Josie and I just returned from an eleven day trip to Hawaii. We have now been to all of the 50 states together. We sailed aboard the Norwegian Cruise Liner, The Pride of America. But before we boarded the ship, we stayed three nights at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Hotel right on Waikiki Beach. We toured Pearl Harbor, which included the Arizona Monument, the Battleship Missouri, submarine Bowfin, and the Aviation Museum of the Pacific which is housed in a hanger that dates back to December 7th, 1941. It still has bullet holes in the windows from that day.
In the City of Honolulu we visited the State Capital, the Royal Palace, The National Cemetery of the Pacific and a Buddhist Temple, where we fed the Zebra Doves by hand.
On the third day we boarded the ship and our first port of call was the Island of Maui. We took the road to Hana which is considered one of the top five most scenic drives in the USA, but also one of the most dangerous. It has over 600 turns and 50 one lane bridges. Our driver Keith had driven this road over 300 times so we sat back and enjoyed the scenery. At every stop we were greeted by feral chickens. They are all over the islands but more so in Kauai where there are no Mongoose to keep them in check. At the Black Sand Beach the local teenagers entertained us by diving off the 60 foot cliffs. The flowers and waterfalls in the rain forest were everywhere. We also tasted local coconut, red bananas and poi which tastes like paste or maybe worse.
Our next stop was in Hilo on the Big Island Of Hawaii. We took a helicopter tour of the lava fields but we were about two months to late to see any flowing lava. We did see a few craters and lots of steam vents. The next day we anchored out in Kona, and we took a submarine ride down to 10 feet. My camera was just not good enough to get good pictures of the colorful fish on the coral reefs. It was however quite a unique experience.
Our final port before returning to Honolulu was the Island of Kauai. It is the oldest of the islands and we believe the most scenic. We again took a helicopter tour of the island. The Na Pali Coast and the Grand Canyon of the Pacific were beautiful and our pilot, Beth, took us right up to many waterfalls and even into an extinct volcano. This was the highlight of our trip. Back in town we got in a little beach time and shared an Hawaiian shaved ice over ice cream. There were chickens everywhere even on the beach.
We also had a great time on the ship. We had great views and sunsets from our aft facing cabin balcony. The food was excellent and we had scenic places to eat it. Our room steward made towel animals to decorate our bed almost every day. There was a wide variety of entertainment every night, from local dancers, comics, variety shows, lounge singers and even bingo. As we were heading to the airport a rainbow over or ship was a great way to our trip.
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