura and I watched "The Princess Diaries 2", and then we were landing and home.

Laura thought it was very cool that she got to stay up all night.

As usual, for more photos, see my Hawai'i 2006 Flickr set.

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Photos

Diamondhead from Catamaran
This is a view we couldn't get from land.

The Gang on the Way Back
Laura got up and walked around like a pro after a while.