hawaii, part two.

A couple of days before we actually left for Hawaii, we decided that we didn’t just want to spend all of our time in Waikiki. We signed up for Discover Hawaii's eco-adventure island tour (more information here), which turned out to be a really good decision.

The day of the tour, we were picked up at a nearby hotel in Waikiki. After picking up the other people who joined the tour, we were off. Our tour guide, Keith, was super informative and had quite the sense of humour. He’s a fantastic guide and I highly recommend him if you ever want to take a tour offered by Discover Hawaii.

As the tour is a “circle” tour, we went around the coastline of the island of Oahu, stopping at numerous points of interests. We first visited the Dole Plantation and then, we were taken to Waimea Valley, where we walked through the rainforest to see Waimea Falls. Of course, me being me, I ended up getting bitten by a couple of mosquitoes. Just my luck! Next up was Sunset Beach and Laie Point, before driving along the coastline for a bit.

We stopped at Kualoa Ranch to pick up our lunch, hopped on a motorized raft over to Secret Island, which is owned by the ranch, and ate lunch ate the private beach. And just to make things worse for me, I was bitten again by a mosquito just after finishing my lunch. We left the ranch and checked out the Byodo-In Temple, a small-scale replica of the same Kyoto temple. Nu’uanu Pali Lookout was next and boy, was it windy there. I looked like Cousin It’s Asian cousin in all of the pictures because the wind had blown my hair around and covered my face. After a couple more beaches, our last stop of the tour was the beautiful Hanauma Bay. We arrived just as the sun began to set, creating gorgeous gold reflections in the water.

All in all, the tour was a very good decision. My parents and I had a great time (apart from the mosquito bites), and we got to see a lot of Oahu without the stress of us driving around.