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18th APRIL 2009 - A VISIT TO PEARL HARBOUR & HAWAII AT NIGHT!!
I woke up just after 7am. The bin men were to blame and they were so loud I felt like they were in the room...how inconsiderate especially on a weekend! I had loads of texts on my phone when I woke from home asking where I was and if I was ok. If only they had the sense to check their emails! I quickly dressed and ran - well, not ran but walked quickly to the nearest shop to buy a phone card. Only in America would a $10 phone card cost me $10.47!! Back at the hostel I phoned home and put their minds at ease that I was ok and safe.
Once I had phoned, I tucked into some cereal and then milled around the hostel for a while until Nat woke up. Once both up and ready we headed to catch the bus to Pearl Harbour. I half expected the bus lady to be at the stop waiting with her bits of paper but she wasn't. It was a long journey; not so much because of the distance but because of the stops and
the traffic lights! At least the driver was nice and not like the one we had the previous night.
Once at Pearl Harbour we got a ticket for the 12.30pm tour. It was free too which was an unexpected surprise. We were taken to a big TV screen where we were shown a video about events leading up to Pearl Harbour and the attack itself. It was really interesting although it did make out that America won WW2 single handed! A tad different from the history books I suspect. I learnt quite a lot about the disputes between America and Japan, Japan's domination and the USA stopping oil shipments. It then led into the surprise attack by Japan on 7th December 1941 on Pearl Harbour and the aircraft base. America was not expecting it and as such all the aircrafts had been left out in the open unarmed and all the ships were lined up peacefully in Battleship Row. It showed how some ships went down, some tipped over (Oklahoma) and then went on to highlight what happened to the USS Arizona. The Arizona was totally destroyed. 1177 men killed and went down with the ship where they still
lay today. Quite moving to watch and learn about!!
After the film we were taken out on a boat to the USS Arizona Memorial. The ship still lies below the waters as a tomb for those who died when the ship when down. Other ships were resurfaced and re-built but the USS Arizona remains untouched. The memorial site was really interesting. You could see parts of the ship below the waters and a list of names of the people who died was up on the wall. Considering the number that died and the way in which the attack occurred, I was unsurprised to learn that Pearl Harbour was the reason for America entering WW2.
After the USS Arizona tour we had a look around other parts of the site, the museum and other war ships before heading back to the bus stop. My flipflop brokemid walk and so I had to do a blue peter style fix up. Bobble from the wrist tied around the foot...job done!! The bus ride back was the single worst experience of my life. It was absolutely packed and so we were stood up and squashed together like sardines. I managed to stay
near the front and had got myself into a nice little position which worked well for a while. 20 minutes into the ride a larger than average guy got on and I ended up with my face squashed against a post for 10 minutes so that I resembled a cabbage patch kid. Worse still he had his arm up holding onto the post and was sweating profusely in his wife beater vest. The bus jerked and I flew, face first into his exposed arm pit. I heard a squelch as my face was embedded in the folds of his skin and sweat!! I wanted to shout NOOOOOOOO but all I could do was shut my eyes and hope it would be over soon. It was disgusting and not one bit funny!!
Glad to be off the bus, we headed back to the hostel and I scrubbed my face before having some fruit. Nat and I then had a little team talk about whether to spend our whole week on Oahu or whether to go to Maui for a few days. We spent a while chatting to the lady at reception who advised that Maui was expensive, you had to
hire a car to get around and she could not give us a reason why to go there. After much deliberation we decided to stay on Ohau as there was plenty to do and see without having to move. It was a shame about Maui but it would not have made sense to go there when we only had a week in Hawaii altogether. We booked the remainder of our nights at the same hostel and were allowed to stay in the private room that we had been put in on the 1st day...sweet!!
Following our decision making time we went out to the King's Palace (not literally) where the King's guards performed at 6.15pm. They spun rifles around, stamped the butt of the gun against the ground and threw the guns in the air. They were all in time and the sound was very crisp. They performed really well and I enjoyed watching them. We then strolled along the beach to watch the sunset (beautiful) before heading to the main street. There were loads of street entertainers out and you could have spent hours going from one to the next. My favourite guy was head to toe in
Newspaper...brilliant and unique! We ended up watching a dance show with an Ugly Betty type character. Pretty funny! We had a really nice night and it was cool to see Hawaii in the dark. It was very busy too and definitely set up for holiday makers.
After our stroll we headed back to the hostel. I had some Ben and Jerry's ice cream (missed it soooo much) and we chilled out with the tv. Enjoying Hawaii so far!!
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