Still Totally Worth It!

Meanwhile these are the pictures we received from home. My mom and sister are hilarious! :)

Poor little Ry Guy.

The kids were doing well with out us. They had cousins to play with and my parents kept them entertained. However, I called home one night and when Taylor heard my voice he started crying. I guess it reminded him that I really was gone. I quickly ended the phone call and thankfully my sister was able to soothe him. I didn't talk to the kids again after that. We missed them but we knew they were in good hands...with hair clips and all. ;)

Day 3 (Part 3) - North Shore

After visiting the temple grounds, we drove a short distance to the north shore. The north shore is known for its massive waves. Our first stop was Sunset Beach where they were setting up for the Vans World Cup of Surfing.

 There were signs posted all along the beach that swimming was prohibited. Dave couldn't resist getting in. He didn't swim but played in the waves near shore. He was great entertainment for the wave watchers standing around me. He got pretty beat up by the waves, but oh the joy on his face every time he surfaced!

Sunset Beach.

 We continued our drive and stopped at a few other locations. (Don't know their names.)

 Eventually we ended up in Waimea Bay. The waves were huge! I loved watching and hearing them. Again, I was there to watch and relax...Dave was there to play. And play he did! He tried his boogie board, but it cracked in two on his first wave. These weren't playful waves, they meant business. We spent quite a bit of time here and we were both happy. I was taking pictures (lots of them) and Dave was as happy as can be in the ocean.

Waimea Bay at sunset.

We then rushed over to the beach where Lost was filmed. It was creepy being there just after sunset. The wind was picking up which added to the eeriness. We continued our drive to the main north shore town of Hale'iwa. We found a recommended burger joint off the main road. The burgers were as large as my head! They were so delicious! We stopped and picked up a couple tiki souvenirs for the boys and headed back to the hotel. It was another long day, but one of my favorites...and a fabulous birthday!! 

Day 3 - Happy Birthday to Me! (I rhyme!)

(I'm sorry if anyone is getting a little tired of my Hawaii posts, but I want to get it all journaled.)

What a place to spend a birthday! Saturday we woke up, ate our mini-bagels and donuts on the beach (we got our breakfast down to a science), and picked up our rental car. For the next two days we saw the island in a black Honda Civic...oh, yeah. :) We drove the Likelike Highway through beautiful green mountains to the Byodo-In Temple. It is a replica of a Buddhist temple found in Uji Japan. Oh and it was in an episode of Lost and Magnum P.I.

 The ringer of this bell is promised "happiness, the blessings of Buddha, and a long life". Sweet! This birthday girl is all set. :) Way better than blowing out candles.

 Dave meditates with Buddha. Ahh...

 The temple grounds were gorgeous! Many types of flowers, a koi pond, streams, and even a little gift shop. We wandered for a little bit until a rain storm developed. We took shelter in the gift shop and the rain had stopped by the time we figured out our Target $1 rain ponchos.

 We took our time driving up the coast. We even stopped for a couple pictures on the BYU Hawaii campus in Laie.

Here's a little joke...Why did the chicken cross the road?

You would too if this big man was chasing you!

Day 3 (Part 2) - Another Temple...the LDS variety

I think we took on the "Aloha Spirit" a little too much. We arrived to the Laie Hawaii Temple 25 minutes after the last session began. Maybe we shouldn't have stopped to chase chickens. :) We were totally disappointed when the security guard in the parking lot informed us that we were too late. We even asked the temple worker at the front desk if we could just take a look around the inside. No dice. So we enjoyed the peace and beauty of the outside instead. 

 We were both surprised how small the temple looked in person. For some reason I thought it would be larger, but I was not disappointed. Gorgeous! Every temple's landscape is amazing, but I loved all the palm trees and hibiscus flowers.

 We discovered, once we got home, that the lens of our point and shoot camera had a cute little Ry Guy fingerprint on it. So all our pictures taken with that camera had a hazy spot in the bottom middle. Wish we had noticed sooner. I tried to fix it in Lightroom, but Dave and I are still in a Ry Guy-made filter. :(

 I found a real flower! (On the ground of course. They fall from the trees.)

