April 15 - 18 - Honolulu Hawaii
Staying  at Outrigger Waikiki on the Beach
 

We should be arriving in Honolulu Airport just before 4:00pm HST (Midnight EDT). So we will probably relax when we arrive and hope to make it to sunset which is at 6:51. Sunsets don't vary that much with Hawaii only 1200 miles from the equator. Every day the sun sets only 20 seconds later. Sunrise is at 6:12 and that gets 1 minute earlier every day.

If you read my first page, I said that our first reservation was easy. Well it was, except that after reading more trip advisor reviews, we decided to change hotels. This is pretty funny (yet sad in a way) but the new place we booked offered quite a discount for seniors. The funny part was that their definition of senior was 50+. The sad part is that I now qualify for this discount and Myrna will (qualify) during our trip. Our original choice of hotel was nice but a little out of the way on the Diamondhead side of the beach. That’s accompanied with a few reviews with the phrases ‘bugs on the headboard’ and a ‘sleazy area of town’ made us reconsider.
We have now rebooked in the heart of Waikiki Beach at the Outrigger Waikiki on the Beach. Other than location, it has some neat features. Free internet which I will be using and free calls to USA and Canada. I think that I will use this to call people back home at sunset. Let’s see now, are you all ready for calls around midnight. On second thought, we might not use the phone that much.

Lesson learned (This tip might save you money one day). We booked the Outrigger on March 27th. On April 11th, I was just checking availability and rates and our room had gone down 70 bucks a night. I wrote a nice little e-mail asking how I could book the same room at the cheaper rate. Presto! They answer that our reservation now shows the new rate. $270 CAD save in about 2 minutes. Since I was dealing directly with the hotel and their cancellation policy was 3 days notice there was no problem. I wonder what would have happened if I had been locked in at a rate using Expedia. Since most hotels offer to match internet best rates, I feel it's safer dealing direct.   

Plans for the island of Oahu

--> Snorkeling in Hanauma Bay (Monday morning 6am)
--> Visit Pearl Harbour (Tuesday)
--> 'Climb' Diamond Head (one day a sunset or sunrise)
--> Sitting on our Lanai watching the sunset (Lanai means balcony).
--> And going for a 'little' drive in our Mustang after Hanauma Bay probably

These are the plans. Come back and visit to see what we really did. Remember that with the six hour difference my updates will be later than usual.

What we really did on (to get to) Oahu

2:15 LA time
Well, as predicted by many people, we would miss our connecting flight. Not because we had only 70 minutes layover but because the 8:50 left Montreal after 10. We took the shuttle to the United desk as instructed and there was only 1 seat left on the later 4:45 flight. We then took the shuttle bus back to Air Canada and they got us on a 3:15 American Airlines flight. One thing for sure is that our luggage will not be with us when we arrive. It will get in (with hope) on the united flight 2 hours later. Myrna did pack an emergency kit so we should be fine. We are sitting in the bar at LAX having a beer. Air Canada sucks but we are not that worried. We are on vacation.
This means that we won’t be sitting on our lanai for the first sunset of our vacation but the plane lands about 45 minutes before the sunset. By the time we report our ‘lost’ baggage and pick up the car it will be dark. (actually had we not run around Waikiki for 20 minutes we would have seen it.) For those of you who haven’t heard, Don Ho passed away this weekend so we will be in Honolulu with that news fresh in people’s mind. We might even be there for the funeral. We’ll keep you posted on the Ho down.
7:00pm Hawaii Time
We have arrived in our hotel sans our checked in luggage. That should be arriving at the airport at 8 so we should have it tonight sometime. Can't post any pictures yet as all the adapters are in the 'lost' baggage. We have a great room on the corner of the 15th floor. One small problem, the Hilton next door blocks the sunset. See this picture. The sunrise should be visible behind Diamond Head. It's really windy and it's blowing right through our living room.
Monday 12:30am HST
Went out for our first Mai Tai and had supper on a terrace somewhere. After being awake for almost 24 hours we went to bed, too tired to sit on the lanai. Good news, the bell man just put our luggage outside our room. From now on it's back to normal. Knock wood.
Already heard that the weather is bad back home. Sorry from missing it. This is the forecast here.

Monday April 16

Today was a big day. Snorkeling at Hanuama Bay followed by a drive around the island (Oahu), a climb up Diamond Head Crater. Too tired to write about it. The Jet lag has definitely kicked in. Here are two postcards for the day Snorkeling and what we had for lunch...

Tuesday April 17

Today we started the day at Pearl Harbour. That is a very busy place but we got there before it opened. I am not a line-up person, but for this I made an exception. We haven't been watching TV much so the first we heard about Virginia Tech was when we picked up the paper outside our hotel room. It's pretty sad. We visited the Arizona Memorial where 1177 people were killed on one ship that still sits in the harbour under the white structure you see in these pictures. It sank over 65 years ago and some oil is still leaking from the ship (about 2 quarts a day). It was a sobering experience. I will have a picture of that later. After that we went across the island to the east side to see if the sun was shining there. The wind at the Pali lookout was something else. Then I went about 300 yards out swimming on Waikiki. Lots of surfers. Took some pictures of the sunset. Here is a montage.

Wednesday April 18

Today we are catching a 10:20 flight to the Big Island. Click here to go to the next leg.