Blogs from Hawaii, United States, North America - page 229

I am definitely falling behind in my blogging, but I dont want to skip over Jen and my experiences on the Big Island of Hawaii because it was truly a brilliant time. The Big island is my current favorite out of all the places that I have been so far. I'm still hoping that jen fills in the blanks. So when we arrived on the Big Island, under the heavy influence of jen, we decided to rent a convertible (good call). We drove all over the island so having a convertible was a definite bonus! Lu'au - Jeff had secretly purchased tickets for a Luau for my first night on the Big Island (apparently everyone knew about it except for me). So shortly after jen and I arrived at Rainbow Plantation we put on our hawaiian ... read more

Hi all, Well, finally we’ll mention the news from Honolulu - now that the snailmail announcements have gone out and the cat is out of the bag! Dick and I were married in Honolulu last Thursday, Jan. 20 in Judge Reynaldo Graulty’s chambers. We have been planning this for several weeks, just a quiet wedding during our one day in Honolulu that didn’t involve a lot of fuss and bother. The agencies we contacted wanted to set up a flossy wedding complete with digging our toes in the beach sand at sunset with champagne and cake afterwards - exactly what we had in mind NOT. What we actually did was go with a group from the ship on a private shore excursion and tour arranged by our travel agent with lunch at a lovely country club, ... read more

On our day in Honolulu we had lunch at very nice country club. We started with raw Fish, Tuna and Octopus. The Octopus was very tough. Next was a salad followed by a fish course and then desert. There was lots of Hawaiian music and a beauaful setting. We returned the 10 miles to the city and were dropped off at the Art Academe .We returned to the ship at about 4:30. There were other Events which ocurred that we will talk about in a few days. Dick... read more

Today we took the bus to Pearl Harbour and visited the USS Arizona memorial, a pretty somber sight as you can imagine. The story of Pearl Harbour has always facinated me, so many stories, myths etc so we wanted to check it out for ourselves. There were tours from the hotel but a wifee told me we could get a direct local bus for $2, sorted, it was an hour on the bus but an interesting ride through downtown Honolulu, not the sort of images you see on the postcards, quite seedy really. Anyway we arrived at the memorial and had to check in all our bags and that, nothing is allowed in, I find these rules bizarre as there is no personal search so if you wanted to do anything you just strap whatever to ... read more

We went to Makapu'u beach today and 'learned' how to surf, I was a total natural, totally and naturally kept falling off as soon as I stood up, Fiona was a bit better but she wasn't going for the monster waves that I was going for, WIPE OUT!!! Fiona has a healthy fear of sharks, a fear that I add to almost every day by telling her that I think I just saw one, I never tire of it and she seems to get as scared everytime so it's all good, this makes her stay in easy swimming distance of the shore. Anyway, the surf lessons started with a skin tight wet suit induction, now I'm not the fattest lad in town but these things don't leave much to the imagination, I have been eating quite ... read more