Monday, January 16, Honolulu Day 2

 January 16, 2023 – Honolulu Day 2 

This was supposed to be posted a few days ago, but shortly after posting Sunday’s blog, the internet went down and has been pretty much non-existent. 

As mentioned earlier, we were supposed to be in Kauai on Monday. But there were insufficient busses and guides to handle the various tours that had been planned by Viking. As a result, Kauai lost out on Viking’s money as well as our tourist dollars. 

So we have another sunrise, we have chickens, and we have another drive around. 

We had all of the morning free, so decided to find a bank for a few US dollars and a Walmart to replace a watch. Google maps showed a Walmart within walking distance. We figured we could find a bank on the way. 

But before we headed out on our walk, we were treated to a wonderful sunrise popping up between the high rises of Honolulu.

 

We’ve noticed that none of the high rises has any kind of logo on it. Or any signage at all. We learned later in the day that signage above the 2^nd floor of any building is prohibited. 

The walk through the business district was quiet as it is Martin Luther King Day and very few businesses were open. But we found an ATM, task #1 complete. On to Walmart. Very old building and not the best of neighborhoods as there were a number of homeless in the little park right next to it. But, they had what we went for, so task #2 complete. We walked back to the ship via the waterfront for a 2.5 mile round trip. 

On our walk, we came across some very handsome roosters and a couple of red headed cardinals that are actually part of the tanager family. Small birds but with beautiful red heads.

 

The rest of the morning was ours with a 1:30 excursion “Scenic Oahu” scheduled. These kind of titles for excursions usually indicate a drive around on a 40–50-person bus. Yup! In this case, our driver was also our guide, and, although his humor often missed the mark, we enjoyed his commentary. Initially, we thought a lot of it was going to be a repeat of yesterday. But it turned out quite different. We continued south along the west coast, around the southern tip of the island and then approached the Nu’uanu Pali from the windward side. We are also having different weather conditions. 

The drive along the coast was lovely and we enjoyed huge variations in the colors in the water. In the distance we could see the island of Maui. 

Diamond Head

 

 

While stopped at the Pali, we saw more chickens including a hen with her chicks and a very handsome rooster. The story of the chickens is that in the early 60s, the islands were hit by a major hurricane. People were very busy protecting their homes and didn’t pay a lot of attention to their chicken coups. Now chickens are pretty much everywhere.

This is not a sculpture.

 

We got back to the ship about 4:30 and all-aboard was 5:00. There were a couple of stragglers, but only by a few minutes. The gangway was pulled in, the ropes cast off and away we sailed into the sunset.