Only 4 weeks later, the Hawaii story is up! Enjoy Text and pictures.

My trip to Hawaii actually started on the 6th of June. My smart Mini brought me to a Park&Ride parking spot. I just missed one of the trains to the Airport but the next didn’t make me wait long for it. A shuttle bus brought me from the green lines Airport station to the Airport. It was already less than one hour when I got to the airport so I thought I’ll miss my ride to Hawaii, Oahu. However check-in was still possible and after a while I was sitting on that plane.
I arrived late on Oahu, picked up my rental car at Hertz, a Ford Mustang Convertible, and drove to the supermarket to buy some supplies for the next days: basically water and non-refrigerate items for breakfast and picnic. I have been damn tired probably because LA time is 3 hours ahead. I searched for a nice silent neighbourhood in Honolulu, parked my car and went to sleep. The worst part about the seats in this convertible were that they didn’t recline much more than an airplane seat :/ For the first night I choose the trunk and a sleeping bag for a good nights sleep.

I woke up pretty early on the 7th of June which was awesomely perfect for a visit to Hanauma bay. I had take-away breakfast from a bakery on the way. I had to watch an introduction video at Hanauma bay on “how to treat the reefs”. I walked all the way down to the bay instead of taking the costly tram. I made myself comfortable on the beach and caught up on some sleep. After a while I thought of snorkelling in the turquoise blue waters of the bay. A problem turned up: I lost the clip which holds the goggles and the snorkel together. I improvised and used two bag clips (from this mornings bakery visit) to attach the snorkel to the goggles – off I went. I was a little disappointed because the reef was so grey and only few colorful fishes were sprinkled in the warm waters. Compared to the Great Barrier reaf a real disappointment! Just after lunch time I felt real hungry and struggled in finding the Diamond Head Grill. One-Way roads all across Honolulu didn’t make it easier to find it. The food there was really delicious and inexpensive!
The next Odyssey was Diamond Head Crater. I found it easily but lacked in cash when I had to pay the entrance fee for the park in the crater. So I drove all the way back to find an ATM. Approximately 45 minutes later I have been again to the entrance of the park and ready to pay. Back to Honolulu Downtown I bought some items for a picnic on Waikikis white fine grain beaches and made myself comfortable in front of the warm turquoise waters. In the middle of my picnic, the Friday Fireworks began. It was a 10 to 15 minutes spectacle and nice round off for the day. I didn’t even had to bother about a thin jacket, the air was even night times warm.
Another Odyssey started just after the firework when I tried to find my way to the north east coast to visit a colleagues home whos visiting with his girlfriend. At one point I drove mistakenly on the Highway 3 towards Pearl Harbor and haven’t been able to turn around for 10 miles. That means a 20 miles extra on my Odometer. These 20 miles were most painfull. My colleague welcomed me in his beach front bungalow and we had a nice hour just before sleeping.
I prepared pancakes on the 8th of June to thank the couple to give me accommodation for the night. Later I drove down the east coast to Chinaman’s hat. It is actually a small Island in shape of a chinaman’s hat. After taking a few pictures I headed further south to “Tropical Farms” with free sample of Macadamias, honey and peanut butter – yum. My next stop was the Pali lookout which offered great views towards Honolulu and Waikiki and Hanauma Bay. I choose to hike an unoffical trail along a mountain rim. The hike was indeed quite dangerous but I still made it up to a spot where I viewed through a natural spyhole in a rock. Incredible views bordered through a spyhole!
I spent the rest of the day in the Polynesian Cultural Center to get some cultural insight of the polynesian islands. The afternoon in the cultural center was filled with 20 minute open-air performances of the Islands of Hawaii, Fiji, Tonga, Tahiti, Aoteaora (New Zealand). Performances consisted of dance, music and history of the Islands. One attraction were floating boats in the artificial river. The boats were differently themed accordingly to the island they represent – food for the eyes! There was also a dome shaped cinema in the cultural center where they showed hardly seen landscape of Hawaii – made me wanting more!
I took place in the large dining hall of the cultural center for dinner and served myself from the buffet and drinking fountain – great food although it was cooked in large amounts. The turkey roast in gravy was probably the best
