Day 1
We enjoyed a relaxing few days in Hawai’i. As mentioned previously, Pat doesn’t adjust easily to time changes, so our main objective while we were here was to relax and adapt to the 6 hour time difference. We arrived at 8pm on Wednesday night at the Kona Outrigger hotel. We were pretty tired, but we knew we had to stay up. There was a bar by the pool were we were able to grab a drink. Before long, we were chatting with a couple from California and it was 10:30pm.
Day 2
Refreshed after a great night of sleep, we started to enjoy our beautiful surroundings. This is our view from our balcony outside our room. I was mesmerized watching the waves crash.
Our hotel was built right next to an old fishing village. We enjoyed learning a little bit about the history of the area on a walking tour and then relaxing by the ocean.
That afternoon, we enjoyed some pool time (and maybe a few drinks).
That night, we had dinner at Sunset Kai Lanai. The drinks and view were top notch, unfortunately the dinner was just OK. They also had a live band (2 guys playing a ukulele and a stand-up bass), which was pretty good.
Day 3
The next day, we toured the craft market that is held twice a week on the hotel property. There were a couple of vendors selling amazing photos of undersea life, but we weren’t in the buying mood. However, we did buy some freshly roasted and seasoned macadamia nuts from two different vendors, which were delicious.
On the way back, we strolled through the gardens.
Then, it was back for more pool time.
After a beautiful sunset that evening, we ate dinner at the resort. While we had low expectations, the local fish dish we both ordered was actually outstanding.
Day 4
The following day (Saturday) we had to check out and head to the airport. Kona airport is very interesting in that it’s mostly “open air”. While there are some structures and some cover from the sun and rain, it really doesn’t have walls. There are no jetways – you just walk up a ramp to your plane from the tarmac.
We arrived a little after 3pm in Honolulu, but our flight on Fiji Air wasn’t until midnight. Rather than sit in the airport for 9 hours, Cheryl found a bag storage service in our terminal, and we dropped our bags, grabbed a Lyft, then headed to Waikiki Beach.
Our destination was Halekulani Hotel, with a restaurant (House without Key) right on the beach walk of Waikiki. We had visited here on our 20th anniversary at the recommendation of a colleague / friend (thanks, Kristin!).
We had a drink at the bar, then headed to our table very close to the live band. While we waited for dinner, we had a nice view of Diamond Head to our East, and enjoyed the island music and traditional Hula.
Dinner was fantastic including the restaurant’s famous coconut cake dessert (on the menu for 65 years). We finished our short visit to Waikiki by watching the sunset before heading back to HNL for our flight.
Leave a Reply