December 14th, 2006

Last night I ended up taking some medicine and took a nap, but ended up sleeping all night. We woke up early though and headed out to the Leeward side of the island. We took in the drive and one of the first things we noticed right away, were all of the squatters living right on the beach. They have their make shift houses comprising tents, poles, palm fronds, and broken down vehicles. Our first stop was at Kaneana Cave. At first we over shot it and ended up turning around at Ka'ena Point State Park. You can walk right into the cave and explore. We didn't have a flashlight so we didn't venture very far. The local legend behind this cave tells of a shark man that lived in the cave and would lure his victims in.
Originally when we headed out to that side of the island we thought we would be able to travel all the way to the North Shore on 93. But the road actually turned into a rugged, rocky road at Ka'ena State Park and leads out to Ka'ena Point. Being that we have a rental car we didn't try and go off road to keep going, we had to turn around. Since we were headed back in the direction, we decided to check out Pearl Harbor and see if there were tickets left to go out to the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial. Luckily, when we got there, we only had about a 10 minute wait. They first show a video comprised all of actual video of the attack. It is very striking and definitely puts you in a mood of reflection and appreciation, before you go out to the sunken ship. We took the boat ride out and walked around the Memorial. It is another one of those places in our country that really weighs heavily on you when your standing on that ground.
After leaving Pearl Harbor we headed out passed Diamond Head and over to the Halona Blow Hole. The Blow Hole is a lava tube that sprays water and mist up into the air as waves crash inside of it. Amazingly while we were at the Blow Hole lookout we saw some whales breaching out of the water! It was first time we had ever seen whales, so we were extremely excited. From there we continued driving on 72 past Koko Head Crater and stopped at Makappu'u Point and got some pics. On our way back to Waikiki we stopped at the Nu'uanu' Pali Lookout and took in the spectacular view there. We then hung out in Waikiki for the rest of the night.