Oahu, Hawaii - Day 6 (Surfing)

 Wednesday was an exciting day - the kids were excited to go for surfing lessons that were postponed from earlier in the trip due to dangerous surf.  AA and DD were also excited to try surfing.

The crew left the condo on time and got to Waikiki Beach about 20 mins before the start of lessons, just enough time for a bathroom break and to apply sunscreen.  The Sharky's Surf School crew were on time and very friendly - they wasted no time getting the 4 surfers through ground school to learn the technique of how to get up on the board.

After the 5 mins ground lesson, it was time to hit the water.  The team was sent immediately to the first surfing launch spot and everyone was shoved off by an instructor and told to "GET UP" when the time was right.

Everyone had a blast!  T really got the hang of getting up and staying upright on the board.  He didn't quite figure out turning (and only ran over one person) but was pumped about his abilities.  B was a little more frustrated that she couldn't seem to figure out how to stand up and stay up on the board - AA thinks her stance may be "goofy" (right foot forward) but she didn't have the patience to try and figure out another method of standing up.  She still had a lot of fun.  AA and DD were surprised at how easy it was to get up on the board (note: easy does not imply that they were successful every time or for the entire ride).

After surf school, the kids still had energy to burn and went back into the water for a little more swim/wave crashing time.  AA and DD needed to rest a bit.

Once the kids were dried off, it was time to go for lunch at Lulu's - a restaurant that the adults had visited before a couple times.  The food was better than everyone remembers from the last visit, although B was not happy that she had a couple jalapeños in her breakfast burrito, but she handled it well.

With lunch finished, the gang wanted to go to a couple shops nearby - DD wanted to get some new rash guards from Quicksilver and MBM wanted to find some new "Hawaiian clothes" for the kids.  There was also enough time for a mid-shopping trip Dolewhip snack.

The drive back to the condo was slow during rush hour (on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving).  Once back at the condo, everyone changed and made their way back to Monkeypod for supper, this time walking 12 mins to the restaurant.  Although it was the same restaurant, the scenery was different (seated upstairs this time) and (almost) everyone had something different to eat and drink (B elected for the same marghareta pizza).

After supper, time was spent shopping a little more at the nearby shops before walking back to the condo to finish the night with some video games.

Oahu, Hawaii - Day 5 (Beach Day)

 Today we headed on the north-west side of island to see what beaches we could find.  There were lots but many of the beaches had "red flags" meaning that swimming was not recommended because of the high surf.

The first beach we stopped at was Nanakuli Beach Park.  It was clear that the water was not safe for us to go swimming/snorkelling.  So we continued to Pokai Bay Beach Bar which was more sheltered with a breakwater.  The beach wasn't very busy and had a lifeguard shack which made everyone feel safe.

We spent about about 1.5 hrs swimming, snorkelling and playing in the sand before we cleaned up and loaded back up in the van to go for lunch.  AA found a restaurant that they tried to go to but when they got there it was managed by the military, and we couldn't figure how to get through the gated security, so DD found a restaurant that was highly recommended on the internet and across from the McDonalds that we were going to go to as a last resort.

The restaurant was called Coquito's.  The pina coldas weren't the best, but the sandwiches were amazing. Lola even got a sandwich made from fried plantains. Everyone enjoyed their food.

After lunch we headed more north to a beach AA wanted to visit, Makua Beach.  The kids were driving Lola a little crazy in the van, so she decided to go for a walk down the beach.  Once everyone got onto the beach and saw the views, they didn't want to leave.  We walked about half a mile down the beach before turning around.  We saw a turtle in the water, crabs on the sand, lava rock in the sand, and a small rain shower.

As we were driving back to the condo, we saw the most beautiful rainbow. Stopping at the grocery store to pick up food for supper for today and the next.

Supper was kind of weird, a mixture of breakfast foods (even though AA doesn't like eating breakfast at dinner.  We had fried spam, guava strawberry and chocolate macadamia nut pancakes, hash browns, breakfast sausages, grilled pineapple and veggies and hummus. 

Kids went to bed and we played some games.  It was a pretty good beach day with a wonderful sunset right from our lani.

Oahu, Hawaii - Day 4 (Ziplining)

 Aloha!

