Mahalo O'ahu

Our final day in O'ahu started with an early rise and shine so that we could hike Diamond Head before it got too hot and crowded. The park was only a 5-minute drive from the Airbnb we stayed at, so we got there right when the park opened at 6:00 a.m. The 1.5-mile hike reminded me of the Cowles Mountain hike we do near our home, but the view was much more scenic.

View from the top of Diamond Head

After the hike, we packed up the car and started toward the Bishop Museum. We had been on the road about 20 minutes when Chris, our Airbnb  host called to let us know that he found one of our phone chargers. So after returning and picking up the abandoned charger, we changed our plans and decided to drive to the Disney Aulani Resort since three of the four of us are fans of Disney and we couldn't pass up an opportunity to visit this tropical resort. We walked around the kid-friendly grounds and discussed our dream plans to return and stay at the Aulani.

Private Beach at Aulani Resort

One of David's friends from college lives on O'ahu, and we made arrangements to meet him for lunch, so it was back in the car driving toward Honolulu again and the Ala Moana Center. The Ala Moana is a gigantic multi-story open-air shopping mall. We met Sean at Shirokiya which was a huge Japanese food court. Zach was our most adventurous eater. He had sushi and a curry bowl. Joe had Chinese food, I bought a meal with fried rice, steak and a fried egg, and David got a...wait for it...cheeseburger. The most interesting thing I saw was Tokyo Dogs. Apparently, the Japanese have taken a liking to the American hotdog, but have added Japanese toppings to give it a new twist, so instead of mustard and relish, you might get a dog covered in nori (seaweed), shichimi (chili pepper), or furikake (seasoning made of dried fish). Yummy.

Testing out the water

After lunch, we walked across the street to the beach and put our feet in the water just so we could . We were starting to grow weary, so we decided to spend the remainder of our time on O'ahu sitting at the Starbucks in the mall working on blog posts and catching up on Facebook. After a few hours, it was time to catch a plane to Maui and our crazy trip to O'ahu.  Although it wasn't an official "road trip" we certainly spent plenty of time traveling in the car exploring the many corners of the island. Sadly, the one corner we didn't reach was the North Shore where my brother-in-law, Martin and his wife Traci live. So the next time we come to O'ahu, our first stop will be Martin and Traci's to experience more of the day to day life of Hawaii.

The flight was short and before we knew it we were landing at the OGG airport on Maui. Matt's flight was arriving about 30 minutes after ours, so I headed over to the rental car center while the boys waited for Matt's plane. Eventually, we all met up again and drove the 30 minutes to Kihei and our final destination for the next 6 days, Villa Moana. It was late when we arrived, but we got a quick tour of the two-story villa. It's a gorgeous place and in the morning, I woke up to an idyllic scene of pink clouds hovering over the ocean and the silhouette of palm trees in the foreground. It was just lovely.

We spent this first day in Maui working out various cooking and activity details. Working with the different schedules and preferences of 22 people is always a challenge, but the time with family is priceless. In Hawaii, ohana (family) is a priority, so what a great place to spend quality time with our precious extended family.

Read my son David's perspective here: http://favoritesonsspiels.blogspot.com/