We planned very little before we left to Hawaii except that we would find a place to camp...hopefully. We arrived around 6 the first night and didn't have a plan on where we were going to sleep in honolulu that night. The trip started out great though because they upgraded us to a convertible for free! We spend the next 4 hours trying to find internet so we could look up cheap hotels so we wouldn't have to spend 120 just to sleep in a bed. We hit drove around trying to find our way on the ridiculously named streets to a starbucks. We finally found one but of course their internet was down. Somehow we ended up on the top of a random parking garage and picked up someones wireless that lived in a building nearby...thank goodness. SO we found a place to crash for the night.
The next morning we woke up to find that we were only 1 block from waikiki beach so we headed down to check it out. It was rainy but still warm.
Honolulu was nice, but we didn't travel across the ocean to be in a busy city so we headed toward the north side of the island. On our way we stopped at Pearl Harbor. I had already been there but Mike loves history and especially WWII history. We went out to the Arizona to pay our respects to those who were caught off guard in the start of America's involvement in World War II.
We arrived on the north side of the island where there are no hotels and we found a great place to camp. It was safe and had bathrooms and showers and everything we could need. Plus it was 10 feet from the beach! It was very rainy so the camp was muddy and the roads to get there were flooded with water, but we found this great secluded site that had great tree coverage to protect us from the ocean wind and rain.
WE hiked up to a lighthouse where we had a beautiful view of the coast.
Then we were able to go to Hanama Bay to snorkel. When you get there they have you watch a movie about how the bay and reef were formed and why it is so important to respect it and how to not destroy it. There were a lot of people complaining about having to watch the movie and waste 20 minutes in the theater, but I really respected the state park for taking all possible steps to protect such a majestic and beautiful place.
The instant you stick your face in the water you see fish of all shapes and sizes. We saw big fish and small fish, red fish blue fish and everything in between. We also saw an eel and an octopus. We were even lucky enough to spend 30 minutes floating on the waves with 2 cute (and kinda cuddly looking) sea turtles.
The place was so amazing that we went back a second time.
we took a lot of underwater pics of all the sea-life...coming soon...
One of our favorite days of the trip was hiking through the dense hawaiian jungle to a secluded waterfall. There was nobody on the trail and it took us through a lot of different terrain. I had no idea that Hawaii had evergreen forests and dense jungle full of bamboo-like plants criss-crossing all over the trail. It was a muddy hike because it had been raining so much but it just added to the fun of hiking through the hawaiian mountains.
The hike was long and ALL uphill, but it was worth it. We had a waterfall all to our selves in the middle of the jungle.
We also went to the Polynesian Cultural center..which was great but kinda a one-time thing. And of course we spent plenty of time relaxing on the beach and exploring the towns. On our last day we went back to Pearl Harbor and toured the USS Missouri. It was the ship where WWII was ended. It was neat to be on the ship and see where the peace treaties were signed and to see where the crew slept and lived.
We were so blesses to be able to go on this trip. It was so much fun and we LOVED it! Can't wait for our next adventure...hopefully it wont be as long of a wait.
