Hawaii - day four

funky strip mall in Makaha


Makaha Resort and Country Club





Ahi and Crab Nachos


Cool bird, I don't have photoshop, probably need to zoom in on it



Sunset at the Club









Ahh, finally a day of just chillin at the beach. We hit the beach about ten am. The waves were pretty intense due to some wind that picked up. After getting thrashed by the waves one too many times, we headed in.

We went shopping at an odd little strip mall. One part must have been a big grocery store, so they put in plywood and screen walls to create a bunch of small spaces. And no, they didn't paint it or anything, just bare plywood walls...

We found some cool stuff here. Some nice souvenirs and odds and ends..

After that, we had to go back to the room and drop things off since the car has no roof..

We then ventured up to Makaha Resort, which is five minutes drive up the mountains from here. It was really beautiful. We went into the lounge, found a great table outside on the deck, overlooking the golf course, with Ocean and Mountains in the distant view.

I saw something on the menu I have never seen before and knew I had to try. Ahi and Dungeness Crab Nachos.. It was strangely good... raw chunks of Ahi, fresh crab, cheese, jalapenos, and mango on a bed of chips.

We also orders a sampler plate. It came with Grilled shrimp, Calamari, chicken wings, two types of ribs, edemame, Onion rings and Jalapeno poppers.Yum, most of it came back to the condo with us..

While watching the sun set, we met a nice lady celebrating her sweet 16 birthday. She asked if I would take her picture and email it to her. I also posted it here... Happy Sweet 16 Diane from Vegas..


Finishing off dinner with a Mai Tai. We went back to the condo full and happy.

Hawaii - Day Three

sunrise over Makaha






Dole Plantation



Pretty Flowers from Haliewa


Our Condo



Sunset






We are still on PST, waking up around 6:30 am..

At least I was able to get some sunrise picts over the mountains and harbor.

We had breakfast in the room, then headed for the north shore.

If you could draw a straight line between Makaha and Haliewa, its probably 30 miles, however, we have to drive around the Wai'anea mountains. Traffic was hell heading back to Honolulu.. Finally we made the turn North onto H1.

The first point of interest was the Dole plantation. We stopped, used the bathroom, looked at some pineapple plants and headed for the big surf.

We drove through Haliewa, sunset beach, Turtle Bay, and finally stopped at one of the busses on the north shore that sell shrimp out of them. Charter busses bring tourists from Waikiki out here to eat the shrimp. Its caught off the north tip of the island I guess.

We stopped at one called Giovanis. Not a very Hawaiian name, but the sign assured us it was "world famous". Funny, all the shrimp busses appear to be world famous.

There is only three things on the menu. Scampi shrimp with garlic, Hot and spicy and lemon and butter. You get 12 shrimp and 2 scoops of rice for $12.95. It was pretty good.

We stopped at Turtle bay and checked out the resort. Then we swam, I snorkeled. I didn't see any Turtles, but lots of colorful fish, like you see at the aquariums..

Next stop was back to Haliewa to Jamiesons by the Sea. A pub - restaurant on the beach. Here we met Dean, a friend of a friend. We chatted with him for some time, he and his wife moved here in 1968 from Cleveland..

We left the pub, and went and did some shopping. Dean had told me of a flower shop in town. We went in, very small, nothing on display except for a few beautiful ginger flowers. I asked her if she could make us a bouquet for $20. She made an awesome bouquet for us. Our room looks and smells tropical.

The rest of the shops were mostly designer. No souvenirs for us here. We headed back, hoping to make sunset, but not very likely. Dean told us to take Hwy 99, Kamehameha Highway. I didn't think it was smart, figuring it would be like 99 in seattle, 35 mph with lots of lights. Well, it was a lot of that, but it did turn out to be faster. We made it back for sunset, but it was pretty overcast. We went out on the rock point to get some picts.

then back to room, dinner and rest...

Hawaii- day two, part two

View from our room






We left Waikiki in our beat up Geo and headed West..

It was 3 pm and traffic was stop and go for most the way.. clearing for stretches, then stopping again..

H1 ended and we were now heading up the west coast on the Farrington Highway.

