Hawaii Photo Album
Day Four - Tuesday, April 17th - Beaches - Towards the North Shore
Tuesday morning marked our departure from Waikiki beach. We checked out of the Moana Surfrider (such a beautiful hotel), and had plans to hike Diamond Head Crater and make our way up the windward coast.
We stopped to take a few last pictures in the morning of the view from our hotel.
And, here's Matt on the beach at Waikiki.
The plan mostly went as designed -- with one distinct departure. Somehow, I (Becky) got sick on the way to the car-rental location. Yep, on our vacation in Hawaii, I got sick in a cab. Looking back, it's pretty funny, but at the moment it lived in the realm of the absurd. It didn't really hamper the rest of the day, just gave us something to laugh about later. :) So, after a burger to recharge my energy, we headed towards Diamond Head.
Diamond Head is the big mountain / rock formation you see in pretty much every picture of Honolulu, Oahu, or especially Waikiki. It sits like a guardian over the coast, looking down onto Waikiki, especially. Diamond Head is technically a crater -- left from Oahu's distant volcanic past. In addition to it's geologic history, it has served as a bunker/lookout for military purposes. Seeing the view from the top, it was easy to understand why - you can see a lot.
The hike to the top isn't too hard, but it's not exactly a walk in the park either. The first section is a gentle but constant slight slope, then a series of switch-backs before you get to the dreaded stairs. Tall, steep steps - and lots of them. There are also tunnels (built in the military history period) and more steps before you reach the top.
About half way up, we stopped for a view and a nice gentleman took our picture.
And here's Matt, at that same overlook.
The hike to the top seriously was not easy -- but this view soothed much of the pain.
Becky, successfully at the top of the climb - sweaty and exhausted!
By the way, it's also really windy. That's the only reason I'm letting this unflattering picture go on the internet -- to prove I made it to the top, and prove that it was really windy!
Matt handled the trail a lot better. :)
This diagram gave us an idea what we were seeing. It also emphasized to us (like being in French Polynesia did) just how amazing it would have been for the first settlers to ever find this place. Other than the other Hawaiian islands, it's thousands of miles to anything else (Tahiti at 2381 miles south).
It's tough to capture the path in any way that makes it look as tough as it was. This picture shows just a small portion -- only a small area.
These pictures may capture one of the stair sections. In the second picture, Matt's only about halfway down.
Here's Becky, happier on the way down!
After Diamond head, we stopped by Wailua Shave Ice for a much needed refresher, then headed up the Pali Highway, over the Koolua mountains toward the Windward Coast.
The Pali Highway cuts thru a valley in the mountains, and as you'd expect, it's windy and cool. But, it has a great lookout.
Matt, at the lookout -- and just look at that woman's pony tail behind!
View from the lookout down to the coast - towards Kailua, basically.
This road was originally constructed in 1897!
Yes, more wind. That's a theme in our vacation pictures -- Becky's hair being whipped everywhere!
We also captured a few views of the mountains.
When we got into to the Windward Coast, the weather caught up with us. We only got out at one beach (and I can't even remember which). I caught this view of Matt, enjoying the second view. Our guidebook (which was excellent, by the way) marked numerous places where the Lost TV show is filmed, and I think this was one of them. Even if it's not the exact place, you can understand the concept.
On the beach
Tuesday night, we checked into the Turtle Bay Resort on the North Shore.
Ok, look close -- look to the 4th set of visible rooms from the left, and the 4th floor down from the top. See the greenish-blue colors on the chairs? Those are our beach towels sitting out to dry later in the week - gives you an idea where we were, overlooking the pool and bay.
A few days later, we took this panorama from our room.
