After many years of thinking and planning our trip to New Zealand, it's finally become a reality. On our first leg of the journey, we fly out of San Jose CA to Honolulu, where we'll stay two nights before catching a night flight from Honolulu to Auckland. There are two reasons we decided on stopovers in Hawaii to and from New Zealand. First, it breaks up a very long flight into two more manageable sections and secondly, it's considerably cheaper flying round trip to New Zealand from Honolulu than San Francisco or Los Angeles.
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| We're off! The salt flats below in south Bay |
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| The last glimpse of California for over a month |
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| In flight movie helps the time pass quickly |
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| Soon we are over Molokai with Oahu in the distance |
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| Coming in for a landing at Honolulu |
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| Our condo is close to the Waikiki lagoon |
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| Evening view from condo |
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My God-daughter Bonnie and her partner, Paul, are living on the
Romany Star now docked at the
Waikiki Yacht Club as they take a break to hide from hurricanes and earn money towards their
dream of sailing around the world. As it's Halloween, we join them for a stroll down Kalakaua Avenue, Waikiki's main drag, to check out the scene. The streets are teeming with people, about half in costumes and the other half snapping pictures.
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| Halloween crowd in wacky Waikiki |
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| Paul as Poseidon & Bonnie as Sea Creature meet Neptune |
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| While tourists record the scene with their devices |
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The wide range of costumes is amazing...
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| From weird and scary |
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| to TV & movie characters |
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| and the just plain strange. |
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We are surprised to see many organized groups in matching costumes strolling the streets and poising for photos.
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| Paul and Bonz are flocked by Asian angels & friends |
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| A group of anarchists poise for photos |
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Below are our favorites of the evening...
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| Best costumes goes to the couple dressed in "Gone with the Wind" |
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| Most outrageous goes to the door mat & bunnies |
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The next morning gives us a beautiful day for exploring. We start off after breakfast to meet up at the marina. On our way, we walk by a very junky looking
junk and seriously wonder how sea worthy this boat is. To keep a slip at the yacht harbor, owners have sail the boat out of the harbor and about a mile out to sea once or twice a year. Other boat residents in the harbor gather each time it's the junk's turn to see if it'll make it out and back safely. So far, to everyone's amazement it has.
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| Morning over the lagoon |
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| Junky junk |
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| Bonz welcomes us aboard the Romany Star |
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We decide to see
Pearl Harbor and in particular to visit the
Memorial at the USS Arizona, which is built over the the sunken wreckage of the the USS Arizona and where the remains of 1,177 crewmen lay after being killed during the December 7, 1941 Japanese attack. This attack was responsible for launching the USA into World War II. As we have heard from many others, visiting this memorial is truly a deeply moving experience.
The Visitors' Center is well worth a stop afterwards to better understand the "
Day that will go down in Infamy."
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| A model showing how the memorial was built over the wreckage |
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| An exploded torpedo |
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| Outside we point to New Zealand on the map of the Pacific |
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Bonnie drops us off near
Waikiki Beach, where we buy tickets and jump on a
Waikiki Trolley. Our first jump off location is close to
Chinatown. In walking towards Chinatown, I ask a beat cop, for directions. He laughs and points us straight ahead and adds not to blink as it's pretty small. Considering Honolulu's large Chinese population, we were surprised to learn he was right. Chinatown in Honolulu is only a few blocks long and much smaller than the one in San Francisco. Still we have a good time looking around and enjoy a great lunch at the
Lucky Belly.
Like San Francisco's Chinatown, the food markets offer a wide array of the strange and exotic as well as the common and familiar.
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| These fish do look fresh |
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| Do you have any recipes for Sea Cucumber? |
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| Good price on bananas |
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Back on the trolley, we get a kick out of the mix of buildings that make up modern Honolulu.
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| Honolulu skyscraper |
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| Noodle houses are common |
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Our next jump off destination is the
Iolani Palace, which was the royal residence of the kings and queens of the
Kingdom of Hawaii. The heavy Victorian decor and clothing is shocking for such a warm and humid climate. It had to be very uncomfortable to be a royal Hawaiian in those days. We surmise they believed they had to model themselves on the predominate European royalty of the era. It's sad to us they didn't develop their own style of living and dress more based on their own Hawaiian culture.
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| Hawaiian throne room |
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We join up with Paul & Bonnie again at Yacht Club for
pupus, drinks, and dinner before they take us to the airport for our
Air New Zealand flight to Auckland.
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| View from Yacht Club bar |
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| Romany Star is looking good |
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| Paul BBQ's dinner |
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| While we watch the canoes paddle back into shore |
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As our plane taxis up to our gate for our early morning landing, we notice a large group of media photographers grouped together at the gate next to us. As we disembark, I ask a woman looking out a window at the photographers what is going on. She replies the New Zealand national rugby team, the
All Blacks, is returning from London after winning the World Cup. I respond with the comment that rugby must be a big sport in New Zealand. She just looks at me like I'm a complete idiot while Peter pulls at my elbow to usher me into the terminal. He tells me that rugby is THE national sport in New Zealand. Unlike in the US where we have many different sports competing for audiences, in New Zealand rugby is it.
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| Media photographers await the All Blacks to land |
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| Moari carved wooden portal greets us to Auckland |
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As we walk into the public part of the airport we are overwhelmed by thousands (Auckland newspaper reported of at least 5000) of sports fans waiting to greet their championship team. Peter spontaneously throws his hands up in a victory salute. The crowd responds with a great cheer thinking we are part of their team's staff.
KIA ORA!
Welcome to New Zealand
