This trip was to kill two birds with one stone: First to make (what will likely be) our only trip to Hawaii and second, to see how we do on a cruise ship. There are other possible cruises in our future, but first we needed to see how Debbie would do at sea. We chose to book a forward stateroom with a balcony on the ship to be sure that the motion of the ship wouldn't bother her. (It's a New England theory: If you have sea sickness, get out in the air and keep the outside visible so that your vision can reconcile the motion of the ship to something. Sea sickness often happens when you feel the motion of the ship, but have no visual stimulus to tell your body what is happening is perfectly normal).
On Wednesday morning, February 10, 2016, we lifted off out of Baltimore-Washington airport flying Delta the whole way. It was 2 hours to connect in Atlanta, and then a grueling 9 hours straight to Honolulu. Although we brought reading material, there was a lot of free television and movies on the flight. I saw "Minions" and then watched season 3 of Vikings (8 out of the 10 episodes). My friend Donny Furbush is into it and has been trying to get me to watch it, so now I'm hooked.
We landed in Honolulu at 4:05 pm (9:05 pm Eastern Standard time) and took a cab to the Waikiki Beach Marriott Resort. On the way we had him stop at a Safeway where we picked up a case of water and a couple 8-packs of low calorie Gatorade to take with us on the ship. We didn't buy the "soda package" or the "drinks package" since neither of us drink that much and I would need to be staying very hydrated the whole trip. We read that Norwegian Cruises allows you to bring water on board, so we decided to take advantage of it. With the stop at Safeway and the tip, cab fare was about $60 down to Waikiki Beach through the evening rush hour traffic. I think it was 6:00 pm by the time we reached the hotel.
It was about 65 degrees when we checked in at the hotel. The desk clerk was wearing a sweater complaining about how cold it was. It had been in the 50's the night before (they thought that was cold). We also supposed to check in with the Norwegian Cruise desk at the hotel, but they'd already closed for the day.
We hadn't made any dinner plans since we had no idea how hungry we would be (we brought bagel sandwiches on the plane and then plowed through snacks like chips & trail mix on the flight). We walked up and down the strip on Waikiki Beach, but it didn't look like we would find any place decent, so we ended up at a roof top cafe at the hotel. After a brief conversation with a retired man sitting alone at a table, he invited us to join him for conversation while we ate. His name was Phil from Minnesota and he comes to Honolulu every year for about 3 months to escape the winter. He's staying at the Waikiki Resort hotel, so we deduced that Phil has a lot of money to play with.
Relaxing with good company and a beer at the rooftop cafe at the Waikiki Marriott. We just missed the sunset over the ocean beyond the trees.
Day 2, Thursday February 11, 2016
We were up pretty early seeing how 6 a.m. Hawaii time was 11:00 a.m. East Coast time. Rather than look all over the place or pay a lot for breakfast, we found ourselves sitting out front of a Burger King across the street from the hotel. This would be our breakfast stop for the next few days in Honolulu.
Sunrise over Waikiki taken from my seat at the Burger Kin.
Before departing we knew we'd be spending 3 days in Honolulu and weren't exactly sure what we would do. The cruise was a "Free Style" cruise, so we had to select (and pay for) all of the excursions off the boat. So, since Pearl Harbor was our biggest point of interest in Honolulu, we bought the 2-day Passport to all 4 sites in Pearl Harbor. We also had to reserve our spot to go out to the USS Arizona, so we booked it for 2:30 that afternoon.
After breakfast we headed to the cruise office to check in. When we told them our plans for the day, they said we should check in with our tour driver to let him know we wouldn't be going with them today. Going where? It turned out that when we booked the cruise, it included excursion packages for the 3 days in Honolulu, including Pearl Harbor on Friday. Had we known this, we could've saved $120 on the Passports we bought before the trip. After speaking with Leo, the driver/tour guide, he convinced us to stay with the tour group since we'd rack up additional expenses like cab fare running back and forth to Pearl Harbor, the transfers between the Pearl Harbor sites and anywhere else we wanted to go in Honolulu. It was a smart choice.
Our itinerary on the island of Oahu was a drive to the North Shore and the Polynesian Cultural Center on Thursday, Pearl Harbor on Friday and to the Kualoa Ranch on the windward coast on Saturday. After the tour on Saturday, the bus would take us directly to the pier.
