Busy Last Day in Honolulu

Oahu travelog #19
Waikiki, Honolulu HI - Mon, 27 Dec 2021, 10pm

Today's our last day in Hawaii, and it's been a busy one. We started the day early with a visit to Diamond Head. We thought we'd beat the crowds by arriving around 7:30 but we were already almost too late. 😳 We hiked to the rim of Diamond Head then drove back to the hotel to eat lunch at a nearby food truck.

As of last night the weather forecast for today was sunny early in the morning and cloudy the rest of the day. Mother Nature had other plans and kept the sun out all day, so we took advantage by going out to the beach after lunch. On the way out I took this picture of the Hyatt Regency Waikiki (right/above). Our room is on the side mostly facing the camera, middle, 14th floor.

We stayed out at the beach for almost 2 hours. It was all bonus time as far as we were concerned. The sun and warmth were unexpected, but there's no way we weren't going to take advantage of them.

Around 2:30 we were getting tired (it was an early morning) and wondering what we had time to do next. As much as going back to the room to veg on the balcony would match my energy it seemed lame. So we pulled out our maps and looked for things to do nearby. We found a cluster of points of interest just to the east: Halona Blowhole, Sandy Beach, and the Lanai Lookout. We packed our hiking bags, got the car out the garage, dropped the top, and went off in search of (more) adventure.

After those three visits we were pretty wiped. And hungry. We stopped for dinner on the way back at the Kona Brewing Company in Hawaii Kai. Mmm, trying a half-dozen local brews was good. My surprise favorite was the Koko Brown toasted coconut brown ale. The sweetness of the coconut was just the right counterpart to the nutty flavors of the brown ale.

We wrapped up the day back near the hotel a food truck that serves a specialty called rolled ice cream. We'd seen them across the street from the food truck where we ate lunch— but the rolled ice cream is only available 3 hours a day as it's labor intensive. It's freshly made for each order!

Now as it's late at night we're winding down. Today has been our last full day here. Tomorrow we need to leave for the airport no later than 10, which probably means starting to the car no later than 9. We'll see if we can get in a brief visit to the beach first thing in the morning!

One Last Walk on the Beach

Oahu travelog #20
Flying home - Tue, 28 Dec 2021, 3:30pm

With our flight home from Hawaii scheduled for noon we had a little time in the morning before leaving. One idea would be to sleep in late, have a relaxing breakfast, then head to the airport. Lingering jet lag replaced sleeping in; I was up before 6am. At least that's an improvement over waking up before 5am every previous day this. Of course, this is my last day in this timezone. And leisurely breakfast? Not really my/our style. I ate leftover pizza from last night's dinner.



With neither sleep nor breakfast to slow us down this morning we had time for one last walk on the beach. The weather was pleasantly warm but, alas, mostly cloudy.

After the beach we showered and changed, then closed up our suitcases. Checkout was quick but getting our car from the valet wasn't. We waited almost 30 minutes. We're not normally valet parking type travelers but valet was the only option when we arrived back at the hotel after dinner last night as self-serve parking was full. Paying extra to waste 30 minutes waiting for other people to do a task I could do myself in 5 minutes is why I'm not a valet parking type of traveler. Fortunately the delays didn't hurt our schedule in getting to the airport as we'd already planned for snafus exactly like this.

We arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare. Lines for everything were short. Maybe everyone was still trying to get their cars from the valet? Maybe half the flights were already canceled? 😅 Well, ours wasn't. It was even on time!



As we had plenty of time we grabbed some food from the airport food court and ate it while awaiting our flight. We also spent time relaxing at the Japanese garden. It's right at the foot of the E concourse, where our flight departed from.

As I finish up this blog we're... about halfway back to the mainland US, traveling at 37,000'. It looks like we'll arrive at Oakland around 7pm local time, 15 minutes ahead of schedule. Once we're home-home sometime after 8 it'll be fewer than 9 hours before we head out to the airport again, this time for our New Year's Eve trip... unless the situation with CoViD forces a change of plans. 😨

Returned Late Tonight; Canceled Tomorrow

Oahu travelog #21
Back home - Tue, 28 Dec 2021, 11pm

What started as a seemingly normal, on time flight home today turned late and worry-making. Yes, while we were in the air it looked like we'd be landing at least 15 minutes early. In fact we did land 15 minutes early. But the sad fact the past few years in US aviation is that any early arrival is negated by having to wait for a gate to open.

"Our gate will open in about 5 minutes," the pilot said. 15 minutes later he said, "It'll be another 4-5 minutes." 15 minutes after that we started rolling toward the gate.



"I'll bet there are a lot of delays tonight," I said to no one in particular. Once in the terminal a quick glance at the arrivals & departures board confirmed I was right. Nearly every flight into & out of OAK was delayed.

As if it weren't bad enough our 15 minute early arrival was dashed and replaced with an 18 minute late arrival, baggage then took a long time to be delivered. From the pacing of how fast bags appeared it seemed there was only one baggage crew working the ramp. I suspect that's part of why there were such widespread flight delays— crews weren't able to unload & reload aircraft fast enough. It's another example of the Shutdowns, Planned or Not situation I wrote about yesterday.

Our bags ultimately appeared on the carousel 57 minutes after the flight arrived. "Big deal," you might think, "Luggage is always slow." Yeah, but here's the thing. Nearly an hour is really slow. You might think you've waited an hour multiple times before, but have you actually timed it? I've had 20-25 minute waits that sure felt like an hour. This one was more than twice that.

The upshot of these delays was, after running an errand on the way home, we didn't get home until after 10. With another flight to catch tomorrow morning at 6:30, that hurts. But here's the other thing: we're not going to go. 😨

Tomorrow's Trip: CANCELED

Tonight's flight helped us decide to cancel our New Year's trip. Traveling on the plane for 5 hours with people coughing and hacking around us, many of them not wearing masks properly or leaving them off when they thought nobody was looking, coupled with the Omicron surge of the past few weeks that's only gotten worse since I wrote about it a few days ago, has led us to decide this isn't the time to take another trip.

Specifically, it's the risks of exposure while flying. Sharing a house with a dozen other people whom we know and know are vaccinated, we're fine with. Making occasional trips outside the house to shop for groceries and supplies, while wearing masks, we're fine with. But flying with the Covidiot wing of the American public, no. Not until the risk level drops back below this surge.

Update: More about our thought process in my next blog.