Oahu 2021
We surprised the kids with a trip to Hawaii as their Christmas gift. Saying that it was amazing, life-altering and mesmerizing, does not actually do the trip any justice. It was just perfect. Here's what we did...
Thursday, January 28th:
0400 we left for JFK. Our 12 hour flight was fantastic. Three out of the 6 of us had window seats. The Hawaiian Airlines airplane was only 1/2 filled. We even arrived 1 hours early!! The Oahu airport was a mix and inside/outside areas. Everything went smoothly proving that we each had our negative COVID tests and the required paperwork. We travelled from one end to the entire other end, to get out luggage. Then we headed off to pick up our mini-van. Christy and Ryan surprised us at the Rental Car area though - they had a lei for each of us!!! It was so awesome.
Since it was around dinner time, we followed Christy back to her place and got settled in. Each of our bedrooms was so inviting, with a handmade welcome sign, fresh flowers, a Hawaiian themed mask, and candy. When all the Leclairs were home for the day, we ordered in a Mexican feast to celebrate Brady. He was sworn in to the Army earlier that day!
Friday January 29th:
On Friday morning, Christy took us to get our passes to the Army post. Luckily, we did not have a fiasco, even though every time we used the passes to get back onto base, we were told to do some new-fangled way. Then the Stringhams headed north to Haleiwa, an incredibly cute little North Shore town. We started out right where a river meets the ocean. We literally had the beach to ourselves, at one point. We played in the clear water, juggled coconuts, bowled coconuts, rode boogie boards, relaxed and SO MUCH MORE. The boys were a little disappointed by the calmness of the waves in our spot, so after a few hours, we walked into town, grabbed burgers, saw Hawaii 5-1 being filmed in TWO different locations, watched experienced surfers and found a beach with bigger waves.
This beach had 2 sun-bathing Sea Turtles, a fun sand hill to surf down INTO the water and cool lava rocks that Jack and I explored. We saw so many rainbows - we said "we had never actually seen the end of the rainbow until today!!"
The drive north was beautiful. The roads were also in MUCH better shape. Sometimes, you could barely see the massive mountains because of rain/clouds but usually you could see it all in all of it's glory. AMAZING!!! We would drive by acres and acres of Dole pineapple plants, hundreds of different types of palms, a few homeless people, red volcanic dirt and through different ecosystems- all on one road.
Saturday January 30th:
The entire morning got hijacked by Rotary Zoom Interviews (starting at 0400 Hawaii time), but afterwards we headed to the west side of the Island where Disney was. It was a different type of beautiful. It was obviously not natural. The area we were in was a huge resort area. It was gorgeous though. We sped walked through the Disney resort since only the first 20 minutes of parking were free. Then we each grabbed what we wanted for lunch at the shopping area right there; I think we ended up with a large pizza, from one place, eggs and bacon from another and an açaí bowl. Everyone was happy. Everyone but Jason then went swimming in "Lagoon Number 4" with is open to the public. This ended up being one of our favorite activities. Unfortunately, Jason missed 2 hours of it, because he was waiting in the parking line. (*This was the only time that COVID restrictions were an actual pain in the butt for us- this parking lot was at 50% capacity) The lagoon was something you would envision when you think of Hawaii. It was safe and warm and beautiful and full of tropical the fish. It was my kids first snorkeling experience- and it was perfect! Though we were all excited for our Luau, we did NOT want to leave the Lagoon!!
Germaine's Luau started around 5 and was literally on the beach. One of Hawaii's COVID law limits public seating at tables- max 5. So, Jason and I had our own 12 foot picnic table and the kids had their own. This luau was different from the one we saw in Kauai and I really enjoyed the story line. My kids were blown away by the dancing. It is so fun to see my kids, especially Jack, just let loose. They were all dancing at their table and watching along. Of course, the fire dance was everyone favorite. Except Jason- he decided that our next vacation will be in Tahiti, LOL. Since arriving in HI, Jackson took it upon himself to try new foods... mahi mahi & coconut pudding/jello are two examples just from this dinner!
Sunday January 31st:
Sunday, we got to hang out with the Leclairs all day long. (not Hunter, he is at college) They took us on their infamous "North Shore Beach Crawl". Around 10am, we headed north again to some of their favorite spots. This time, we went north and kept going, we were in the northwest corner of the island. The first beach was hidden right off the the main road - I don't think any tourist would ever find it. It was the gorgeous, calm Kawela Bay. The girls had the paddle boards out in the bay for hours. Jason and Jack even tried it once. Jaylee took me out one time... I loved it at first but after we knocked off in a wave one time, I saw how deep it was, how many sea urchins were covering the coral and just how far out from land we were - I got a little freaked. We saw tropical fish and a few turtles. Ryan was giving my girls basic surfing lesson too. The boys were busy playing football with Brady all day. They also kept busy chasing around chickens. We ate our sandwiches and all of the fresh fruit we picked up at the fruit stand where we parked- I remembered to drink from a fresh coconut this trip!!!!! (Bucket list - check!)
After a few hours, we went snorkeling at Shark's Cove. It was another area that took my breath away, when I saw it. The boys jumped right in but after seeing the amount of size of sea urchins in the wild, they decided that they had had enough of snorkeling in the coral. We still saw a lot of beautiful fish in the 30 minutes that we were in the water. BTW... there are no sharks, I'm not sure why it is called "Shark's Cove." Maybe now that we are gone, I should google it.
Our final beach for the day was Waimea Beach - THESE were the waves that my boys were in search of all day. They were huge and strong and beautiful and intimidating. If we weren't on a relaxing vacation, I would have never let the kids into this kind of ocean. Vacation-Jenn is fun! The girls just went up and over the waves, while the boys TRIED to ride them in. Jason even attempted to bogie board in - once. We sat around and talked and played with the volleyball while we watched one of the most incredible sunsets.
We stopped back in Haleiwa at their food trucks for dinner.
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