O'ahu, Hawaii (FSR Training), Sep 16-20

Another FSR training in the books! I know I should have been super excited for this trip, but I wasn't really looking forward to it and I wasn't sure why. The trip over was long and painful. That many hours on a plane is terrible, not to mention the added hours due to flight delays!! But, no matter, I was going to Hawaii.

I flew over a day early so I could be sure to get in some sightseeing. I arrived around 7pm on Sunday. I was so exhausted, I barely found the rental car and got myself to the hotel. I knew going into this that Honolulu was a monster city so I was braced for that part. The hotel was valet only, which was a bit of a pain getting in and out. The first night I ate poke from a convenience store. Ahi Spice Poke Bowl, to be exact (raw tuna on rice with spicy sauce). It was really good and I thought, hey, maybe this place isn't so bad.

The next morning I booked a sea turtle snorkel tour through the Viator app. I woke up way too early... jet lag at its finest. The hotel had a coffee shop, and I had time to kill, so I treated myself to a fancy coffee. No free breakfast bar at the Courtyard, which actually didn't matter since I was going to be starting work the next three days at 6am!! But this day, Monday, was my free day and I was still up super early. When the coffee shop opened or ordered a Taro Root Latte. It was good, not the best I had, but fun to drink a purple coffee.


I found the pier and a parking spot very early, thinking I could walk around. Unfortunately, the area of town I was in was not good... lots of homeless. It got to the point that every direction I looked, there was a bum. They have a serious homeless problem. The next day I even drove up the coast, thinking if I got outside the city I would get away from the bums, but I was wrong. There were even more!! To the point that you could not stop to take any nice pictures of the coastline because it looked like a shanty town with tents and lean-tos. Really bad. 

But, for day one on the island, I had a snorkel trip to look forward to, so I did my beach walk, pretended to not see the homeless, and enjoyed the morning.





I'm finishing this post about a month after returning from Hawaii, so I'm just going to do a picture dump. To sum it up, I hope I never have to return to Honolulu... not my cup of tea (which is unfortunate since it reminded me an awful lot of Florida).

Did a snorkeling tour and saw a ton of sea turtles. That was well worth the money and probably the best outing of the trip.

Visited the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor.

Got a Dole Whip at the pineapple plantation. 

Watched a typical Hawaii performance at one of the posh hotels on the beach in Honolulu.

Ate spam on rice with seaweed. It was actually pretty good. The spam tasted like it was cooked in soy sauce so the whole thing was a bit fishy/salty. They call this Spam Musubi.

Hiked to the top of Diamond head, which is a dead volcano. It was a hard trek to the top, with no shade. Not exactly fun, but I'm glad I did it. That's Honolulu in the background... told you it was a monster city.

Drank some local brew at a cool little restaurant outside the touristy area, to the east of Honolulu.

Found a waterfall, but didn't swim. It was highly regulated by an private park. There was a roped off area you could go, you had to check in with a life guard, and they made you wear a life vest... nothing like the pictures you imagine of Hawaiian waterfalls. Maybe there are better places on the other Hawaiian islands.

The was part of the same private park where the waterfall was. I thought the trees there were fantastic, not sure what thy were.

That's a pineapple field!



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