Hawaii Day 2 - Shark's Cove & Castles Beach

All the pictures look like postcards. 

We started the day at Shark's Cove - a fantastic snorkeling location. You have to catch it right when the tide isn't too high or too low.

It's a circle of reef. The waves come in through an opening and fish get trapped until the tide rises and they can swim back out.

The water was just right when we got there and according to Debbie, Jeff's wife, it was the best snorkeling she had ever seen there. We saw huge angel fish, parrot fish, a sea turtle and other fish that I don't know the name of. Sadly, I didn't have an underwater camera so I didn't get pictures of any of it. Swimming along with the sea turtle is one of the coolest things I've ever done.

I did go down on the reef with one leg. It wasn't a hard fall, but it bruised and scraped me up pretty good. I had a goose egg on my shin. Debbie gave me a special ointment to prevent infection. I was a little bloody on my leg and my arm.

A week later, the bruise was more visible. It stretched from knee to ankle.

One amazing story of the day was that Debbie was swimming and just happened to see a man's wedding ring in the water. When she got back to shore she showed it to us. David looked down and realized that his ring was missing. Debbie had found David's ring! What are the chances of any of that happening??!! Insane!

 

We were introduced to the "shrimp death camps" where shrimp are raised to die.

I think this is one of the areas where Jurassic Park and Los were filmed.

We went to see a huge banyan tree that was featured in Lost, Jurassic Park, and Pirates of the Caribbean.

Our kids and the Christensen kids got along really well. Jonah and Jalen are almost the same age and Baylie and Chloe are just a couple weeks apart.

Banyan trees are amazing with roots that stretch from the branches into the ground.

The short walk to the tree was beautiful.

Coconuts

Our next stop was the fabulous Ted's Bakery and it did not disappoint.                                                      

David got their famous chocolate haupia cream pie and it was AMAZING.

I got coconut cake, which was good, but not as good as David's

Then it was off to Castles Beach. It's the Christensen's favorite place to swim and boogie board. We loved it too.

It was a beautiful day at the beach, although a little chilly.

For dinner, we went to Seven Brothers. Oh my heavens! It lived up to the hype.

David's burger.

Baylie's burger had onion rings on it. It was huge!

I got pineapple salad with coconut shrimp. It was one of the best things I have ever eaten.

We went back to the temple and toured the visitor's center.

You can barely see him, but there is a mongoose diving into the bushes. There are lots of mongooses on the island. Can you spot this one?

The Laie temple is beautiful.

There's another big banyan tree at the temple.

Jalen loved the Christus statue.

Plumeria

Ginger

We learned how to make earrings out of banana leaves. The tree only produces fruit one time and then dies. The Christensens wanted to learn how to make something with the tree.

Just by chance, my cousin Christina Willardson's (Cosby) family ended up being in Hawaii at the same time as us. We swang by to see them at their amazing place on the beach. They had been whale watching all day. Dennis and Cathy are two of my favorite people.

Then it was on to David's cousin Taryn Russell's (Aussem) house. She lives on Sheffield Army base because her husband is stationed there. He was in the Philippines doing training. It was so fun to see her and her cute kids - Hailey and Charley.

We couldn't believe how much we had done in just two days!

Hawaii Day 1 - Bumped in D.C.

I was invited to speak to BYU-Hawaii's travel and tourism students and we decided the whole family should head to Hawaii. It was an AMAZING trip. We enjoyed being together and Hawaii was breathtaking.

My sweet friend Yasmin Baltzegar took us to the airport at 4:30 in the morning! It is so wonderful to have friends that are basically family. The kids are used to going with the flow and they entertained themselves playing cards.

It started out smoothly as we made our flight to Chicago without any trouble.

Jalen was surprised to learn that many of his classmates had never been on a plane so he asked me to take pictures from the sky for them.

Chicago

Once we got to Chicago, things went south. This wonky sign from Delta was kind of symbolic, although it was American that messed everything up.

Our flight to Hawaii had been wide open, but American cancelled a flight and put passengers on United and we got bumped. We then tried to go through LA, but got bumped several times. After 14 hours, we knew we wouldn't make it to Hawaii that day and we needed an alternate plan.

As always, the kids were great sports about it.

Not gonna lie, I was kind of glad we didn't end up on this plane. I've never seen one look as banged up as this one.

I looked at our options and decided our best bet was to fly to Washington, D.C. and then fly to Honolulu the next day. It was kind of a scary move because there was only one flight out of DC and several out of LA, but it seemed like the best option.

We flew into Washington National airport and would need to fly out of Dulles the next morning.

So essentially, our luggage flew CAE-ORD-HNL while we flew CAE-ORD-DCA. So ironic that we ended up close to where we started.

It was semi-late when we got to DC. There was a fox at the airport!

We booked a room at the Residence Inn. Everyone else fell asleep while I went to work updating our Hawaii COVID paperwork so we wouldn't have trouble the next day.

The next morning, we needed to get from DCA to IAD. It would require us taking a shuttle, a subway, and a bus. And we needed to do it all in time to clear security and make our flight. We were a little nervous about it.

The subways in DC are pretty cool.

The shuttle and metro went smoothly, but when we got ready to board the bus, we found out that the passes we bought didn't have enough money on them to also get on the bus. We had been misadvised by the lady that helped us at the subway station.

I got ready to pay our $24 fare with $40, but the driver was really nice and said for me to just pay $20 so I wouldn't waste money. Then the meter wouldn't work so she said it was our lucky day and let us ride for free! Wahoo!

We got through security and got to our gate shortly before boarding. The flight was so open that we already had seat assignments! We weren't in first class, but we were all together. I was relieved to see that had we kept trying for Los Angeles, we would have missed our flights so we had made the right choice.

It was the longest flight the kids had ever been on - almost 11 hours! They were excited to see all the movies they could watch. Because of COVID, the FAA requires masks in all airports and on all flights. 

We were so happy to finally make it to Hawaii! We were greeted by this rooster, which reminded us of Cocky, the USC mascot back home. We soon learned that there are roosters and chickens all over the island of Oahu.

Jeff Christensen - my friend and the professor at BYU-H that invited me to speak - and his son Jonah picked us up at the airport. From the beginning, we were blown away by the beauty of Oahu. It's essentially a giant volcanic crater - high lava rock mountains covered in green vegetation and surrounded by the ocean. 

That evening we saw the Laie temple. Jeff's family lives within walking distance. It is so pretty.

Jeff then drove us around temple. It was a little surreal to see a flyer for my presentation 

It was a great first day in Hawai'i.