When we got a few miles up the coast, we started to see these tent cities along the beach. They were elaborate set ups, multiple tents connected by big tarps and sometimes trucks or busses mixed in. Some had parking areas, with decent cars.. Some had POW MIA flags flying.. These tent homes stretched up most of the West Coast...

Come to find there are some 4000 homeless that live on the beach here. They choose this area because its on the lee side of island, it doesn't rain much here and very few storms hit here. Its the perfect place for outside dwellers. Also, there are not many tourists on the west coast, so the state officials seem to turn the other way. Apparently many of these dwellings have generators. They thumb their nose at society..

We reached Makaha, and were surprised at the lack of services here. We saw two old grocery stores, a few liquor stores, many boarded up "drive ins". Apparently, the drive in burger joints were big here. They all look to be from the late 60's, and 70's in design.

We found the Condo unit, the only ones we saw the whole way up the coast, so it wasn't hard to miss. There are 2 tower condos here, right next to each other and right on the beach. Both have security gates, and then security lock to get into building area, and another security lock to get on the elevator.

We opened the door to the condo, and we were pleased. Its real nice condo, the bedroom is all the way back towards the water and there are double sliding glass doors to the lania, with sweeping view of the ocean.

The front of the condo units are all the louvered glass windows. The entire front wall is made up of louvered windows.. They are secured though, not the kind you can slide out. Its big business in Hawaii, fixing the louvered windows to be secure. Most every structure on the island has louvered windows.

We unloaded our gear and then went to register at the managers office.

It was 5pm now, and it was shift change. We met the night security guard. The security guard patrols 24 hours a day, on the beach, walking the halls, parking lot.. Its nice to see good security.

We asked where we can get groceries. They told us to go to the store on the East side of the road, not the one across the street.

We took their advice and drove down to the Tamakura Supermarket.

The building appears to be 50 years old, and never maintained..

I can barely describe what I saw in that store, but I will try. I wanted to turn around and leave immediately, but we only saw one pizza place that looked decent, so we needed food.

Everything was soo expensive.. Tortilla chips are 4 bucks a bag. 4 bucks for a dozen eggs....


I wanted some fresh fish.. I picked up a package of frozen fish. The label said "codfish". I don't know if it was.. the fish was yellow and completely freezer burned. It looked as if it had been filleted by a 5 year old.. There was bones all through it.. It was the scariest piece of fish I have ever seen.

They had big bags of frozen, whole, in shell oysters. Frozen oysters? can you do that? Did they ever hear of jarred or canned oysters?

There was packages of Dungeness crab, with guts and matter in the packaging.. They all looked very, very old..

We didn't buy any seafood.

We did get a decent head of lettuce, tomatoes, a loaf of bread, small cheese package, eggs, coffee and some misc condiments and snacks. Oh, they had NO macadamia nuts. We bought a big thing of nuts for 3 dollars in Waikiki...

We went back to condo and unloaded groceries and headed to beach to watch sunset. Everyone gathered on the beach for the sunset. I swam a little as we waited.

Sunset was at 6:30 and it was cool and I didn't have my camera.

Right after the sun went down, a group of senior haolis blew conch shells in unison. Then, they turned to the North and blew the conch, then the East, blew conch, then South.. Everyone clapped when they were done. I thought, how great that must be for them. Obviously retired and living here. That is the only thing they need to do each day. I hope I am that lucky some day...

We sat on the lania and watched a family swimming and playing in surf for another hour after sunset. They have big spot lights on the roof that shine into the surf.

Hungry now, we went to the pizza place down the road a mile. We had no idea what to expect and were a bit nervous. When we pulled in, another car parked next to us and a military family got out. We asked them about this place and they said it was good. I asked about other places around here to get drink or dinner. They told us we could go to the army rec center down the street, that was about it..

The pizza place was called Red Baron pizza, no relation to the frozen brand. It was pretty funky, the place was full of locals. We ordered a pitcher of beer. It took a while for it to get to us. Thats island life...

We ordered a big cheese and B ordered a side salad.

The side salad came in a huge place, with two small bowls.. I didn't want salad, it had ham in it. I am not sure, didn't really look at tab, but guess they charged us for two salads.

With the salad came a dressing thing, it had three big bowls of dressing. B likes to mix and match her dressings, so this was good. However, they came by in a few minutes to get the dressing back, it was a community bowl of dressing.. weird..

