Sunday 1/27: Diamond Head Runs & Guaranteed Honu
I did my favorite run around Diamond Head in the morning and stretched out with yoga in the room. Breakfast at Hideout again with inconsistent food. *sigh* Then I called Mom to chat for a bit before we walked the short distance to the Hilton Garden Inn for our pick-up by
Hawai'i Nautical for our honu snorkel cruise.
Our cruise left from Kewalo Basin and moored at Turtle Canyon, a popular cleaning spot for the awesome honu. Lots of clouds and still windy today, so I was very glad to have my new wetsuit in addition to my two rash guard layers to help keep warm in the water. And we saw turtles! Honu, honu, honu, honu, honu! And maybe one more honu for good measure! They are such amazing creatures to watch in their natural habitat, and a couple of them came up to the surface to linger and breathe several times. So awesome!!! We also got bonus whale sightings as we ate lunch and sailed back towards the harbour.
We got back to the hotel around 2:30pm and washed out our salt-water filled swim stuff. Then Mr. E went out for his Diamond Head run while I checked email, updated the blog and the travel journal, and finished my book.
Another try for the Top of Waikiki, and we discovered that Sundays are much less busy than Saturdays. Yay! No problem getting seats at the bar. We shared calamari and I took advantage of the $5 Happy Hour house wines while Mr. E enjoyed a couple of cocktails. One full revolution of the revolving restaurant to see sunset around 6:18pm. Lovely!
We picked up food at Duke's Market one last time for a final dinner in our room. On the way, we walked through International Marketplace and caught the last 15 minutes of the nightly hula show. What a perfect finale to our Hawai'i trip and the entire sabbatical!
Monday 1/28: HNL > SFO > SMF
Another morning swim for me (brr! chilly today!) and room yoga. Coffee delivery to Mr. E just after 8:30am followed by some packing and breakfast at the nearby Reserve Starbucks. Then to the ABC Store to redeem our receipts for a tropical beach towel and another reusable bag. Back to the Laylow to finish packing, and we still had enough time too procure the rare cloisonne pineapple ornament. According to the sales clerk, these ornaments are being discontinued, so we were very glad to get a yellow one to pair up with the red one we bought two years ago before they're all gone.
Charley Taxi pick-up at the hotel around noon. No problem with airport check-in, and we had enough time to find lunch (sushi, burger) before our 2:10pm flight to San Francisco. Totally full! No chance for an upgrade on this flight. A bit bumpy throughout the entire journey, but some very friendly flight attendants provided good wine and conversation.
We had a layover in SFO for almost two hours, which was plenty of time to get dinner at the revamped food court (salad, Chinese mixed plate). We actually did get upgraded to First Class for the very quick flight to Sac, although our seats weren't together. Our bags arrived promptly, and thanks to the slightly early arrival of the flight, we were home before midnight for some minimal unpacking and then bedtime with the velcro-ish kitties.
Welcome home!