We boarded the tour bus with 38 other people, mostly retirees and several who had difficulty walking. We figured that these would be our companions on the cruise as well, so we already assumed there would be times when we separated from them to do something a little more active. Leo was a great tour guide, narrating the sites of Honolulu and the island as we made our way north past Wheeler Field (attacked by the Japanese on December 7th) where we stopped at a little surfer town called Hale'iwa. It was a 30 minute stop for a bathroom break and the obligatory "shopping." We hoofed it up to the beach to get a look at the extraordinarily large waves (extraordinary for East Coasters like us, anyway). On the way back I picked up a bottle of water at a 7-11 while Debbie visited a shop to buy a scarf (there was too much A/C on the bus).
Pacific Ocean Water in a bottle! It wasn't bad, but had me thinking "California is having a water crisis and here I am drinking a bottle of ocean water." Irony. It didn't surprise me in an earthy-crunchy surfer kind of town that they sold something like this.
The surf along Waimea Bay.
Our trip took us along Waimea Bay, the surfing mecca of the world, including the "Pipeline" which had been set up for a surfer competition the week before, but the waves were breaking at 40-feet and they deemed it too dangerous! As it was, there were places where the waves were breaking at 20-feet and our cameras just weren't able to do justice to them.
There are no wild animals on Hawaii, including Mosquitoes. Everything was brought to the island by the settlers: Rats (stowed away), the Mongoose (to kill the rats), Wild Pigs (boars), feral cats and Chickens. Wild chickens were everywhere. Apparently they got loose during the storms over the years and have proliferated because they have no predators once they get past chick stage. Natives are allowed to capture them and kill them for food (assuming you feed them to fatten them up first). You found them everywhere scavenging for food in the vegetation.
The "hang loose" sign is called the "Shakka." It is very popular on the islands (at least when it comes to communicating with the tourists).
The Polynesian Cultural Center is owned and operating by BYU. As an incentive to bring in international students, they offer low tuition at this campus as long as the students work at the PCC. It's a series of islands along a river, connected by bridges, with each one focusing on the culture of other Pacific Islands. We started at Tonga where we worked out the kinks of a 2-hour bus ride by paddling a canoe along the river. We got a demonstration on making coconut bread, all of the things they do with the Taro Plant and Coconut trees (rope, clothing, paper, food, etc.), we got a demonstration of the native dances and a quick lesson. (We video taped it, but are keeping it from public viewing!).
We grabbed an unremarkable late lunch before going to the Samoan show, which was the highlight of the day. The MC of the presentation was phenomenal and we got more demonstrations involving plant life, including an impressive climb up a 60-foot palm tree with nothing but his bare feet and hands. The Samoans also gave us a classic fire baton show.
At 3:00 pm there is a parade along the river with each island culture performing a dance.
The day ended with a 2-hour drive back to Honolulu where we'd reserved a table at Tiki's Bar & Grill; a rooftop establishment next door to the hotel. It seemed appropriate to have my first fruity drink.
Day 3, Friday February 12, 2016
Today's tour was a little more somber, with a visit to the "Punchbowl" National Cemetery on our way to Pearl Harbor. The Punchbowl is a dormant crater right in the Honolulu city limits that became the "Arlington Cemetery of the Pacific." All of the fallen troops in the Pacific theater, from World War II to Korea and Vietnam are buried there. We couldn't get off the bus, so we made a note to return there on our own on our last day.
Our first stop at Pearl Harbor was the Aviation Museum. Having toured the USS Yorktown in Charleston the year before, I wasn't expecting much. I figured it would be redundant, expecting most of the aircraft there to be models I had seen before. I was pleasantly surprised (this is the military geek section of the presentation. Scroll down past all the planes if you don't get into this sort of thing):
The Swamp Ghost: A rare B-17 Bomber survivor that went down on New Britain after a bombing run on Rabaul. It remained in the swamp there for decades (thus, how it got it's name) and was finally recovered and brought to Pearl Harbor in 2006. It appears they have no intention of restoring it.
The Swamp Ghost
Communist MiG-21. This was a heavily produced and exported jet fighter and was the staple of many enemy air forces during the Cold War.
This was a very pleasant find! A Japanese Zero! There is a group of craftsmen at the Aviation Museum that spend time restoring and maintaining the aircraft. There's a parking lot full of them outside the hangar.
A diorama with Jimmy Doolittle in front of a B-25 bomber. It was said that these planes were too big to lift off of an aircraft carrier, but they stripped them down and managed to get 16 of them in the air to conduct a bombing mission on Tokyo less than a month after Pearl Harbor. It was important that America send a message early in the war that the Japanese had picked the wrong fight.
