Today was a day of mixed emotions, the sobering sights and sounds of Pearl Harbor mixed with the joys of shopping!

We had already booked online sometime ago for the first tour at 8am for the Arizona Memorial and had to be at Pearl Harbor by 7.  Rose at 5.30, out the door by 6, arrived by 6.35 (we were allowing for traffic and wrong turns!), joined the already forming queue.  Arriving early did give us the benefit of parking right outside the entrance and of having only about 15 people ahead of us in the queue.

By the time they were letting people in at 7am there would have been 300 plus people in the queue.  Crazy.  Although many of them were on tours, or did not have pre-purchased tickets for the Arizona Memorial tour so needed to be there early to secure them.

We had booked a days passport so that gave us entry to the memorial, with guided audio, entry to the Mighty Mo, Aviation Museum, Bowfin submarine and museum.  A real boys day!

We used our time between 7 and 8 to do the audio tour around the grounds, only problem was the skies opened up, rained heavy, Q was worried about the camera getting wet (no not about me!) so I rushed to the book store and got us two of those lovely plastic macs and a plastic bag for the camera.  Arrived back to where Q was hunkering under cover and the rain stopped.  Typical.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Time to see the movie of the attack and then head to the memorial.  Not much that one can say about all this other than it is pretty sobering and pretty emotional.  All those what if’s.  What if the fleet hadn’t all been there, what if the US hadn’t stopped selling oil to the Japanese, what if everything wasn’t anchored side by side, what if when the planes were first seen on radar the alarm was raised rather than thinking it was their own planes, what if….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Getting back from the memorial the skies were once again black and a light shower started, by the time we had got from the boat to cover it was bucketing down, and for the first time I was feeling cold.  Only lasted a few minutes but looked like it was going to threaten off and on for the day.  Q headed back to the car for our rain jackets, yes we had them in there all along, not only would they look nicer than the plastic macs they would protect us, oh and the camera more!

From here we headed by shuttle to the Mighty Mo, did the guided tour and then explored the rest of the ship.  Was really interesting to think we stood in the same place that the Japanese signed the surrender documents to end WWII.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Yes that is a phalynx CIWS and cruise missile launchers on a WW2 Battleship)

After lots of walking up and down hideously small and steep ladders we headed back to the shuttle and on to the Pacific Aviation Museum, every boys dream, not so much every girls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As soon as we arrived Q was look at that look at this, I was “where are the shops”.  To be fair the size of some of these things were amazing, the helicopters especially so.  It was now lunch time, shared some fries and a brownie and then headed back to Pearl Harbor for the Bowfin tour.  I wasn’t too keen on this one as I find submarines pretty cramped and I get a bit claustrophic.  But being the trooper I am I went.  To make it more bearable I listened to the children’s audio version of the tour rather than the adults.  Much more fun!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a quick trip to the museum it was time to leave and head to near by Pearl Ridge shopping centre.  A rather large mall that consists of updown and downtown and is joined by a monorail.  Oh and had a dive store Q wanted to go to.  After doing the top layer of the updown mall we headed downtown where the dive shop was, which happened to be next to Longs Drugs and by now I had the headache from hell, a combination of not enough water, those small spaces, the cold and then the heat etc.  I got drugs, he didn’t get the mask he wanted because it wasn’t at that store, it was at the other one, the one we hadn’t gone to.

Still feeling tired and not in the mood for shopping (we had been on our feet for over 6 hours now and a lot of it standing in one spot at a time), I suggested we head to the movies, a chance to sit down, cool down and relax and it just so happened we were right next to the movie theatre and The Family a movie we had seen advertised on TV was due to start in 15 mins. Perfect.  Even better it only cost us $12 for the two of us.  The movie was funny and brutal all at once.  It had Robert  De Niro, Tommy Lee Jones and Michelle Pfeiffer in it.  A nice way to spend a couple of hours and gave me renewed vigour for shopping!