Next item of the itenerary was the production of “Breath of Life” an 1.5 hour spectacular with fire, dance and music. The story in short is of a newly born baby getting introduced in the different cultures of the polynesian Islands, marrying later and having a baby right at the end which could go through the same story again.
I parked my car at Laie point right in front of the sea and slept on the passengers seat.
On Sunday I woke up facing the sea in the dawn. I turned the car around and held a photo shooting with it before I had breakfast sitting on the trunk lid stil watching the uprising sun – relaxing start of the day, huh?!
My first stop of the day was the turtle bay resort where I snorkelled among huge sea turtles. These gigantic turtles moving slowly around in the calm waters of the bay. It looks effortless how they move and slowly flap with their fins. I drove across the north shore and stopped every now and then for some beach stroll or snorkelling. I bought some fresh from tree ice cold Lychees on the way. Snorkelling at the sunset beach was a little better than at Hanauma Bay but still not great compared to the Great Barrier reef. There has been a lot of brown rocks which are perfect hiding spot for colorful fish – every color is better than the grey at Hanauma Bay. I sprinkled a little diversity in my day by doing the hike to the waterfall in the Waimea valley. The path was all paved and equipped with thousands of plant explaining signs. The pond of the waterfall didn’t look much dangerous but still 2 lifeguards were supervising the people swimming there. They also made sure that everyone is wearing a swimwest. I asked them for sun screen because I didn’t have any due to restrictions in hand luggage in airplanes and they were so kind giving me a little. A little further west seemed to be the place for beach fun sports. People were Kite Surfing and wind surfing – my favourite beaches on the whole island!
I took a lunch break at Haleiwa and ate some lamb chops along with rice and shave ice coconut flavoured for dessert. Then I drove southways towards Dohle Pineapple plantation to get an insight in how the pineapple comes from the field to the supermarket. There was a huge FAQ board which covered the same questions answered on the pinapple express. The pineapple express was a train which was going two miles across pineapple plantation fields for the price of 8 $ per ride. Well I just knew that the content of the narrators speech on the train is the same as on the FAQ board because I was doing both – reading and riding. I drove all the way south past Pearl Harbor to KoOlina bay in the south west for a great sunset picnic with crackers and cheese. I then droveup on the west coast until I reached the end of the road where I parked my car for the night. I know the west coast is not very famous for sunrise in the morning – but sometimes I need to make a compromise.
I woke up with the first rays of sunlight on Monday and had breakfast along with compulsory photoshooting. I then tried to start a hike to the most northwest point of the Island Oahu. A girl in another car was starting a conversation with me about Hawaii and her past life. Additionally she gave me about 15 small shells she collected in a secret spot and wished me a good hike to the “edge of the island” – definitely nice chat in the sun! I found that there are 3 geocaches on the path of the hike but my cell phones GPS didn’t work, so I didn’t find any of them – Bugger! The views from the most north-west point were great but bathing was not possible. I saw a few really large birds nesting in that area and also present were some seals almost perfectly hiding on the rocks.
I drove down the west coast after the hike. Again I stopped on some of them and also ate lunch, some take away food which I bought in some restaurant, at Pokai Bay Park Loco Moco.
Next stop was the Pearl Harbor area where I used all the free facilities to soak up an impression of the days around the 7th of December 1941. Afterwards I had a clear vision in mind what happened back then. I drove back to Honololu to have a stroll through Downtown and Chinatown districts both are kind of similiar to other American cities. I neither had a shower nor had a swim in the sea on my last day on Oaho, so I decided to have a swim in the warm turquoise waters of Waikikis Fort DeRusy Beach park. To gain some strength for the long flight back to main land I went to the Hard Rock Cafe Waikiki and had some fries plus chocolate flavoured thick shake – latter one was free because I ordered a mix of vanilla and chocolate; even better! I still had some time which I utilized in the fluffy bear museum – awesome but expensive!
I then dropped the car off at the Hertz Station at the Airport. I first had troubles to get a seat on my airplane because they changed the airplane model and had less seats to offer. They assigned me an exit row seat which was not to recline – Bugger again!
When I reached mainland America, my bussiness trip to San Diego began.

But more on that in the next story