The pizza was decent and we had lots leftover.

That concludes day two...

hawaii - day two

AM on the Ala Wai Canal




Tilapia as i am told, in the Ala Wai Canal


Diamond Head Crater





Creepy tunnel in Diamond Head


Views from top of Diamond Head









Day two started early, we are two hours behind PST here.

We started out about 7:30 am, for breakfast at the Outrigger. I must admit, the Waikiki portion of this trip is really a trip down memory lane for me. When my mother took us to Hawaii in our youth, we ate brunch at the Outrigger many mornings.

On the way to brunch, we walked along Ala Wai canal. It was very peaceful, I remember this too from earlier visits. It too, had changed. In my youth, many locals lined the shores to fish, now no one fishes there. It is terribly polluted. However, there were many fish swimming around. We walked upon a local who was feeding the fish Wendys french fries. We asked them what the fish were, he said they were Tilapia. Wow, I have eaten Tilapia, however, most of the local Tilapia is fresh water raised, farm fish from China. He says they love the french fries!

The host station at the entrance to the Outrigger restaurant, now called Dukes Canoe Club, seemed familiar. The host took us to our table right away. He asked us if it was our first time to the restaurant. I answered that it was my first time in 20 years.. well, it was my first time, as with most everything in Waikiki, it had been remodeled. Remodeled for the good though. Open air, right off the beach, it was beautiful. The food was average and the price was decent, just as I remember!

After breakfast, we walked back and packed up. Then we went out to rent a car. I had read that the best way to rent a car was to do it in town, as the competition was high and we could get a better deal. Let me say now, that almost every tip I read was wrong. Heck, even the travel information in the main newspaper, the Honolulu Advertiser, where inaccurate...

I had spotted one rental car place the night before down the street. They advertised 12.95 a day for a Geo Tracker Convertible. Seemed good at the time. When we got there though, we realized these cars were thrashed. There was a sweet Mustang Convertible on the lot, so we started there. The man who spoke with a soft accent, possibly local, not sure, on a loud busy street, quoted us $ 79 a day. When we balked, he dropped it to $69, cash price... Too much, so we asked about the Geo. $12.95 first day, 3 day minimum, 24 a day after the first day. .We got him down a bit with cash and then found the one vehicle on the lot that actually had a working am-fm radio. Most of the Geos had no stereos, clearly they had been stolen. All the Geos where convertibles, or used to be. Now they were just open air vehicles as all the canvas retractable roofs had been cut out.. Car break ins are extremely common...

We headed out in our beat up Geo and went to Diamond Head. We left our bags at the hotel...

Hiking to the top of Diamond Head was the plan. We paid our 5 bucks and parked. It was .8 miles to the top. No biggy, I did this long time ago and my 70something Grandmother even did it.

It was steep and hard, but over before cardiac arrest set in. The heat does make a difference. The trail starts in the crater and gradually climbs. Then you hit the stairs.. The final part is stairs... Well worth it, and going down is easy..

Hungry now, we decided to head to Ala Moana Mall to again go to a memory from the past.. Patties Chinese Kitchen. We parked at the first place we could find, since I had no idea where this place was anymore. We went to the directory and it said 1b. We were close and hungry.

Patties Kitchen is no more. The best I could tell is that they redesigned the mall. moved them into a smaller location, and they didn't make it.. There was a recently vacant place, which looked like the last none location of Patties.

B ended up getting Panda Express.. I wandered for a while and ended up at some Japanese place. My meal was definitely Japanese.. duh, I am not a big Japanese food fan. It was ok. I took a long time to get my food, and while B was eating hers, she heard a local complaining about Patties closing.. I didn't miss it by much, but it wasn't the same.

It took me a while to find my way out of the damn mall, signage is not big in Hawaii...

Headed back to Hotel, grabbed the bags and off to Makaha.

I should almost start a new post here.. Because our trip changed when we got to the Wai' anae coast...

Hawaii - Day one

View from room


Lunch at international market


Royal Hawaiian


Statutue on Beach


Sunset from room


Street performer.. only cost me a buck!


first day well in the books, I am a day behind

Day one quick recap. Left BI at 5 am, caught 5:20 am boat. Had a towncar waiting in Seattle to take us to the airport. Everything went fine, the flight left on time. We had a screaming baby near us most the flight.. I need a portable dvd player that is louder!

