So, just how far I am behind in my blogging is unreal. I refused to let anymore time pass without finally posting a recap of our Hawaii trip. So, here we go!
In a nutshell, we arrived back 'home sweet home' on a Monday from San Diego, only to pack up once again and leave on the following Saturday for Honolulu, Hawaii. (Gosh that makes us sound like these trendy little jetsetters-- I promise you, we are not! Haha!) It was a whirlwind of craziness but believe it or not, our kids survived (and had so much fun spending time with their grandparents/aunts/uncles, etc) and so did we....
As I was saying, we flew out Saturday, March 1st. The plane ride to Hawaii is LONG. It's kind of a bummer, but since our connecting flight was in LA it worked out to be a nice little 'halfway' break to get up for a bit, grab a bite to eat, and stretch our legs. Especially important to me being pregnant and what not.... I think the first stretch was close to 4 hours and the flight from LA to Honolulu was another 5 hours. We were extremely lucky to have the seat next to us open which was amazing for such a long flight. I will say that by use of our tablets, the flights went by MUCH faster than I imagined. I don't watch much tv at home, as in, at all most days- so it was nice to have NOTHING to do but read on my kindle, and watch movies with the hubs. We arrived late Saturday night and by the time we got settled into our hotel room at The Hilton Hawaiian Village it was around midnight, so 4am Minnesota time! Ouch!! To be honest, we had a hard time adjusting to the time change for the majority of our trip. 4 hours difference can really take a toll on a person, but we managed! The rest of our week went as follows:
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Good morning, Honolulu! The main beach at our hotel.... |
Sunday: We were bummed to wake up to a rainy day on our first day in Honolulu but we decided to tackle some of the 'banking stuff' that we needed to do that day anyway. We were up early (of course--time change) and grabbed some yummy mochas at "Lamperts" on our resort and did a little walking around/exploring before we had an orientation meeting at 9am for the bank convention. Following the meeting, we did a little shopping/exploring in our village (I don't even know how many shops the resort has, but its ALOT. They range from convenience marts/souvenier shops, to Louie Voitton and everything in between. Unreal! We grabbed lunch at the Pronto Pickle (great lunch food!) and relaxed for a bit in our hotel room before deciding to venture off the hotel property. Thankfully, we chose to rent a car for our entire stay in Hawaii. It's a decision we are so happy we made and we definitely made use of it everyday.... We drove up the beach and watched some surfers for a while and then made a spur of the moment decision to hike Diamond Head Crater. It was still sprinkling off and on and overcast, but it made for perfect hiking conditions.
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We made it! |
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Seriously, those views..... |
After our hike, we trekked it back to the hotel to shower up and get ready for a welcome reception sponsored by the ICBA. We were so exhausted by the end of the day that we ended up turning in really early after snuggling up watching the rest of 'Captain Phillips' in our hotel room!
Monday: Max had a few hours to put in right away at the morning for some trainings, so I leisurely made my way to the beach for a bit and then to one of the many pools on the resort just to relax and enjoy my coffee. I also managed to find my way to the Mandara Spa where I treated myself to a manicure and enjoyed learning lots of fun hawaiian traditions from my manicurist, a Honolulu local. She had a lot of interesting things to say including an old hawaiian tradition of being able to tell what the sex of your next baby will be depending on your youngest child's hairline. Crazy stuff, but it was definitely entertaining! :) I met up with Max shortly after and we hung out at the beach for a while, despite the fact that the weather was still not all that great. It was a little windy, but no rain so we were happy!
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Stud :) |
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I think I could handle that job..... ;) Side note- I SO badly wanted to hop on one of those paddle boards, but my balance is so off when I'm pregnant that I"m pretty sure it would have been a disaster! |
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Each of the pools on the resort were so different and unique! |
Max discovered there was an Outback Steakhouse just up the street from us so guess where we had supper that night..... Yep. He is obsessed with the wings there and since he rarely gets them back home since there isn't a convenient location near us, I decided to let it fly and boy was he happy, happy, happy! After supper we went back to the resort and spent the evening at the Tapa Bar because they had live music playing and by then the weather was perfect for some outdoor drinks! Max tried his first 'mai-tai' and quickly became a fan of them! Perfect end to a great day!