Korea: A Communist MiG-17 and American F-86 Sabre. This was a rare time when jet aircraft still fought against each other with machine-guns and cannons rather than air-to-air missiles.
The stalwart P-40 done up in the recognizable "Flying Tigers" paint scheme.
One heck of a story! This is posted on a placard just outside Hangar 79.
Nothing to make you feel old like finding the equipment you served with in a museum! This is the venerable UH-1 Huey. They're known for their extensive service in Vietnam (my Uncle was a crew chief on one). I flew in them around Central America in the early 1980's. These were my first "doors off" experience in a helicopter.
I have great affection for the AH-1 Huey Cobra Gunship. It was 1984. We found ourselves across the border in Nicaragua and suddenly found ourselves spotted by the Sandanista's. There were a lot of tense minutes waiting for the extraction. The first on the scene were these Cobras who dusted the Sandanista armored vehicle on the opposite ridge. It was the feeling one would get with the cavalry coming over the hill (and yes, I kissed this copter!)
As we were getting ready to leave Hangar 79, an employee there pointed up at the windows and said, "Those are original bullet holes from when the Japanese strafed the hangar in 1941." Knowing that the bullets landed right where I was standing, I got goosebumps. All of the windows were littered with bullet holes, or the original pains had been replaced (probably shot out).
From the Aviation museum we headed down the road to the USS Missouri. I was able to get a glance at the USS Oklahoma memorial across the street on our way in (The Oklahoma capsized, trapping 429 crewmen under water, but the tragedy on the Arizona overshadows the Oklahoma).
The USS Missouri is a New Jersey-class battleship; the last battleships to fight for the United States navy (they were upgraded with cruise missiles for the Gulf War before being retired). The Missouri is notable because it was on the deck of the Missouri that General MacArthur accepted the surrender of the Japanese in Tokyo Harbor.
The main batteries on the USS Missouri are 16" guns. This is one of the shells fired by the main guns, weighing about 2,000 pounds. To the right is a gun powder cartridge. They would stuff 3 of those white bags of powder in each gun to fire the projectile.
Ever the military geek, I spotted this M20 Armored Car on the pier alongside the Missouri. These served in late World War II and Korea.
The pavilion area over by the Arizona museum was crowded as our bus dropped us there for lunch. We grabbed some sandwiches in a convenience store and tried to find some shade to sit in. I had a pretty bad sunburn from yesterday and the sun today felt 10 times worse. Of course, I hadn't brought any long-sleeve shirts to Hawaii, so we decided that we'd have to alleviate that if I was going to enjoy the rest of the vacation. I started by buying a commemorative long-sleeve T-shirt at the USS Arizona gift shop.
They're very strict about security with the Arizona Memorial, banning all carry-on items, fanny packs, etc. No food or beverages either. We went through security and sat through a 15 minute movie about the cause of the war, including about 5 minutes on the Battle of Pearl Harbor itself, then boarded the launch and headed out to the Memorial.
I can't take credit for this picture (I got it off the Internet), but it shows how the battleship is laid out beneath the Memorial (something you can't see when you are on it). The bow is to the right. An armor penetrating bomb hit between the 1st & 2nd main gun turrets, exploding in the powder magazine and killing 1,177 men almost instantly. Turret one was destroyed completely and left on the vessel, turret 2 was salvaged for scrap. Above the monument are turrets 3 & 4. Both were recovered and placed elsewhere on the island as shore batteries for the duration of the war.
Arriving at the Memorial.
The mount for Turret 3 sitting clearly above the waterline.
You can see some of the fuel oil still leaking from the wreck in this picture. It's been leaking for 75 years now. The smell of fuel oil is so strong, even now, that it seems if you lit a match the surface of the water would catch fire. There are too many uncertainties surrounding why they won't pump the rest of the oil out (potential collapse of the wreck causing more spillage in the harbor and the fact that the remains of over 1,000 sailors are still down there that could come free).
One moment that struck me while we were at Pearl Harbor was the amount of Japanese tourists there. (I thought they didn't have any money any more). I admired the fact that they came here to study their history just as much as we studied ours. A retired gentleman, who we saw regularly on the tour up to this point, leaned over and said to me, "I can't believe all of the fuckin' Japs that are here." I was taken aback. He obviously wasn't a Vet, or if he was he sat on his ass Stateside while better men deployed overseas to do the fighting. From that point on I avoided him and referred to him as "the bigot" whenever I turned my head to keep from acknowledging them on the ship for the rest of the cruise. Heaven forbid, if this was one of those cruises where you sit with the same people at dinner every night, that I would've had to share my evenings with him!
