We started out the year 2019 in Hawaii. It was a surprise trip for our girls. We had been talking about a "big trip" for a couple of months, but the girls didn't know where we were going. Once we got home from our Christmas trip to Utah, we repacked our bags and headed out of town again. As we left town, the girls kept trying to guess our final destination. They were using their phones to try and map where we going based on the direction we were headed and the 10-hour distance we had mentioned. The Kasallis family found out they were going to Hawaii at Christmas and were flying out of Denver. The girls thought we were headed to Denver too until they realized we were driving west and not north. We drove to Southern California and ended up flying out of San Diego. Once we got to the airport the next morning, we were flying Hawaiian Airlines, so the girls finally figured out where we were headed.
Even pulling into the airport parking lot got our girls excited because only Abby remembers ever flying before. Tessa has flown but not since before she was two; and the other two girls have never flown on an airplane before. They were very excited and nervous. However, once we were on the 5-hour flight, the excitement wore off pretty quickly and they just got bored. Luckily, we watched movies, slept, and played games on our phones to keep us entertained.
We got into Hawaii the afternoon of December 31st. We met up with the Kasallis family in the airport and surprised their kids because they had no idea that we were going to be in Hawaii too.
After getting our rental cars, we drove an hour to the other side of the island to where we were staying for the week. We were on Oahu, and we stayed in Laie. We were three minutes away from each other and right along the beach. The Hukilau Beach was right across the street from where the Kasallis's were staying so we walked on the beach and the kids jumped a little in the waves before it got too dark. It was New Year's Eve; although with the time change, we were exhausted by 9pm and didn't even make it to midnight Hawaii time. We did toast with our sparkling cider together when it was midnight on the mainland.
We woke up on January 1st to a free day and decided to go for a hike. The weather was great, however it had been raining before we got to Hawaii because the hike that we went on was so muddy. Here's a picture of where we parked leading to the entrance of the hiking path.
The hike led to a waterfall, so we had an end in sight, but we quickly realized that it was not going to be an easy hike. We tried to say clear of the mud puddles, but that only lasted about 5 minutes before we realized that everything was a mud puddle. Every time we crossed the stream, we stopped to rinse off the mud splatters.
The trees were so cool and there were long vines everywhere. I think every kid (and probably adults too) tried to Tarzan at least once during the hike. The kids didn't care that the mud got on everything. We all just tried to not fall down too many times, but by the end of the day, I'm pretty sure everyone had fallen at least once.
We sometimes tried to walk only on the roots that were spread all over the ground, but they were pretty slippery. Abby was showing me how muddy she was on the back of her legs, but Logan had to photo bomb the picture and show us his muscles.
Almost to the waterfall, we came to a peak where you could see out over the island. It was so pretty, and the perfect place to stop for a picture.
The waterfall was where we were headed and it was so cool. People were climbing the rocks and jumping from the top of the waterfall. My girls wanted to try, but the rocks were slippery and the signs said not to jump, so Tyler made them stay down in the water. The girls waded in the water, we took pictures, ate some snacks and cleaned off our muddy limbs.
But once we were done at the waterfall, we had to take the same trek back so it was muddy all over again. But the kids did not complain once about how long we hiked or hard we climbed. Having friends to hike with and the fact that they thought "the messier the better," made it an enjoyable day spent together. The kids thought it was the most fun hike they'd ever been on.
By the time we made it back to our cars, and rinsed off our legs and shoes again, (by using a friendly neighbor's hose) we drove back to our side of the island and it was too late to do any other activities. We learned pretty quickly that everything closes in Hawaii once the sun goes down, so most of our days we were done and back to our hotels by 7pm. And with the long adventures every day, we were exhausted and in bed and asleep by 9:00 or 9:30 at night. We did start each morning before the sunrise so we were definitely get our day's worth of activities in. It was a great first day in Hawaii.
On our second day, Wednesday, we started the day at Pearl Harbor. As we were walking into the museums, we saw this huge snail on the grass. Aubrey put her hand down by it so you could see how big it was. It was amazing!
We only had a few hours to spend at Pearl Harbor, but there were so many things to do, we could have spent all day there. We took some pictures out front before taking a tour of a submarine.
We had a lady in the submarine take a picture of all of us together while inside the sub. It was so interesting to see all the gadgets, levers, and knobs; and all of it crammed together in such a tiny space.
After walking through the submarine, we walked along the top and had this picture taken of all of us at the front end. You can see on the far left some white which was the monument for the Arizona that sunk and the Missouri battleship that we were headed to tour next.
We took a quick bus ride over a bridge through the naval base to the next tour spot. The kids had fun even on the bus deciding who to sit by and smiling for our pictures.
The Missouri battleship was very cool to walk around and tour. We toured it on our own versus having a tour guide, but the kids got to see the captain's room, the cannons, and where they signed the treaty. Everything just seemed so large to me. The battleship was huge!
Aubrey loved the big, bright flowers that we saw everywhere on the island. She wanted her picture by this bright pink one which was near the waiting spot for our shuttle bus.
We didn't get to spend the entire day at Pearl Harbor because we had reservations to snorkel on that same day. So we spent some time at the swap meet buying souvenirs, and then we headed over to Hanauma Bay after picking up our snorkeling equipment.
We had a hard time getting to the bay because their parking is very limited, but once we got there, the view was beautiful. This is the bay from up top, and once you watch a video on snorkeling safety, you walk down a long ramp to get to the beach and bay.
Snorkeling was hard for the little ones, especially with it being salt water, but by the end of the time we spent there, everyone had gone in the water at least once and seen some cool fish. There was also a sea lion basking on the beach that we kept watching too. Swimming over the reefs was hard because you're not supposed to touch anything, but there were a ton of schools of fish everywhere to swim around. The kids thought it was cool, even if they thought the actual snorkeling part was hard.
I mentioned the early mornings and early nights. The girls definitely slept well every night after spending every day on the go. I woke up one morning to this and thought it was so cute. Aubrey had almost pushed Tessa off the bed, but she was practically sleeping on top of her.
Our Hawaii vacation, dubbed the Kasibbons Trip, was off to a great start!
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