Didn’t buy too much, Q bought a belt and some dive gloves, I bought a top, a new cover for my phone, the best ever suitcase, handbag, bracelet and some sneakers.  Actually when you type it out like that it was one or two things.  Oh and we bought some chocolate…surprising I know.  We passed by See Candies, well actually we didn’t pass it, Q suggested (yes he, not me) that we go inside.  As soon as we got in the door they were asking if we wanted to try something and if so what.  I tried the raspberry cream chocolate and Q a caramel one.  They actually gave you the whole chocolate to try, so we had half each and then swapped!  It worked because we bought some and then as we were leaving they gave us another whole one each, this time pineapple to try.  Yum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Getting hungry as by now it was late and we had only had the fries and brownie for lunch, so just got asian at the food court.

It was now about 7.30ish, Best Buys was close by and I was looking for a new laptop, we headed off.  This should have been very simple, out of the parking lot, on to the main highway, turn left and then left again and there was Best Buys.  However the GPS didn’t want us to turn left into the parking lot of Big Buys and wanted us to do this big loop around the block.  Problem was, it was dark, we hadn’t seen Best Buys across the road and we were now in some dark back alley.  Decided to give it a miss, did the big loop to get back on to the freeway and there was Best Buys, stopped, bought my new laptop.  I really wanted the orange one but they didn’t stock it and there was no guarantees it would get to us before we left, so boring silver is what I ended up with, which Q was happier with!  So now I will look for a sleeve in bright orange for it.  It is gorgeous, touch screen, can swivel the screen so it looks like a tablet, small, light and half what I would have paid if I could even get it at home.  Sexy!

Then time to come home, finally arrived back some time after 9.  A long day!

Up at 4am, out of the house by 4.30, arrive at the Honolulu Zoo parking lot before pick up time of 5.10am.  Take about 10 minutes to work out how to use the pay machine, things are pretty dark at that hour, thank goodness for our torch!

Picked up by Alex from Ohau Photography Tours a pretty laid back surfer type of guy, there are 5 others on the tour.  A couple from Perth, a couple from Atlanta and a girl from NZ.  We head to a beach (too early in the morning have forgotten the name now!) to wait for the sunrise and to take photos.  Really lovely, a nice breeze from the tradewinds keeping it cool.  Some fabulous photos and on to our next location.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was a great way to get to see some of the lower part of the island.  We stopped at Makapu’u Lighthouse, a really pretty spot, didn’t do the hike just in the parking lot (phew!).  Alex would suggest settings and ideas for framing pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From here headed down to the beach area by the park, then to Waimanalo Bay a stunning beach with no one else on it, mind you it was still before 8am!  From here we headed in land to look at the mountains in the hope that the sun would peek through the clouds and cast light on the mountains, it didn’t.  The mountains were pretty amazing as they have all these deep ridges down them.  The ridges are made by water.  When it rains heavily the water pours down the mountains creating these ridges.  It apparently looks quite spectacular in the rain as there is hundreds of waterfalls cascading down the sides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stop at a little general store in Waimanalo (which by the way is in the neck of the woods that we are staying in Kailua) for breakfast.  Very yummy egg and bacon muffin for me, waffles for Q.  Then on towards the city where we go to a little park that has a waterfall for some more pictures.  Then back into the van and back to the zoo.  Feels as if we have been awake for 12 hours but it is only just gone 10.30am.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had paid for parking until 12.30, the zoo is very close to Waikiki so we decided to take a walk get a cold drink and Q could get his first glimpse of the madness that is Waikiki.  Passed a Cold Stone creamy shop, yay, early, but still time for ice-cream, help cool us down as by now it is scorching.  Damn, don’t open until 11am, still 15 minutes to go.  Cross to the other side so Q can view the beach, the Royal Hawaiian in the distance, slowly go to the next block, head back, arrive at Cold Stone at 10.55am, sit wait, it opens, we cool down.  Bliss, time to head back to the car.

Head home to Kailua, dip in the pool, which to Q’s amusement I found freezing, he found wonderfully refreshing.  I dipped then sat in the sun, he relaxed.

Head down to Kailua town, look around the shops, all pretty high end, have a late lunch, early dinner as it is now 3pm.  Pizza at Californian Kitchen, with yummy peach lemonade.  Not fizzy lemonade, but the old fashioned home made.  They had Strawberry, raspberry, mango and peach.  I asked our waitress which was the best flavour, she said peach, so I tried it, it was!

By the time we get home it is after 5, relax a little, get everything ready for tomorrows early start.  Heat up left over pizza for dinner, go to bed.  *sigh* long but good day.