Hawaii: Arrival and Day 1

*Added note: Don't worry!  I was in Hawaii about a month ago but I'm just now doing the re-cap.  For those of you concerned about earthquakes in Hawaii, I've heard from my friend who lives there that there were no repercussions from the earthquake/tsunami in Japan.  However, my thoughts and prayers are with those in Japan.

2/10/2011
We were SOOO excited to get up at 4 am to catch our 6:30 am flight.  NOT.  Jeremy and I tried to stay up all night so we would be able to sleep on the plane, but fell asleep at about 2 am.  Needless to say, waking up 2 hours later to go to the airport was rough.  I am not a morning person.  At all.

Though I recently have been enjoying morning workouts.  Go figure.

Anyways, we flew from Boise to Portland (about an hour flight) and then from Portland to Honolulu (about a 6 1/2 hour flight-- the longest I've ever been on a plane).  For the first time of my life, I could NOT sleep.  Since I'd planned on sleeping, I hadn't brought any movies or books to pass the time.  It was a long boring flight.  But I survived.

We landed in Honolulu at 11:30 am, rented our car and made our way to this restaurant called Zippy's.  I have an old friend, Emily, from 8th grade who lives there, and I was excited to see her after all these years!  There was a bit of a bit of everything on the menu.  I tried fried SPAM with a side of rice (of course) and liked it.  I unfortunately have no pictures because my brain was shutting down after little sleep.

After lunch, we immediately went to our hotel, checked in, and crashed for a few hours.  We we awoke, it was dark and we were STARVING.  The hotel had two restaurants so we decided to try one called Bibas.  I got a (virgin) pina colada and we goofed around with the camera while we waited for our food.




This is Jeremy's sleepy smile.

I ordered the surf and turf with shrimp and steak.  It was goood and not huge portions, just right!  And then we gobbled it up so fast I didn't take a picture.  Eeek.

Then, we headed back to our room where I instantly fell into a coma and didn't move until morning.  I need my sleep.

2/11/2011
Despite the three hour time change, we still slept in until about 8am.  It was a beautiful morning and we were loving our view!






One one side, Waikiki.

The other side the ocean!

We were on the top floor... that's a long way down!

Our stomachs were definitely grumbling, so we decided to wander around Waikiki a little bit and find breakfast.



Unfortunately, we had to wait 45 minutes or so before we could get a seat.  The place was PACKED!  They gave us menus while we waited.  Which only made us more hungry because everything sounded so good!


But it was our first day in Hawaii, so we couldn't be too grumpy.  Check out my pretty lei Emily gave me the day before at lunch!

We ordered our food and got some fresh pineapple and orange juice to start.  Oops, we ate the pineapple faster than I could snap a picture.


But there is nothing better than fresh squeezed orange juice.



Finally, it was food time!


I ordered a mushroom, spinach and cheese omelet with salsa and a side of pancakes.

You know it was good.


Jeremy ordered a bacon, potato and cheese omelet (which I had a bite of and it was also good) with extra bacon and a side of pancakes as well.

For not being a pancake fan, those were the BEST pancakes I've ever had.  Probably because they were drenched in this:

Coconut syrup!  Best. Thing. Ever.  I am seriously going to order a gallon of it online.  If you like coconut and haven't tried this, DO.  I'm thinking this might be my first giveaway.

It's THAT amazing.

Afterwards, we went to the army museum nearby.


Hawaiian god of war.


Island tribes going to war.



Helicopters like the ones Jeremy works on.  The cool part was all the artwork was done by military members.



Here's the outside of the museum.  Considering everything in Idaho is brown right now, the green was welcomed.


Saw birds of paradise flowers.


Lovin' the flip flops in February.

And took another nap.  We are 80.

Then we took a long walk along the beach in the sunset.  But since I have a history with dropping things in water, I left the camera behind.  We enjoyed dinner at the buffet at our hotel and explored Waikiki a bit before going to bed and promising to get up earlier to avoid waiting so long for breakfast.

Since we stayed at Hale Koa, a hotel exclusively for military members, there were a lot of retired people there.  They've got the right idea getting up early for breakfast!

Stay tuned for the rest! :)

Are you a morning person or a night person?