Day Three - Pearl Harbor and Island Tour

This was the first of our early morning tours. It started in the lobby at 6:00 AM with the usual pick up from various hotels. The first stop was Pearl Harbor and the USS Arizona Memorial. Our tour guide was a long-time Hawaii resident and made sure we knew how great it was that the Japanese didn't attack the Hawaii people; only the naval bases. (He failed to mention that Japan attacked without a declaration of war.) Besides the Bush bashing, complaining about the US taking over when Hawaii had great treaties with other nations and the fact they had to call the main highways an Interstate even though it of course isn't just to satisfy the US government, he was knowledgeable about the island, culture and history. (I just decreased his tip every time he went on his rampage.)

After about 2 hours at the memorial, we went around the island visiting various spots. We saw the Dole Plantation (and heard about how third-world countries are causing the shut down of all the pineapple and sugar cane plantation. We went to the North Shore where all the big waves are this time of year (although they were down quite a bit the day we visited). We had a nice lunch at the Crouching Lion Inn.

We stopped at the Halona Blowhole and watched the surf and right up the road was Hanauma Bay that has some great snorkeling. (We planned to come back another day; but more on that later.) We then ended back at the hotel around 4:30; tired and hungry. The driver talked from 6:30 until 4:30; non-stop. The only break we had was when we got off the bus on each tour.

We were lucky enough to stumble on the hotel bar where they had a group of four young men singing great harmony. We bought a CD and enjoyed a great burger and Mai Tai. We knew the next day was going to start early so we headed up to bed and got tucked in by 8:30. We knew that 2:50 AM when the alarm was going off would come around quickly.