We got to hotel around 1:30 pm local time. 80 degrees and clear! We stayed at the Ocean Resort Hotel Waikiki, on Paoakalani Ave. 2 blocks from the beach. The room was ready when we got there. After getting settled, we headed out to see the town. We went to the international market and had a pretty good, cheap lunch in the food court. I had mahi mahi skewers with pancit noodles. Yum!

After lunch we walked over to the Royal Hawaiian for some history. What a beautiful hotel. I am sure the chandelier in the lobby is worth more than my car... well, thats not saying much.

We went back to room and lathered up with lotion and headed for the beach. Swam for a while, laid on beach for a while, then headed to a beach bar to watch the sun set over the Pacific.

Later that night we went out and saw the nightlife.. B says its like Vegas on the beach..
I saw many places that reminded me of my trip to Japan. The majority of tourists were Japanese. Most businesses have Japanese signage, and most service workers are fluent in Japanese. I told B we would be back in USA tomorrow, as we plan to head to West Coast Oahu.

I am exhausted.. its two hours behind Seattle time and I have not caught up.. I will try to add more tomorrow. Thats all I can do for tonight. Tomorrow I will comment more on the hotel and restaurants we went to.

Best of Both Worlds

On Sunday I took Kelsey to see Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus - Best of Both Worlds Concert Movie in 3d!

There was a 10:50 showing, and since I was without teenager on Sunday, I felt we could make the ferry and get there for this first showing.

We got to the theater, a half block away from my office, and the doors to the theater were closed... we ran over to my office for a few minutes. When we returned, the doors were opened.

15 dollars a ticket, all ages, says the paper sign taped to the electronic board behind the ticket seller. apparently their machine can't display $15 for a show!

we sat down in a mostly empty theater and watched the previews. After a few previews, text came on the screen asking us to put on our 3-d Glasses. These were not the old paper glasses with one red lens one blue lens. These glasses were plastic framed and the lens were tinted greyish. They could almost pass for real sunglasses, however, the frames were large to fit the widest of faces..

With glasses on, we waited in anticipation. We watched two more previews, in 3-d of upcoming Disney produced 3-d movies. One that caught my attention was the remake of the Journey to the center of the Universe, starring Brendan Frasier. It looked pretty good, lots of great 3-d effects.

The movie started shortly after. It opens to a concert, but quickly moves to behind the scenes. the executive producer, Kenny Ortega, is there going over every detail of the rehearsals.

The band backing Miley is very good. The dancers are also great and the choreography is very well done.

The Jonas brothers come in and play during the middle of the performance. That was odd, they didn't open, like a normal concert. When they played, Hannah Montana switched to her real self, Miley Cyrus, and she came out and played another set.

Not a huge fan of this genre, but I was fascinated by the production. Every single detail was very tight. They did show one concert where she is almost dropped by her dancers. Then they go into a scene behind stage before another show in which she is fighting with Ortega about not doing te lift anymore. A sneak peek at the Diva in training... Her mother tells her to suck it up and do the lift..

The 3-d effects were sprinkled in throughout the movie. the drummer throws his drum stick at you, the guitarist throws his pick.

Several people have commented that she is probably lip syncing. She is not. there are definitely times when her voice wavers and you can hear her getting tired after a long song. Its nice to know its real in that aspect, beyond the millions Disney spent to fine tune this movie.

We have not seen the last of Miley Cyrus. This girl is gonna go places. I just hope its not to rehab or a psych ward like other young female stars...

Morning excitement....

This morning I was at the Federal Building getting my Captains license renewed.

The Coast Guard Merchant Mariner office is on the first floor, overlooking 1st ave.

I was waiting to be helped, gazing out the window. I saw my Eye doctor walk by...

Then, this woman with a dog on a leash comes up to the window and starts tapping the glass, she is saying something but we can't hear it. The glass looks to be at least 8 inches thick.

A couple of Federal agents come up to her and get her away from the window. I lose sight of them briefly and figure all is well. Suddenly white suburbans with Homeland Security emblems on them come out of nowhere and block off all the intersections surrounding the building. I see agents running back and forth. We all look at each other and wonder if we should leave or get down or something..

