Hawaii: Days 1 & 2

A few weeks ago David and I made the five hour trip over to Hawaii to celebrate our 10th Anniversary. The day before I flew the kids to the grandparents house then almost immediately turned around and flew back to SD, three different airplanes in 36 house to three different destinations is a lot.

We ended up getting our tickets bumped up to first class on the way out. The food and service were excellent. When we arrived it was raining and we had an hour drive to the airbnb where we were staying. We stayed North of Honolulu in Ewa Beach. The place we rented a room was AMAZING. The pictures from the site were surprisingly accurate and we were grateful to unload and relax. The house was right on the water (rocks, no beach). The waves crashed on the rocks and would spray the yard. I loved listening to the ocean every morning while getting ready. Yes, the bathroom was outside and most of the house was open air that was modeled after places in Bali. Because of the recent storms it was humid but our room closed up and included an air conditioner.

The first night we headed over to the Kapolei area for dinner and ate at a restaurant our hosts recommended, Monkeypod.

We were both pretty exhausted but we managed to stay up late and still wake up at 5 am HST. Since we were both up early we figured we might as well start sightseeing early. Our plans included exploring the North Shore - Dole, Waimea Falls, and the town of Waialee.

Our first stop was the Dole Plantation. We didn't intend to go there first, but since we were driving by as it was opening, we decided to cross it off our lists. Did you know pineapples start out pink? The maze was closed due to the recent storms, but we enjoyed the train ride through the fields. The pineapples had just been harvested but we saw other fruit grown on the plantations. 

Next up was Waimea Falls. If you are a LOST fan then you'll remember the scene where Kate and Sawyer swim in the waterfall, this was that waterfall nestled in a botanical garden. No jumping is allowed, but are are able to wade in and swim at the base of the falls. It's about a 1 mile hike from the entrance, did I mention that it was uphill? It felt so good to cool off in the water, but we didn't stay long due to the quickly approaching cloud cover.

After our dip in the water and the walk back we were famished. We headed further up the North Shore in search of Haupi Pie, and stumbled upon a line of food trucks. After eating dessert first, headed back to the food trucks in search of Poke. You might be a little skeptical of ahi poke from a food truck, but it was the BEST AHI POKE of our trip. 

I wasn't a huge fan.

After stuffing our faces with food we visited Turtle Bay. Several movies were filmed there so of course I wanted to check it out. The North Shore is known for amazing surfing waves.

On our way home we decided to hit up a few other places recommended by friends. Shaved Ice was one of them. We shared a large with strawberry lime, and pineapple. 

We had one last stop before calling it a day. I was in search of the beach where LOST was filmed. After Googling how to get there, we found parking on our second attempt and made the 1/2 -1 mile trek to the approximate location. Beach access is nestled on a walkaway between to houses. If you don't know where you're going you'd miss it. When we finally made it to the beach I could recognize the scenery, but couldn't tell exactly where filming took place. I walked down the beach to where I thought the show could have been filmed. After filming finished there were still remnants of the set and netting indicating where things were but those are long gone. It was still pretty cool to check out the beach. 

After a quick trip to Costco we headed back to relax in the pool.