Iâd been waiting for this trip for a long time. Had a lot of photography/film gear and was ready to go the night before. Luckily I didnât forget anything at home, which is a surprise.. Saturday morning I got dropped off at BART and Oakland Airport shuttle was just one stop away. The shuttle to the airport was nice and smooth. I met up with J and headed into the terminal. Security checkpoints are the worst. Iâm always rushed because I have hella shit. We boarded our flight and smoothly moved onto Oahu quickly afterwards.Â
Iâve never been to Hawaii before so I had certain expectations. I thought I was gonna be greeted off the flight with leis and a ukulele serenade. But when I walked off the plane, it was just fuckin humid. And hot.Â
No big though. Me and J walked out towards baggage claim to wait for Karen and Andrew; they arrived shortly afterwards. Leonardâs flight didnât land until later that night because he didnât want to wake up early lol. Oh Lenny.Â
We quickly got our rental car and went to get some food at Kakaâako Kitchen. I had some dope ginger chicken and fried catfish. Afterwards we drove to Ala Moana which is huge mall; I wanted to find some cheap hiking shoes that i could just wear for the trip. It took a while but I eventually found some at a Payless. It was a mistake.. I ended up using it only once -_-.Â
As we were walking through the mall, I ended up finding Hawaii to be much different than my expectations. I thought most of it was going to be like a resort. But the people who live there are just like us, but Hawaiian. Also Japanese and Filipino. If youâve ever seen the movie The Descendents (with George Clooney), youâll understand what I mean. Everyone here has a family, a job, and their own problems, just like us.Â
If youâve never been to Hawaii and plan to go, you should know itâs fucking hot and humid. Uncomfortably so. I brought a lot of clothes that I ended up not wearing. All you really need is a lot of t-shirts/tanks, underwear, a bunch of shorts, and flip flops. I ended up wearing my swimming trunks about half the time I was there.Â
Anyways we went over to Foodland to grab some groceries for the next few days. Ended up getting breakfast food and about three pounds of Poke. Checked into our hotel in the late afternoon. I really liked where we stayed, a condo that was about a 5 minute walk from the beach; just what I wanted. It wasnât too big but it fit all five of us. Andrew slept on the floor. It didnât take long before we headed to the beach in Waikiki, or as Leonard calls it: "Wakaiki". It was hot but the water made up for it-just perfect. All I thought at that moment was, âthis is what I came forâ. It was sublime. We played with my GoPro at the beach and walked around for a few hours before heading back to pick up Leonard at HNL. Then had some Zippyâs chili; Zippyâs is sort of like the McDonalds of Oahu-good fast food.Â
I was pretty tired by the time we got back so I just chilled for a bit and went to bed while J, Lenny and Andrew went night swimming.Â
I woke up really early to try and get some good morning photos. The view outside our window was insane. Walked over to the beach and got a nice pic with the sky. When I got back we made some breakfast before heading out to Diamondhead Peak. The hike itself wasnât too bad, but it was just so damn hot. Itâs a man-made trail to the peak so it was pretty busy. Kind of underwhelming. Sort of like Mission Peak in Fremont. I was getting tan really quickly. By the next week I stopped caring tho, thatâs what happens haha.Â
After the hike we went to get the famous Waiola shaved ice and slow-roasted pork bowl from âYour Kitchenâ. Then wenât back to the hotel to relax and hit the beach for a bit. I was getting tired.
Later in the evening we had a catamaran boat tour scheduled - barely made it in time to board. It was a two hour ride. It started out smooth for me but I got seasick later on. A LOT of people did and were throwing up. Kind of funny actually. I got a few good pics in, weather wasnât too sunny but the clouds were lit.Â
Once again on our way home we went to Foodland to grab another 4.5 lbs of Poke for that night. It was truly a Poke Party. We all knocked out afterwards
Woke up and ate breakfast again. Headed to the Dole Plantation which was kind of cool. The Dole whip was delicious, especially in the heat.Â
Then headed off to Waimea Bay. It was pretty empty, surprisingly. There was a rock/cliff that we could jump off of, it was about 40ft high. I was hesitant to jump off at first because Iâd never done it before. But if there was ever a time to start, it was there. It was kind of scary actually. The drop was really long and the impact from the water was strong. But it was worth it. I ended up doing it a few times with my GoPro. The bad part was the dirty water at the bottom. It was disgusting. We learned on the radio later that the water was dirty from unpumped sewage water (omfg).. Whatever man!
