I got the famous Royal Hawaiian Pink Palace pancakes and they were soooo delicious!
Ben got the loco moco, a popular local dish.
Today was the day we picked up our car and drove to Pearl Harbor. I had tickets for us to view the Arizona Memorial at 11:00, then the rest of the day was open until our sunset sail that night. Jason and Alice were sleeping in from their long travel day, so we would meet up with them for lunch after Pearl Harbor.
We walked to Avis next door at the Sheraton and rented our car, a minivan that would hold all of us. The agent gave us a map and instructions on how to get to Pearl Harbor and Ben put in the exact address from the national park website.
Despite all of this we still got lost and ended up in a huge traffic jam! Driving on Oahu is no joke.
We made it to Pearl Harbor around 9:20 am and exchanged our 11:00 tickets for the 9:45 tour that was about to start. We watched a 25-minute film about the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor and it was really interesting with incredible footage. Then we boarded the boat that takes you to the memorial over the sunken USS Arizona.
We got back to Pearl Harbor at 11:00 and decided to tour the USS Bowfin submarine. The tickets came with an audio tour that was very interesting. I don't know if I will ever get a chance to tour a submarine again but it was fun and we all enjoyed it.
Can you imagine living in this space with 79 other people? I can't!
There is alot to see at Pearl Harbor but most of it is outdoors which was something I had not realized. So it was really hot now and we were ready for lunch so we decided to go back to the hotel to meet up with Jason and Alice for lunch.
We walked over to Rumfire at the Sheraton and had a nice lunch. It was fun to meet Alice and hear about their travel day from Boston and to talk about our upcoming plans.
After lunch, Ben, Jason, Alice and I spent some time at Waikiki Beach.
We all met back up at 4:30 pm and took a short walk on Waikiki beach to meet up with our Na Hoku catamaran for our sunset sail. This company was not my first choice to go with but my first choice was chartered (most likely for Halloween). But Na Hoku still had great reviews so I went with them.
We saw a beautiful sunset, the drinks were good and it's always fun to be out on the water. The beautiful sunset was marred though by the terrible music the crew played--explicit rap and heavy metal. This was not the melodious Hawaiian sailing music I was expecting!
I was pretty mortified and worried the family was now doubting my planning abilities! But at least the scenery was beautiful.
Back on dry land, we talked about what we wanted to do for dinner. I had not made a dinner reservation since I didn't know how tired everyone would be and thought we could just wing it. But Halloween in Waikiki is pretty busy and the place I suggested was booked solid.
So we ended up at a nice seafood restaurant at our hotel, Azure. They gave us a beautiful table on the patio and everyone enjoyed their meals but I was so tired, it was hard to stay awake!
After dinner, we went to bed with plans to all meet up the next morning for our drive of Oahu's north shore.