 He's always willing to pose for the camera! :)

Polynesian Cultural Center - Day 2

The next morning, after our breakfast on the beach, we caught our tour bus which took us up to the Polynesian Cultural Center in Laie. Our tour guide was hilarious! He pointed out different sites of interest and where movies were filmed. It was a beautiful drive through mountain passes and alongside beaches. Just gorgeous!

We purchased our tickets weeks before our trip. We sprung for the Ambassador Pass which gave us a  shell lei greeting, guided tour of the center, dinner, and the best seats for the nightly show. I think it was money well-spent.

I was a little bugged to see that the focal point was off on my camera which made us out of focus. But I still like the picture.

(The night we arrived in Hawaii I saw these foam flowers in an ABC Store and I laughed at the thought of someone wearing a foam flower. But the next morning I fell in love with the flower when I saw the real thing falling from trees. And it turns out that the clip really did look like the real flower and so I decided to let go of being so self-conscious and become a true tourist. So there's the story behind my flower, which Kenna now owns. :)

The PCC has 8 mock villages representing 8 islands. Our tour guide went lightning fast through each one, so they all kind of blurred together. These are pictures of us in our "tattoos". Each pattern represents something. I believe Dave chose warrior. I don't know what mine meant...I was just going for pretty. :)

 We paused our tour to watch the boat show. Each island demonstrates their specific type of dance on canoes. Dave enjoyed the "Haka Dance" (above), a war dance from New Zealand, and I liked the pretty Tahiti ladies (below).

Tonga dancers

 

 Dave tried climbing one of these coconut trees. He made it about 6-7 feet up. I quickly realized that this trip was all about "doing" for him and I was all about "seeing". :)

 We received these black shell leis as a greeting for our Luau. Again the Ambassador pass was money well-spent because we also got first dibs on the food! Our seats were front row for the hula show while we ate.

This poor little piggy was our dinner.

 And after the Luau we wandered the marketplace looking at little souvenir shops, until it was time for the evening show. It was called, "Ha: the Breath of Life". It was AMAZING!! The entire show was non-stop dancing, singing, and even fire walking/fire baton throwing. It felt like the finale to a firework show. I found myself gasping "wow!" several times. Just an incredible amount of talent. It was a long day of walking and we were exhausted by the time we reached the bus. We both slept for the hour ride back to Waikiki.

ALOHA!! - Day 1 (Flashback Post)

Dave and I have left the kids overnight only twice in our 11 years of marriage. We wanted to go somewhere exciting for our 10 year anniversary in 2010, however we had a little baby at the time, so we put it off a year. The moons aligned just right for the week of November 23-30, 2011. My incredibly unselfish parents agreed to watch the kids and my saintly sister, Laurel would be in town to help out as well. Crowds are non-existent and the airfare and hotel are much cheaper during the winter in...HAWAII!! Finally, a grown up trip for just two! Heaven doesn't begin to describe our week together. We flew from Salt Lake to Seattle and then a 5-hour flight to Honolulu (airport code HNL or "Hole 'Notha Level" ...a favorite phrase in our house). It was late Wednesday evening when we arrived to our Aston Waikiki Beach Hotel room so we couldn't see our view, but I could hear the waves crashing. The next day we discovered the view from our balcony!

 Our hotel provided free breakfast and a little tote bag for us to fill up. We took our breakfast down to the beach each morning. Breakfast on the beach has become one of my favorite memories of the trip.

Our room was literally the last room on our floor, so we were on the edge of the building. It gave us a view of the city, Diamond Head, and the beach. This was our view of Diamond Head from our front door.

After breakfast we took the city bus (TheBus) to hike Diamond Head. This was definitely one of my favorite activities of the week! The hike was steep, but the views were amazing! 

The military once used it as a lookout.

 Once to the top, it gave the best view of Waikiki down below.

 I got a kick out of this garbage can. Mahalo means "thank you".

 After lunch we suited up and headed to the beach. Dave bought a boogie board and tried it out while I read a book with my feet in the sand. Ahhh....Seriously, it was amazing to leave cold winter weather and enjoy highs in the mid 80s all week. Dave and I played frisbee in the water and watched the sun set. That sunset drew quite a crowd every night, with good reason, because it was gorgeous!

With it being Thanksgiving Day, we made a late reservation for a restaurant that was serving their version of a Thanksgiving dinner. It was yummy!