Day 4 was a slower start to the day.  The only timeline we had was to be at ziplining for 12:50 which was about 1 hr 15 mins away on the north(east) shore.  We left the condo at 9:30 and started the drive through central Oahu, passing by Schofield Barracks and Wheeler Army Airfield, which we learned about yesterday during the Tower Tour at the Aviation Museum.

The drive was mostly through rain which had the crew a little concerned because no one brought rain jackets for the day.  We stopped in a small town called Kahuku to have some burgers at Seven Brothers.  Everyone really enjoyed lunch.

We had a little more time to kill so we decided to drive to a nearby beach to "see what we could see".  What we saw was some pretty big waves, some chickens and stray cats.  

It was a short (2 mins) drive back to the ziplining place - Climbworks Keana Farms.  Lola, MB Mell and AA went ziplining here seven years ago and were interested to see how much had changed.  In summary - quite a bit had changed with more suspension bridges and two repelling stations.

The kids LOVED the ziplining tour.  They made friends with our guides Izzy, Jonah and Reagan and everyone had a great time.  It all started with a quick "show and tell" with a chameleon which each kid got to hold.

The wind made some of the ziplines a little challenging for the lighter weight children - B had to get retrieved once whereas T had to get retrieved three times, when they didn't quite make it to the end and "captured" to be reeled in by Jonah or Izzy.

B really enjoyed the "trick" zipline where we could do any kind of trick that we wanted - she even got her favourite song as a send off (Bad Blood by Taylor Swift).  We think that T was crushing a bit on Reagan, especially when she asked "T, what is that smell?" and responded with "I smell adventure" (which he declared a couple ziplines earlier, and promptly turned a shade of red).

After ziplining, the crew was hoping to spend some time at a nearby beach.  After checking out a couple beaches and deciding that the 4ft high waves were a little bit too gnarly for the boogie boards, we started to make our way back to the condo, stopping for supper in Haliewa at Haliewa Joe's.  Supper was delicious!

The drive back to the condo was relatively short (only 40 mins).  Once parked and unloaded, it was time for T and B to go to bed to get some rest for another busy day tomorrow - this time we are hoping we can catch some waves with the boogie boards.

Oahu, Hawaii - Day 3 (Pearl Harbor)

 We all got up at around 7:00 am this morning in excitement to go to Waikiki beach for surf lessons (for AA, DD, B and T) but we got a phone call about 30 minutes before we were leaving that the surf and weather conditions were not favorable for surfing, especially for the kids.  So we rescheduled and quickly made a plan to go to Pearl Harbor.  This was definitely a day for the boys.

It was a short 40 minute drive and we arrived around 9am.  T was very excited.

First stop - we headed to the submarine USS Bowfin.  The submarine is quite small and made B feel a little claustrophobic.  We all survived walking through the sub seeing where the crew slept and ate, the engine and torpedo rooms.  There are some tight quarters, and we all couldn't imagine being in there for 75 days at a time... with almost 80 other people.

After the Sub we walked around the outdoor and indoor exhibits all about Submarines and the different wars they have been involved in.  It is amazing to learn that submarines are designed to last for 40 years of operation.

After the submarines, we got on the shuttle bus and went to Ford Island and the Pacific Aviation Museum.  We first went up the airfield tower for a small tour of the events of Dec 7, 1941.  We didn't realize that the attack on Pearl Harbour was only one of a few attacks that day on the island of Oahu, with other attacks at the other air fields in an attempt to prevent the US from defending from the Japanese that day.

After making our way back down, it was time for lunch.  Lola was disappointed that the restaurant ("The Hangar") had changed their menu and no longer had the fried rice with spam meal.  But the food was still good and everyone was fueled up for the remainder of the afternoon.

The B17 "Swamp Ghost" which crash landed in New Guinea after a mission in WWII. AA was excited to get a new t-shirt commemorating this plane

T was pretty excited to get a new book about WWII and proceeded to read it in the bus on the way to the Battleship Missouri.

Once at the Battleship, it was time for a little snack for the three youngest members of the crew - each enjoying some Dole Whip before spending the last hour walking through the ship.

After walking through the Missouri, it was a short bus ride back to the visitor center and then a 30 mins drive back to the condo (area) for dinner at Monkeypod.  Everyone thoroughly enjoyed their food, not to mention the dessert.

Back at the condo, a couple quick video games were played before getting the kiddos off to bed and the adults enjoyed some relaxing time watching a tv show (For All Mankind) before heading off to bed.