Today we woke up very early again which was good because we could watch a bit of the Ryder Cup live and as we needed to go and collect our car rental at 8am. We picked up a Kona coffe from the cafe downstairs from our AirBnB and then went to the Enterprise offices also downstairs. This is the best place to stay! After some bureaucracy and Jane getting the slight hump about the cost of insurance, the nice man took us upstairs to the car park. I made a joke about the white Porsche being our car but then couldn’t believe our luck when he went no we are looking for a small car…how about this one? He was pointing at the most gorgeous red , soft top Beetle!!! I thought he was joking then I was so excited when he said he wasn’t! I was all discombobulated and so it was a good job we weren’t driving off just yet.
Instead we were heading upto Kalakaua Avenue to watch the Aloha week Floral parade. This is one of the main streets here in Waikiki with lots of big hotels and posh shops. We had to hang about quite a bit in the heat (it was only 9am) because as the policeman told me, they were operating on Hawaiian time. Whilst we waited we discovered our new favourite store, Coco Cove, where we’d come back later and pick up supplies for the day…including beach mats, sandwiches, fresh pineapple, cuddly pineapple and my $14.99 boogie board. We were all set …
Anyway, eventually the road closed and the parade began. It was very sweet with marching bands, Hawaiian queens on horse back with beautiful floral decorations. Even the mayor was on a horse. There was a bit of a lack of hula girls but generally it was all very nice and bits of it brought a lump to the throat (overtired) including the Little League (baseball) World Series Champions 2018 and Brook Lee , Miss Universe 1997!
I understood, from the tattooed local I’d made friends with in the pool the day before, that there would be representations from all of the Hawaiian islands and we hadn’t even left Honolulu yet. So we left them to it and headed back to Seaside Avenue and after a spot of lunch we got in the car to make our way over to the Windward Coast. I was rather nervous of driving as it had been sometime since I’d driven in the US. To help find our way around here we’d included Sat Nav in our rental but this just made it all the more stressful and she was rather shouty and insistent. I did initially make some school girl errors to do with red lights and getting in the wrong lanes and momentarily forgetting which side of the road I should be on! Jane took this all very calmly…not! Hahaha. Anyway, after a while I got use to it and by the time we reached the scenic lookout all was well with the world. We had headed up the Pali Highway into the misty, clouded mountains. The scenery was stunning…very dramatic and some beautiful pine trees we’d never seen before.
After this little stop we dropped down into Kailua to try and find the beach. Here the Sat Nav lady was worse than useless but eventually we found a little car park and waited for a space to free up. We walked onto the beach…and it was indeed absolutely beautiful. Kailua Beach is about two miles long of soft, white sand and lovely turquoise sea with gentle surf. It wasn’t even crowded and I was straight into the sea with my new board. I LOVED it. I soon found, that I still had the skills mastered when I was about 14 with a wooden board, down at Trebarwith Strand in Cornwall. It was great fun. You might wonder what Jane was upto all this time. Well, the sea was a bit too much for her and she was generally trying to avoid the sand!!!
After a couple of hours here we were back in the car, now with the roof down and feeling like Thelma and Louise and heading to our next stop. However, what we came across next was the actual Kailua Beach Park which was probably where I’d intended us to stop. It had a much bigger car park and we wandered down to the beach here to take a look. It was much more sheltered and the sea calmer and there was more shade from the pine trees. There were lots of families at this part of the beach.
Next stop was what we’d been looking for, Lanikai Beach. This was a beautiful spot..in fact all around here the development is low rise and really lovely. The beach here is narrow but very idyllic with its palm trees and tropical islands in the background. By now it was quite late and the sea was a lovely sky blue colour and really clear. But overal, I’d really enjoyed where we’d based ourselves with the surf.
We headed back to the city which is only about a 40mins drive. After a refreshing shower we headed out for dinner and a shot glass at the Hard Rock Cafe. What another fabulous day!
Where shall we go to next? 