The agents keep the intersections closed for 10 minutes or so, and they are diverting all northbound traffic on 1st ave down to the waterfront. I feel for the people on the busses as they have no idea where they are going!

Some agents with dogs move in and the dogs are sniffing everything in site. I look over at the Suburban in the middle of the intersection and its rocking violently. Someone inside must be trying to get out or something.

Then, the Suburbans drive off and all is returned to normal.

I understand crazy people probably don't know what they are doing most the time, but they shouldn't be crazy around the Federal Building because its clear those guys are on red alert all the time. Defending our freedom one crazy lady at a time!

Finally I was called to fingerprint. They scanned my fingers 10 times each with an electronic scanner. It was pretty cool, but I wonder what is gonna happen to all my prints now? I am in the system.

After the computers were up, my license renewal went through. Another 5 years before I need to go into the Federal building again...

Note: I didn't take the picture. I was afraid to reach for my camera, for fear of violating national security. I google searched to find that image then quickly edited it in photoshop to remove the name of the building and the id number of the vehicle. I hope that's enough to keep me off some list...

Washington State Democratic Caucus - Feb 9, 08

I just got back from my first Caucus. It was an interesting experience.

When I found out that the mail in primary vote was basically worthless, that the delegate votes for the democratic nominee come from the caucus vote, i decided to go cast a vote that counts.

I have been so excited by the Obama movement. Every day there are Obama volunteers out on the streets. I over hear people on the ferry, or in the grocery store talking about Obama. Then, on Friday, Obama came to Seattle and was greeted by 21,000 supporters. It is such an exciting time in America. People are ready for change.

So, on to the Caucus.






I walked to my caucus location. Its about a mile, but with a record turnout predicted, I thought I would end up walking most the way anyways.

Cars were lined up on Grow Ave. A few people stopped to ask me where the caucus was. I guess I looked like I knew what I was doing.

The caucus was held in the lower gym, between Commodore and the High School. I entered the gym right at 1:pm. There were Clinton supporters and Obama supporters just inside the door, ready to hand you the sticker of your choice.

Then they ask you if you know your precinct number, which I didn't, so they pointed me the map. I located my district and the looked my group.

Once I found my group, I waited in line to sign the sheet to select my candidate. There were many people sitting around in a big circle around the table. After people signed the sheet, they went and sat down. I saw some neighbors from my complex, so I went and made small talk for a while.

I finally got bored, so I went outside for a walk. I came back at 1:25 and heard an announcement that things will begin in 5 minutes.

Five minutes later, a speaker came on and started explaining what was to happen next, and then we said the pledge of allegiance.

I believe there were 6 total precincts in the gym, and someone in charge from each group began to speak to their individual groups. this is where it got tough, there was so much commotion. My group was probably the biggest and there were no chairs left. I stood in the back with many people and tried to hear what was going on.

They explained that they were now going to count my precincts group. The count was read, 13 undecided, 56 for Clinton and 195 for Obama. A loud cheer erupted. The same loud cheer was repeated at all five groups as their results were read. From what I could tell, it was pretty much an Obama majority.

Then people were given a chance to address their precinct about why they support who ever they support. About 10 people spoke, most unheard my the majority. Finally around 2 pm, apparently it has to go on till 2pm by law, a woman who knows something opened a motion to stop the comment period. At that time, anyone can change their vote, and the undecided can choose a candidate. It didn't appear that anyone changed their vote, and I heard one undecided select Obama. I never heard a final tally.

This is the part that got confusing. We split in groups, Obama, Clinton. Then we had to choose delegates from our group to apparently cast the delegate vote? I dunno what was going on. Too many people wanted to be delegates, so we had to vote for our delegates. I did nothing. I don't know any of those people and they are supposed to cast the vote based on the outcome of our group so I didn't see much point in staying. I saw many people leaving at this time.

I did stay just a bit longer. there was a letter to Jay Inslee being passed around to sign. The letter implored Inslee to cast his "super delegate" vote for the people his constituents support. Inslee is a clinton supporter, so I hope he listens to the letter.

All in all it was an interesting process. Next time I will probably just sign the sheet and leave though.