Thursday, September 30, 2010

Hawaii 2010 Day 6 ~ Bellows Air Force Base

Wednesday morning dawned another beautiful day on Waikiki!  After breakfast we went to base and picked up Ralf and Gwen for a day of fun!  We came back to Waikiki and ended up going to Round Table Pizza for lunch.  It was an amazing sandwich!  After walking the the leftovers back to the hotel, we headed off down the Pali Highway.  What a beautiful drive that is!  We left the camera in the hotel though, so all we had were phone pictures.  What did we do before phones with cameras?  The views are absolutely amazing!
One great thing about Ralf and Gwen being in the military is they can get us into any military base on the island, and today was Bellows.  What a beautiful place.  It was probably my favorite beach other than Kailua!  The waves were crazy and kept knocking us down.  One time while I was helping Geneva with her swimsuit *cough cough* a wave came and knocked us over.  I am pretty sure the goggles she dropped are almost to Japan by now!  After a while, we got out and sat on the sand.  There were thousands of little sand crabs everywhere.  They are so funny to watch!  Chad decided to build a sand creation and suddenly jumped up and ran into the ocean.  He came back with a yellow shovel to finish his creation!  Lose a pair of goggles, gain a shovel!
After the beach we decided to head back.  I really wanted to have L&L BBQ for dinner, so we stopped there and Chad and I got L&L and Gwen and Ralf got something else.  We headed back to their house to eat.  After a while Chad and I headed back to the hotel for a good nights sleep. The time change can really wipe you out!

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The only rainbow I saw in Hawaii!


Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Hawaii 2010 Day 5 ~ North Shore and the Shrimp Truck

The view from our hotel at Ko Olina!
Mr. or Mrs. Sea Turtle!

The waves at North Shore!

Tuesday morning, we decided to take a look around the hotel. It was so pretty! There was a water display through the whole thing with sharks and sting rays and all sorts of amazing fish! We tried to find some breakfast and ended up with an OK muffin and a drink. 
Shrimp Truck
After we left the hotel, we were going to try and find parking to go the lagoons, but there was a wait at every one of them. Instead, we decided to head into North Shore for some yummy shrimp (from a truck!) It was delicious, but I think the onion rings were even better! We were going to go to Geneva's favorite chocolate place, The Chocolate Gecko, but it wasn't open that day. We walked around North Shore for a while trying to find me some new shoes. For some reason, mine decided to rub a blister on my foot. OUCH!
We did stop at a beach and find some turtles also. There were lots of them just swimming around, but we had a hard time getting a good picture of one. They were HUGE though! We also saw some interesting tourists having some fun in the water...it was quite the site!


After a while we decided to head back to Gwen's house and relax. On our way home, we stopped at NEX to get some food to grill. It was a nice night relaxing at their house! After a while, the guys decided to go fishing. They ran and got some bait and headed to Ralf's favorite spot. When they got there, they found the Candian Marines were camping there! Did I mention it was the week of RIMPAC? There were soldiers from all over everywhere on the Island. It was pretty neat to see! Anyway, there were Candian Marines camped in Ralf's spot, so they went somewhere else. Geneva and I decided to head back to the hotel, get some cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory (Red Velvet and Chocolate Chip YUMMY!) and hang out at the hotel. Long story short, Ralf and Chad neither one had a cell phone on them, it was past 1:00am when they finally called and a crab ate their bait!

It was all in all a great day!
Water display at the hotel!

Water Display at Ko Olina!

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Hawaii 2010 Day 4 ~ Ko Olina

Monday morning we took Ralf and Geneva down to breakfast with us, once again, Dukes was amazing! After breakfast we all got around and headed back to base. Ralf was taking Chad to the flightline to see the planes and Gevena and I were going to the mall to get some stuff for her re-enlistment that night.

Ralf works on the flightline at Hickam Air Force Base and took Chad to see a C-17 and actually sit in a cargo plane! He looked pretty smokin' in Ralf's too big shoes.
These bullet holes are from the attack on Pearl Harbor!
Geneva and I headed to the mall, and it was my first time driving the mustang. For a little car, it seems really big. The front is just big! We went to Sephora to get some make-up. On the way there, Geneva drove me past her old place. It was pretty nice.
After the guys got back from the flightline, we headed to Ko Olina. Geneva knew someone who got her a good rate on some rooms at the Marriot on Ko Olina. When we got there, they went ahead and upgraded our rooms. We each had our own "roman bath" our outdoor hot tub to the rest of us. Our view was amazing! Looked out over the ocean. We found a salamander under the umbrella!
We decided to walk around the hotel, which was amazing! Since we were starving we found a place to eat at the hotel that didn't have a dress code! There was a poolside cafe that we decided to eat at, and it was pretty tasty! I had a hot dog, but it was huge! After dinner, the boys decided to walk over to Lagoon 4 and snorkle before the ceremony while Geneva and I got ready!
After Gwen was ready, we walked over to the lagoon for the ceremony. It was quite a site and Geneva had a lot of friends join her. After the ceremony, they dove into the water in full uniform. It was pretty funny! I was able to get some pretty amazing sunset picture too!