Once had Money

So that dream of a white Christmas and a few days in the sun in Hawaii is coming to an end !

What a wonderful adventure we have had ❤

Hawaii is like a TV series of days gone by … all the hotels are quite old, it’s like it is 1980 all over again and we are watching shows like- Hawaii 5 O and Magnum PI ….. they have had a make over or three though. My fav is the Moana Sands, it’s an old beach house style like Raffles just smaller and has amazing outdoor areas and one of the best Christmas displays we have ever seen…. We have pretty much spent most of our time on the beach here listening to their cool tunes as we lay like broccoli in the sun- to quote Julia Roberts and  ☀

We arrived from a cool Vancouver to a warm winter evening here in Honolulu 20 degrees, 11.00pm , yep we are all good with that.  Our hotel is in the main street, perfect for shopping, walking the promenades, across the road to the beach, restaurants etc, we are high up on the top floor with stunning ocean views and a view back towards one of the many mountains here. The whole area is very Gold Coast with its hinterland and lovely beaches. Having said that it’s a very very small balcony and they have plastic cups!  Oh and for our own personal safety, no fire works are permitted in the hotel! Schoolies on the Gold Coast eat your heart out.

We have hired a car and are heading out on an adventure , but first a quick trip to the Doctor on call at local clinic near by. Lana has a sore throat ? and earache ….poor honey is not well at all.  They make me pay USD201- before she sees the Doctor, and let me know it might be more depending on how long we take.  Gee thanks ! The clinic is quite large and well organised, we see a nurse who takes her vitals before the lovely doctor, checks my baby out who has an nasty ear infection and pharyngitis so she gives Lana an antibiotic prescription – well actually she faxes it to the pharmacy 3 blocks away and off we go! 300USD later and I haven’t even shopped yet !

Steve is only here for New Years Eve and then he heads home, so we head off with a map and limited road signs, and some how after we head half way around the island we get lost ?  I grab out the iPhone and map it and we are soon back on track via the free way and head to ‘Pipe’  Sunset Beach and Waimea Bay ~all those world famous beaches ….. they are all pumping waves and the beaches themselves are all free range … white sands, big blue waves just lovely. The lemonade girls are there sweetening the day with  lemonade and cookies too.

We are so spoilt living where we live on the northern beaches  of Sydney and to us,  it’s just another beach. Steve notices there are some amazing local surfers out when we visit, so we sit and watch for a while… The waves just keep coming and don’t stop.

Unlike in Sydney where you get a set and then nothing for a moment and then another set, these waves well they just keep rolling into shore. The shore drops are big! Obviously the island is surrounded by a coral reef,  and the waves dump into a shelf right on the shore, one minute you have your ankles in the waters edge and next you are knee or neck deep depending on the tide…. I love the ocean but we will head back to Waikiki before we get in, too big a swell for me !

We stop at their equivalent of the Big Pineapple ?The Dole Plantation since 1900, along with every oriental person on the island, anyway we just laugh at them and their photo taking style. I have learnt they take 50 pics just to get the perfect shot and they look at each one as they go.
Last year when I spent the day in Santorini Greece with a professional photographer he told me when Asian tourists are taking too long to just say excuse me, wave your hand to get them to move, jump in grab your shot and move on. I’m now quite talented at this! Thank god or it would be January 4 before we got a stupid dumb photo of the big plastic pineapple.

We head back to Waikiki Steve makes me laugh as he tries to pronounce the Hawaiian names of streets etc, saying ‘gee I think I’d fail a spelling test here! ‘

Haleiwa Bay for lunch -Haleiwa Joes Grill where 50 first dates was filmed ….. kidding but it looks just like it !
Where I had the best ginger beer ever ! No cock n bull about that !

We make it back for dinner and an early night, no 9pm fireworks here so we wake up at midnight to watch them explode over the ocean.
New Year’s Day we have a yummy brekki with Steve at ‘Bills Sydney’ in Hawaii and our 4 becomes 3 as we say bye to my honey and send him home to start work the next day….sorry babe !
So I gotta say I have so many friends who come here year after year and I just don’t see the attraction.
I’m glad I’ve been here and the shopping is good, But it’s aimed at the HUGE Asian market. I’ve never seen so many ‘orientals’ as our Korean taxi driver called them!  Too many he says -‘I’m moving to Australia this year’ … well mate they are everywhere.
The big shopping centre at Ala Moana again it’s all about the new year bag surprise! Spend $400 on this paper bag that says it had $600 worth of product inside …. the Asians go nuts ….. me I’d rather spend $600 on what I actually want than a lucky dip even if it is Kate Spade ♠️

We climbed Diamond Head this morning with so many Asians who clearly don’t read -“the wear walking shoes signs!” It’s not that far however it’s very steep, uneven oh and lots of steep stairs too! And there they are in high heel thongs tottering along…..we did chuckle !

Anyway the high light of our 4 chill out days apart from the beautiful beach days and climb of Diamond Head Lookout and outlet shopping was a taxi ride to …….
WALMART!
Well isn’t this joint an eye opener… Bunnings, spotlight, Kmart oh and a little Officeworks thrown in for good mix…. We lose Jess in the first 10 minutes and I’m calling out ‘Jess’  and she can’t here me because she was actually half a kilometre away!
There are aisles of everything you need like the oil for your clippers and shavers, right beside new electric shavers and clippers, smart marketing.  Lipsticks and nail varnish for days….. pet stuff . birds . fish. cats .dogs and yes I bought a couple of things for Addie and Bear.

As it’s New Year and everyone is packing away their Christmas stuff, there is an aisle completely filled with Valentines ❤ cards and another aisle for my OCD friends- containers for days that hold all your Xmas decorations, trees, tinsel etc. including a plastic box with 20 holes to pop your baubles from the tree in ! I lose Jess again and then we find her in the toy dept…… 5 rows away from the rifle and gun aisle… mmm anyway we buy a few bits for kindy -paw patrol, pepper pig and some amazing markers !
Everything is also on steroids big bottles of car wash, drive way cleaner you name it they got it! We leave and chuckle all the way home, our day is complete.

Its our last day here and I’m lying on my sun bed with an umbrella on the edge of the Waikiki beach wondering why we don’t have beach rentals in Australia ? Money making venture number 4056… I love having a sun bed.

Canada and Whistler were amazing and we will definitely be back
Honolulu … mmm I can’t believe I’m saying this we think we’d rather go back to Bali. Perhaps the other islands are more my style  either way it’s time to go home ……
Here’s to more adventures in 2017, and thanks for reading my travel blog ! I enjoyed doing this and yay I think it’s my first New Years resolution that I’ve ever kept!

Ps just in case you are thinking about flying Hawaii airlines I’d give them c- and as for Air Canada Rouge e-
Just saying

Love Mrs Wong from Waikiki beach ❤

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave