A few final Hawaiin pics...

Sadly, all good things must come to an end, even our perfect Hawaiin vacation... so we spent the last day lazing around the Hilton Hawaiin Village, enjoying the sites, the food, and the beach...

There were plumeria trees everywhere-- they're beautiful and they smell wonderful too!

Everything just blooms and it's beautiful!!

At our final lunch, Seth enjoyed a delicious Mai Tai...

... while we dined on the patio overlooking the ocean.

After one final swim, we just relaxed on the perfect beach until it was time to go-- although Seth had apparently gotten enough sun!! What a trip!!!

Snorkeling at Hanauma Bay (for real!)

From above you can see the huge coral reef in Hanauma bay-- it's amazing to think that the whole thing is alive!!

The bay was relatively small, but there was so much to see!!

So Seth and I hiked down the hill... ready to snorkel!!

...but first, wild chicken on the beach! Apparenlty, a bunch of livestock got loose during a hurricane and now there are lots of wild chickens and such all over the island!

All done snorkeling-- we LOVED it! Was saw SO many beautiful and interesting fishes and corals! It was unreal!!!

Seth Learns to Surf

Seth and Dominik took surf lesson from Uncle Sparky (in orange).

He was excellent on land... but how would it translate?

Dominik and Seth carry their boards out to Waikiki.

Here they are paddling out-- Seth is second from the left. Don't the look like turtles???

There he is!! Seth's a SURFER!! He was excellent-- had the longest ride of anyone!! Woo hoo!!!

Our Friends on the Best Vacation Ever!

Chris and Melissa Lema took Seth and I on this amazing Hawaiin vacation and we enjoyed it so much! Along with us, they also brought along their super cute little kids, Emily (3 1/2) and Christian (2), who we just adore, and their friends Neil and Shelley, who are just so much fun! Here are some photos of us with our friends:

Christian at Ko Olina... in my sunglasses!! SO cute!!

Melissa playing with Emily and Christian, who only became a little swimmer on the very last day, in the lagoon!!

Emily took some time out from her busy life working in the sand to rinse off her mom's chair!!

Chris giving his little boy a ride around the lagoon!

Shelley and I out on the jetty waiting for Seth and Dominik to surf by. (Side note: Seth saw a sea turtle on his way in! How awesome?!)

Me, Shelley, and Neil enjoying Seth and Dominik's surf lesson by Uncle Sparky!

Emily and Christian at Ko Olina. Emily's smile was provoked by saying, "whatever you do, do NOT smile for this picture!! Don't do it, Emily! Don't you dare" I heart reverse psychology... they're SO cute!!

Having little kids around gave me an opportunity to build sand castles-- I'm just "playing" with the kids, you know, to be "nice." We even caught a couple little minnows for the moat!!

The Guys at Benihana-- Neil, Seth, and Chris!

The Girls at Benihana-- Melissa, Me, and Shelley. So tan and happy!! (And the food was excellent! Almost as good as the show!!)

Christian and Emily in their leis!! And Emily with her pretty plumeria in her hair!!

Me and Emily at Senor Frogs! Little did she know the balloon animals we're coming and things were going to get even better! She was digging the music here and took a brief time out from dancing to take a picture.

Pali Point

We took the Pali Road up to Pali Point for a great view of the island!

The road is windy and steep and goes through a couple of tunnels-- shown here from above!

The views from Pali Point are SPECTACULAR!!

Ulupa'u Crater is on the right, it's another volcano on the island, and Coconut Island (where the opening scene of Gilligan's Island was filmed is off in the distance)... everything was so green on this side of the island! Gorgeous!

... and we look pretty good up here, too!

A first attempt at Hanauma Bay...

We drove to Hanauma Bay to snorkel around the reef, but..... it's closed on Tuesdays! Random!! So we kept going to see what we could find!

There were rocky cliffs to the east of Hanauma bay, the "blow hole" is off to one side (not visible).

A nice photo-op, even if it's not snorkeling!!

We stopped at a couple beaches-- both of which had signs like these, yikes!! The first one had only locals in the water, didn't look safe for "haoles" like us! But we kept going and found this beach, with big waves, but lots of fun!

Another picture perfect day at some unnamed beach to the east of "Sandy Beach."

Seth, Dominik, and I entred slowly...

... and the waves just beat us down!! But is was F-U-N!

Much beach relaxing was required after all that!

There's my baywatch babe!!

Pearl Harbor

The submarine memorial at Pearl Harbor.

The memorial to the USS Arizona, one of the many ships that was sunk on December 7, 1941, was built directly over the top of the sunken ship-- you can still see it just below the surface of the water.

Part of the USS Arizona-- only partially submerged.

The USS Arizona was refueled shortly before it was sunk-- gas and oil still leaks from the ship, although holes are frequently repaired.

The flag over the memorial. A beautiful day.

The North Shore

This is Waiema Bay on Oahu's north shore... we drove through the Dole Pineapple Plantation on the way here. All the soil was really red and the water turned Seth's white shirt a reddish brown color! The "washing machine" was our favorite plaground though-- we played in the waves all afternoon!

To the left is a large rock-- Trista and Zach were here (what are the odds?!) and they jumped! We just watched and cheered while bobbing along in the water, much more in our comfort zone!

After swimming all afternoon we drove to Haleiwa for some shave ice-- this is the "Rainbow Delight" and it was, indeed, delightful! We visited Aoki's rather than the famous Matsumoto's, it's right next door. I have no complaints! Yum yum yum!!

The View from the Penthouse!

This is the view off the penthouse balcony-- can you believe it?! That's Waikiki beach and Diamondhead in the distance. GORGEOUS!

The view from the other end of the balcony (it was that big!)-- you can see the ocean and the small lagoon in the foreground.

The is the Rainbow Tower at the Hilton Hawaiin Village... we were in the Lagoon Tower right behind it.