Aloha And Back to Reality

Our trip to Hawaii is behind us.  It was fun but it was also great to get back.   When I look back on everything we did, even I get a little tired.  With the 3 hour time difference we were always up way before sunrise and usually in bed a little after sunset.  When we’re only gone for a few days, we usually try to fool ourselves into thinking we’re in the same time zone.  That way there is no adjustment.  We did have a great time.  We also came to the conclusion that we liked being on vacation and now we’re already planning the next one.  We may not go back to Hawaii for a while but there are many other places where vacations are fun too.  Believe it or not, we already have another destination picked out.

On arrival our taxi ride from the airport to the hotel had cost us a whopping $47.00.  We discovered quite by accident that Honolulu has an amazing bus system.  Tourists use it to visit not so packed beaches outside of Waikiki.  The best thing about it is that it’s cheap.  With senior ID you can ride the bus for $1.  Or, you can get a 4-day pass and ride it as much as you want to wherever you want to go.  Obviously, we had to give it a try.  We were impressed.  We could have saved $45 between us if we had known about the bus from the airport.  It picks up right at the airport and would have dropped us off right at our hotel.  We also think it would probably have been faster than our taxi who took the freeway and got stuck in construction.

We discovered our very favorite hotel was really more about the beachfront facilities.  The Hale Koa is next to the Hilton Hawaiian Village and Fort DeRussy.  The grounds of this hotel are full of lush green tropical foliage. 

On the beach is a bar, snack bar and mini-restaurant.  We rented two lounge chairs and a huge beach umbrella for the whole day at $30.  The beach was probably the most enjoyable way to spend the day. 

Our chairs

It was a perfect area to do some people watching, walk along the shoreline and even rent kayaks.  So, next time we return we already have our days planned out for us.  We were lucky this time in that we only had to pay for one night’s hotel since Tammi was there on business and already had her room reserved for her.  Of course, she worked most of the time while we got to play.

Tammi took us to a restaurant frequented mostly by locals on the pier.  It was Nico’s on Pier 38 that had been featured on Diner’s, Drive-ins and Dives.  It’s always more fun to get away from the touristy places and visit local ones.  It definitely was on the pier and packed with mainly locals and few tourists.  There were several other restaurants and places to buy fresh fish along the pier.  We thought Nico’s was probably the best of the bunch.

After that it was back to the airport.  We had a flight departing at 11:15 PM.  Like a bird, we were off!

Normally we like the red eye flights but our return flight was nothing like the flight we had on the way over.   The plane was icy and even though we had blankets, they just weren’t thick enough.  We were excited about the exit row seating until we discovered on this particular 757  the row we had was also a bulkhead next to an exit door that leaked icy drafts.  We hate bulkhead seating plus the leg room was virtually non-existent.  The seats were very uncomfortable and trying to sleep was difficult in those seats.  Oh well, the good thing was we did have seats and we didn’t have to hang around for hours before take off.

Of course, that also meant upon arrival back in Phoenix, it was naptime.  I did just that.  I took a long, long nap.  Getting back to the reality also meant we needed to contact Terry’s mom for another lunch date before we head a little farther south.   We had pretty much put everything away when we left for Hawaii but there are finishing touches to take care of before we leave for Tucson on Sunday.

‘Tis life on the road.