Hawaii 2018 - Pearl Harbor

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Well today another big day but what a day. Went out to Pearl Harbor early this morning and caught the first bus across to Ford Island where the Battleship Missouri (Big Mo) is docked. As we boarded to look around we were asked did we know who sang on this ship? Answer Cher. We were advised that we were more than welcome to re-enact her song, sadly we declined saying we forgot our costume!! Wandered about the ship looking out for the kids to arrive. Finally saw them and watched them set up for their first concert. How proud were we standing watching them play the US National Anthem and seeing US citizens stand proud while the kids played. How awesome was it standing on the Deck of the USS Missouri watching them play. Felt very sorry for the band in the morning - it was steamy hot - and they were dressed in Black long pants and shirts. But they did the school proud.

After they finished we did a tour of the ship - amazing - saw where they signed the surrender for WWII on the deck of the ship.

Caught the bus back to the memorial to do our tour of the USS Arizona. Saw a short movie that took you back to 7th December 1941 and showed actual footage of the attack it was amazing. We then did a short boat ride out to the memorial which sits over the Arizona where it sank that day and remains today as the burial ground for those on board that died that day.

After lunch we did a tour of the USS Bowfin submarine. You obviously need to be small to work on a sub. Not much room.

The Band then played their second concert on the grass near the sub. Thankfully it had started to cloud over by then and was a little cooler for them. Once again they were awesome. They even had a few - other than the band groupies - that watched the whole concert.

After that it was back on the bus over to the aviation museum. Two hangers, the first had WWII planes and the second a lot more recent planes from the Korean war onwards. The amazing thing was that this hanger was an original from 1941 and you could still see some of the bullet holes in the glass from that Japanese attack 1941.

Back then to our hotel for a sunset swim at Waikiki to rest our weary legs.

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