Hawaii – Days 1-3 – Oahu

Greetings from Waikiki, Hawaii! The first 3 days of my trip to Hawaii, where I stayed at the Hyatt Regency in Waikiki, are coming to an end. Tomorrow morning I’m taking a quick flight over to Maui for the rest of the trip. Here’s the recap from the first 3 days.

After arriving on Saturday afternoon I tried to get a feel for Waikiki. The area around the hotel is a lot like the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica, with shops and restaurants all over the place, just a block from the beach. I spent most of the time walking up and down doing a little shopping and figuring out where I wanted to eat. I ended up having quick drink over at Dukes, but with no space at the bar to eat, I went over to the Cheesecake Factory. Sad, I know, considering there’s a Cheesecake less than a mile from where I live in Marina del Rey.

It wasn’t until late Saturday night that I realized I forgot a charger for my phone. Maybe subconsciously I just wanted a reason to go to the Apple store. . So, Sunday morning, after my phone died, I walked over to the Apple Store at 9 AM, or so I thought. Without my phone I used the clock on my computer to figure out what time it was, but forgot to change it to Hawaiian time, so it was really 7 AM. I found a Starbucks for some coffee and walked to the beach to spend some quiet time before the crowds started to show up.

Most of Sunday afternoon was spent taking a tour of Pearl Harbor, one of the few things on my to do list while on Oahu. The tour included a walk through of the USS Bowfin submarine and the Pacific Aviation Museum. The whole tour took about 4 hours and a lot of walking. I even managed to injure myself during the tour. While walking down the stairs on the USS Bowfin my left foot slipped and it took a few steps for me to regain my balance. A little pop in my left knee and I was a bit worried that I did some damage. Luckily, after being a bit sore the rest of the day, my knee is all fine and dandy today… well, as much as can be expected. In the end, the foot slipping on the USS Bowfin was just a microcosm of my thoughts while walking through the submarine. The steps were small, the beds were small, the quarters were small, and the “doors” between rooms were small. It makes me wonder if there was some sort of hight limitation to be able to be placed on the subs. After returning to the hotel I went to Dukes again for dinner a drinks. Since I was able to find a spot at the bar it turned into a lot of fun. The interesting part is, other than the bartenders, I met a bunch of people from California.

Today I took a long drive up to the North Shore hoping to watch the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing at Sunset Beach. Before leaving in the morning I checked online and it didn’t look good that the tournament would be on due to stormy conditions. After driving a couple of hours (I went the long way), there was no surfing. With a good amount of people there I stayed and sat on the beach, people watched, and got to see a couple of surfers head out there. The waves were large, but inconsistent, so there wasn’t a whole lot of surfing going on. Dinner, drinks, and watching the Pats get beat by the Saints was at the Red Lion here at the hotel.

So that was the good part of the trip. Sadly, there was bad too. The weather was anything but what I was hoping for from a vacation. The weather seemed to go from sunny to drizzle, sunny to drizzle, sometimes sunny and drizzling at the same time, both Sunday and Monday, making it tough to just lay out in the sun. That didn’t take away from the relaxation going on though. And here I am ready to start packing for my early trip to Maui. Pictures and video from the trip will be added later in the week or after I return to California. Until then, enjoy the 2 I’ve added to this post.