Hawaii

Emily and I celebrated our 5th anniversary last year, and would've taken a trip somewhere, but Emily was less than a month away from giving birth to Harlow. So, any sort of trip was delayed until we felt Harlow was old enough to be left behind with Emily's mom. The end of January seemed like a good time and Emily just said she wanted to go somewhere warm. Belize was next on our list of places to go, but tickets were crazy expensive. I saw tickets for Hawaii were pretty cheap, so booked them. We ditched the kids with their Meemaw and headed for Oahu. 

This was Emily's first time in Hawaii, and my second. The first time I was in Hawaii was for Rissa's wedding, and I was only able to stay for like a day and a half. So, this was really the first time experiencing all the things.

I found an Airbnb right on the beach that offered a great view of the ocean, but before we got there, we stopped off at a food truck for some lunch. 

For dinner we headed over to North Shore Tacos, which was essentially the Hawaiian version of Cafe Rio. Emily got her first taste of a pineapple tiki, which she thoroughly enjoyed.

Emily couldn't get over just how many chickens there were that just freely roam the island. She made sure to take a picture of every one she could.

The only thing scheduled for Friday was the temple. Emily recognized a couple in the session as old high school classmates of hers. 

It was good session. Afterwards, we made sure to take some photos to prove we were there. I also had the Moana soundtrack stuck in my head the whole time.

The rooster was still in the condo parking lot when we got back.

Finally, we made our way down to the beach. The water was actually colder than we expected, and the sand was a lot softer, too. 

There were a few people out deeper that were swimming and snorkeling, but we just hungout where we could sit or kneel in the water.

It was obviously nice and relaxing.

That evening we headed up to the Nu'uanu Pali Lookout to catch a view of the island. And of course, there was a chicken in the parking lot. This one had some chicks with her.

It was crazy windy up there. It was a neat view, and we also learned it was the site of the Battle of Nu'uanu, where hundreds of warriors were forced over the cliffs to their death. 

Emily asked to do two things while in Hawaii, and for dinner that evening, we were able to do one of the two. Emily wanted and got some sushi.

This is the view from the other side of our condo. We were about ten miles of so up the road from where Jurassic Park, Lost, and other stuff was filmed.

For breakfast the next day we hit up a little market across the street. I got a loco moco omelet, which was pretty good. Basically just brown gravy on top of a sausage and cheese omelet and rice. Again, chickens. Emily got a kick out of the boldness of this little one that tried to steal our food.

We headed over to Honolulu to hit up the Aloha Stadium swap meet and visit Pearl Harbor. We walked around the swap meet and mostly saw a bunch of stuff from China. We ended up getting the girls some flower dresses. 

We then headed over to Pearl Harbor for our scheduled ferry out to the USS Arizona memorial. 

It was pretty cool and sobering to be right over the ship. 

The last time I was in Hawaii, Spencer Webster took me around the base and showed me all the cool stuff tourists don't get to see, but I didn't get to see the USS Arizona. So, it was pretty cool to get to see it now. 

For dinner we went to Spice Up, an Indian restaurant downtown that had pretty good reviews. It opened at 5pm and we got there a little early and were second in line. After five to ten minutes, every table was occupied. It was pretty good. When we left there was a line out the door with a dozen people or so. 

We decided to drive down and around the south end of the island to close out the evening. We stopped at Kokonuts, where Emily got a smoothie and I got a cookies n cream shake. We stopped at a couple of beaches and viewpoints to see some of the big waves, but it started to get dark pretty quickly. 

* * *

There was a chapel about two minutes up the road from our condo, so we hit that up for sacrament meeting. As we were walking in, we were behind a guy with his kids. Emily said she knew him from when she grew up in Texas. How do we keep seeing all these people Emily knows? Anyway, when she told me his name, I was like, "that's my daughter's name." I then remembered that Emily had said she knew a family with the last name Hadley, and always liked it as a first name for a girl. Emily wouldn't let me go over and introduce myself and let him know we named our daughter after him. She thought that would be too weird. "I didn't think I'd ever see anyone from that family again." 

After church we went for another drive. This time around the north end of the island. It had rained off and on the last few days, but it really started to come down on Sunday. During a gap in the rain we found a nice beach to walk along.

Just as we were about to head back to the car, it started pouring again.

The second thing Emily wanted to do while in Hawaii was to see a waterfall. So, we walked the 20 minutes to Waimea Falls. It poured rain the entire time, so we got nice and soaked. We weren't going to let a little rain keep us from getting to this waterfall. 

However, while at the waterfall, it stopped raining. So that was nice.

And just as we were getting ready to walk back, it started pouring again. 

Monday was our day to go to the Polynesian Cultural Center. On our way, we stopped at a beach that we kept driving by that had a cool looking coconut tree and rock wall that I thought would be a good spot to take a picture. Emily went over and sat on the tree while I set up the tripod and camera. All of a sudden, I hear Emily kind of yell and look up to see her fall backwards off the tree and onto the rocks below. After helping her up, we decided it would probably be best to just lean up against it.

We got to the PCC just in time for it to start raining again. We got some lunch at a food truck, and I while I waited for the food, Emily went to go find some cover to eat under. Of course, it stopped raining immediately after we finished eating. We hit up the gift shop for a couple of souvenirs, and then headed inside. We took a canoe ride down this river they have, and got an idea of places we wanted to go. It was cool to see all the different islands represented, and see how they all compared and contrasted one another.

We sat through some of the shows they have, and Emily got her picture posing as Moana. Apparently the people that made Moana came to the PCC for inspiration. They took a little from each island to make up the people of Motunui.

We sat through a couple of the Samoan shows, and they showed how they use the coconut for tons of stuff, even to start fires. Which, he then stomped out with his feet. They also showed us how they climb coconut trees.

After all that fun, we headed over to the Gateway buffet for dinner. We weren't really all that impressed with the food, but the desserts were pretty good. It was the first time we've been able to try panna cotta or chocolate soufflé after watching it made every season of MasterChef. 

We then got back to the condo and hit up the beach on last time. On the beach was a massive turtle, just hanging out. We didn't take our phones with us that time, so don't have any proof of it. 

Our plan was to go to the beach one last time on Tuesday before headed home, but it started raining. After we got all packed and ready, the sun came out and the sky cleared up. Of course.

It was a really good trip, and we both got to get some relaxation out of it. Emily said she doesn't want to see rice for at least a week. I'm glad we were able to make it happen, and that Emily's mom was able to watch the girls. Sounds like they weren't too bad for her.