When we got back from Pearl Harbor we had dinner at a place called Duke's right on Waikiki Beach. It came highly recommended. We also walked the strip of stores along Waikiki and I bought another 4 long-sleeve shirts to cover up with for the rest of the trip. Two were wet gear shirts, designed to be worn by surfers, so I could wear them in the water and not worry about them drying out.
Day 4, Saturday February 13, 2016
We were up pretty early again today, knowing that when we left the hotel for our 7:30 tour we would not be back to our hotel. We tagged our bags (and the case of water) and left them in the hotel (with a big tip to be sure the water made it) for the tour company to pick them up and transport them to the ship.
Today we cut across the center of the island, stopping at the Nu'uanu Pali Lookout on our way to the Kualoa Ranch where there would be agricultural and "culture" demonstrations. Having seen my share of them at the PCC on Thursday, I wasn't really looking forward to it.
While everyone gauked at the view of Honolulu from the pass, I decided to hop the rail and trudge into the woods to take a leak. I found myself surrounded by tall, thin bamboo clattering in the breeze and had a moment of bliss before a feral chicken and a cute little chick came along. Since there was only 1 chick left, I figured they'd gone through some hard times (not to mention, what were they doing up here, 1168 feet up a mountain pass?)
Oahu is one of the older islands in the chain, meaning that the volcanoes that formed it are now extinct and there has been millions of years of erosion to carve away incredibly steep mountainsides. Because this side of the island also catches the weather as it reaches the island, the mountains tend to block them in, so there is less sun and a lot more vegetation.
The Kualoa Ranch is a popular place to film movies. Of note are the Jurassic Park movies filmed here. The T-Rex cage is still somewhere at in the wilderness on the other side of the ridge. The Ranger, who was our guide at the ranch, commented about all the movies and scenes around the area.
Now THAT would be climbing a mountain!
Rather than hang around with the rest of the tourists listening to another "tourist shpeel," I decided to sneak off and make my way up the foothills of the ranch toward the mesmerizing mountains. I figured I had an hour to kill before I needed to be back. On my way up there were all kinds of unique flora and birds I had never seen before.
This is a Brazilian Cardinal. They are all over the islands, but very hard to photograph because the either keep at a distance or flit around too quickly to shoot.
Sneaking away from the group at the ranch. The presentation pavilion is on the right.
At this point I came to an outcrop where there were a couple of Park Rangers in a golf cart. They asked for a Pass and when I told them I was with the group down the hill they told me I had to go back down to join them. I refused their offer to drive me back down in the golf cart, preferring to take my time in my descent, but I promised I would go back!
When I returned to the presentation they were talking about how the ancient Hawaiians established their own fish estuaries and oyster farms along that side of the island. It was very interesting stuff.
From there we headed down to the beach, boarded a motor boat out to the "Secret Island," which is neither secret nor an island and had a picnic lunch within site of "The Chinaman's Hat."
Note the wet gear long-sleeve and bandana to cover my neck. We looked all up and down Waikiki for a bandana and you'd think we were crazy. We finally lucked out in a bin way back in the Urban Outfitter store.
One last view of the mountains on our way back across the bay.
A boat ride and bus trip later we were boarding the "Pride of America." We were given laes and greeted with "Aloha" as we boarded the ship, found our way to our room and located our luggage, which was still being parked in the crowded hallway outside the room.
Deb on board with her first lae.
Our Stateroom looking from the door... well, the bathroom is to the right.
Our Stateroom from the other end (taken from the balcony doorway).
The instructions for Debbie's motion sickness medication said to take them while on land before going out to sea. But I said, "If you take them now, then how will you know if you don't have an issue or if it's the medication that is making you feel better?" Since we'd be on land tomorrow, she decided to forego the medication and just wore a pair of bracelets that are supposed to prevent motion sickness.
After unpacking our baggage (we placed the empty suitcases under the bed as the collection point for our dirty laundry), we made our way around the ship to get our bearings and figure out where everything was. We ate at a Turkish Steakhouse on board for our first dinner, where we ate too much (this would be a common theme on the ship). We also bought 2 bottles of wine, which they would keep in the wine cellar and we could drink from anywhere on the ship. At 7:00 pm the horn blew and the big ship slowly pulled away from the dock. We made our way to one of the dock decks to enjoy the night and take in the sight of the city as we steamed out of the harbor. Tomorrow would be our first stop: Maui.
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