Saturday~Our Last Day

We said good-bye to our lovely house (the square one) and headed down the middle of the island in search of the Atlantis submarine at Waikiki Beach
We found the sub pier without too much trouble . It is directly in front of the Hilton Hotel. You take a ship shuttle out into the ocean about a mile

As you approach, the sub surfaces. The Atlantis poeple are a private organization that is trying to restore the reefs all over the world. They 'install' artificial reefs like sunken ships so the coral can grow on them and invite all the critters to live and feed there

Here we are inside. It was very awesome and one of the great highlights of our trip. Each person has a porthole to view outside.

The underwater pix aren't great but here is a pretty good one of one of the sea turtles swimming around the 'reef'.

There was a family with 3 small children on the sub with us. The children were darling and so excited. The oldest one-a boy-attached himself to Dad and was so excited to show him all of the things underwater. You could fill out a checklist of everything that you saw. we even saw a shark (rare) and the little guy was so.o.o. excited!

I guess that he could tell a good grandpa anywhere!

Diamond Head from the sea shuttle. We did drive up to the other side and look out over the valley.

Pink Flamingos on the grounds of the Hilton. They are very beautiful in real life and seem much more pink.

Finishing off one of Ted's bakery chocolate pies in the parking lot of the USS Arizona Memorial

We tried several times to get on the USS Missouri~where the war ending treaty was signed. Between the Parks service and the military, we kept getting bad information. We tried to get on too late on our Wednesday trip so we stated we would come back in a few days. They forgot to mention that it wold be in dry dock in a few days.

So here it is in the background as we drove away in the bus from the Air Museum.

We were very disappointed.

This is the Punchbowl Memorial Cemetary for those who have died in military service. This is a national cemetary and we did not realize how many there are around the world. It is a huge place~

They told the story of the war in the Pacific Theater by these mosaic displays. Everything is done in little tiny colored stones

Here is part of the panel of the display. It extends to the right quite a distance

Lloyd and I at the top of the memorial.

The whole trip was so very enjoyable. After we left here, we found some excellent food in Chinatown in Honolulu and then off to the airport.

It was a wonderufull week.

Thanx to Lloyd and Peggy for planning it all!

Friday in Paradise

If you turn east at Laie and head down the east side of the island on the Kam highway you come to the Valley of the Temples Memorial. It is basically a cemetary for Asian peoples~mostly non-Christian. You cross over this bridge to enter into the main grounds. The plantings and trees are absolutely gorgeous and it is so peaceful there. The architecture is very fascinating
This is a big bell standing by a big bell that is hit with the pole on the ropes in the left of the pix. You can hear it ringing all through the grounds when you strike it.

The Budda is inside the main entrance

We curved around on the Kam Highway and arrived at Kaneohe and came to Kailua Beach. It is the most gorgeous beach that I have ever seen. The water is the most brilliant aquamarine color that I have ever seen with white, fine sand beaches curving around in a graceful half oval.

I obviously did not get a very good picture of the actual beach but this catamarand sailed in on cue as if it were on a postcard

Hawaii techincally has no private beaches but the locals, many times, make it very difficult to find them. The access is hidden behind homes or is so obscure that only the clued in can find it. This beach was worth the find and they do have a nice park there but it took a lot of winding aorund and peering through every alley to get there.

Once you buy a pass to PCC, you can get it for several days after for free to see the general stuff. We revisited on Friday afternoon and saw the Tahatian Village and went to the IMAX movie about coral reefs with was very interesting.

We also took the shuttle over to the Temple and had a guided tour by one of the sister missionaries there.

There are sister missionaries at PCC much like there are on Temple Square. They conduct tours of the Temple grounds and talk to some of the any thousands of visitors each day

We are looking toward the Temple and our sister missionary photographer is looking down the Temple grounds through Laie and toward the beach. They have the most lovely hibiscus hedges called hula girl hibiscus. They have brilliant and huge yellow blossoms

She told us that when the Temple was built in 1911 that many of the island people started to leave their homelands to settle near the Temple and kind of abandon their culture.

Matthew Cowley-who had served a misison to the islands-conceived an idea to have a center where culture could be preserved.

It took quite a few years to some to fruition but it is a great place where these young people can have opportunities to have educaiton