After that we headed to Sharks Cove to snorkel, which was one of my favorite parts of Oahu. We rented some gear and went out into the ocean. It a lot of fun until one my fins fell while I was being washed away by a huge wave. The other fin quickly came off and I started panicking because I canât really swim. Everyone had to help me back to a rock while I got my bearings back. Ended up having to pay $30 for losing the fins. -_- lame. But I got another pair and went back out there. Snorkeling is definitely one of the funnest things to do. Saw a lot of schools of fish and took a bunch of underwater videos with my GoPro. The shitty part is getting cut on all of those rocks though. They hurt while you walk and donât go away for the whole trip.Â
After snorkeling we went to get the famous Giovanniâs Shrimp Truck - it was delicious. Btw, there are chickens everywhere. We heard that they used to belong to people but after the hurricane they just got step away all around the island.Â
We drove on the east side on the way back to Waikiki. It was such a nice peaceful drive through the mountains. Barely made it in time to get some more Poke at Foodland.Â
That night we decided to go out. We found a place called the Tiki Lounge that served food and drinks. Their Lava Flow smoothie was really good. Leonard got everyone shots as per usual.Â
We walked out to the Pier afterwards. Karen and I were getting tired though so we headed back.Â
Tuesday was a really nice and peaceful day. We had a late start and tried to go to the Pali Lookout but it was pouring rain so we left. We ate lunch at Cinnamons. They had a famous Guava Chiffon (pancakes) that was really good.
Then we headed to Kailua and the beach there. It was raining but we still wanted to go into the water. We swam to a bird sanctuary island that was about half a mile away. It literally took us about 30 minutes to swim out there on floaties and boogie boards. It was alright, there were some coconuts there that we brought all the way back but ended up not taking home. The swim back to from the island was really nice though. We just took our time and chilled in the middle of the ocean for about an hour. Leonard is so funny. When we got back to the shore, he just knocked out on the beach for about 30 min. Looked like a homeless dude hahaha.Â
The guys wanted to check out Lanikai Beach which was just down the shore but me and Karen were a little tired of the water so we dropped them off and headed to back to Pali Lookout. It was still drizzling but I didnât mind. The lookout was amazing. It was at the top of a mountain and overlooked the eastern shore. It felt like one of those places in the Tibetan mountains where monks trained haha. I took a few good photos and time-lapses there.
We headed back to meet up with the guys at Lanikai. By that time it was dark, but the water looked so nice so we got back in with them. Super peaceful and relaxing. We chilled there in our floaties for about an hour, there was no one else in sight.Â
Afterwards we raced over to Marakune Udon on Kuhio street before it closed. Some really good udon that was cheap; we ate like pigs because we were all so hungry.Â
Had some spam and toast for breakfast before heading to Manoa Falls. We got a little worried because it was pouring rain on the way there. But when we arrived it wasnât too bad. The trail was so nice; lush and green like a forest. It was exactly what I wanted in a hike. It didnât take long to get to the waterfall. We met a couple; the husband had an insane drone for recording footage up the waterfall. Looked really cool, and he said it cost $3K⌠#Goals.Â
We saw some girls get into the water, so we were like, âif they did it, why not us??â We went in shortly after afterwards. It was super cool. Exactly how youâd expect a waterfall pool to feel like. We enjoying frolicking in it and taking videos/pic with my GoPro for a bit. I gave the camera to Karen while I stood under the falling water. Then suddenly⌠we hear a rumbling above us and water just started pouring from the top like a hurricane. The water came down hard and it was hard to see. Me, Andrew, Lenny, and J went out towards the rocks but I was worried for Karen, I look back and sheâs in the same place that she was before, just covered in falling water. We went back to get her. I got some pretty insane footage; props to Karen for holding on haha. All of our stuff was drenched because we left it pretty close. Jâs phone stopped working. Thankfully I left my DSLR in a ziplock bag; that wouldâve been a close call. Overall that hike was definitely a big highlight because of the sudden flash flood. That was something I donât think will ever happen to us again.Â
On the way there and back I started to itch really badly.. I ended up having about 10 mosquito bites just from that hike alone. I think itâs because of all the candy/sugar I eat.
We tried to snorkel at Haumana Bay but the lot was full so we just stopped at a scenic lookout and tried to dry our clothes in the sun.Â
We went home and got ready for dinner after. Since it was our last day we had to get the car cleaned from all the sand inside.Â
Jeffâs dad hooked us up at the Kai Market Buffet. We got seated next to the balcony where it overlooked the beach. So essentially we had a buffet at the beach. The experience was transcendent. Yes, transcendent. Motherfuckas. Garlic shrimp, roasted pork, BBQ ribs, Poke, vermicelli noodles, at an endless supply. The best part was having our bill cut in half. We had a table reserved for us outside near the bar and live music afterwards so we chilled there for an hour or so. That night we just  hung out, talked, and packed up for Kauai the next day.Â
