USA Trip: Aloha from Honolulu

Hi all,

Long time no speak, mainly due to the fact that we have spent some of the last week staying at places with no wi-fi and the rest of the time we have simply been too busy to sit and blog! So what have we been up to over the last week and a half?

Well, we spent our last day in San Francisco exploring the waterfront west of Fishermans Wharf and Ghiradelli Square, which was once that chocolate factory but is now a menagerie of shops and eateries, many of them selling those chocs. We then decided to slog our way on foot up one of the city’s notoriously steep hills (to burn up the chocolate calories we had consumed…) to Lombard Street. Lombard Street has the reputation of being the crookedest street in the world. This little street zigzags its way down the hill for a block (one way traffic only, of course) with a speed limit of only 5mph – you probably couldn’t do much more than that anyway, as there is too much tourist traffic.

We walked down the sidewalk (yep, we are using yankee terms now) and decided that we (meaning Graham) would drive Lombard Street the next day when we picked up our hire car. The next morning we did just that – after checking out and picking up our car, we headed to Lombard Street and drove down it, not once but twice. Graham passed with flying colours with no paint scrapped from the brand new Chevy. We next headed to the ‘painted ladies’, a famous row of Victorian-era houses that Rebecca wanted to see but which none of the kids (nor Graham, for that matter) were that impressed with.

Our next trip was a drive north across the Golden Gate Bridge (just to say we had done it, of course). It was here that the glorious weather we had experienced in San Francisco – who says the weather is lousy here? – and for most of our trip ended and the rain began. We viewed the bridge from a lookout in the car, as well as the pretty bayside town of Sausalito, before driving back over the Bridge and starting our journey south to Monterrey.

As the weather remained quite grey all day, we decided at the last minute to divert west to the shopping outlets at Gilroy (after all, you can still shop - rain, hail or shine) and spend the night there. The following morning, with the glorious sunlight back to greet us, we headed to Monterey.

Monterey is truly beautiful, with its lovely beachside settings and quaint weatherboard buildings. However, the boys will remember Monterey as the town where they tried to beat the clock at “laser maze” and find their way through the mirror maze, which the attendant made more difficult each time they entered the course.

From Monterey, we took the “17 Mile Drive”, a scenic drive through a private gated community which also included the famous “Lone Cypress Tree”. Rebecca and Graham took in the beautiful rugged coastal scenery while the kids wondered what all the fuss was about. “It’s just a tree…” Liam was heard muttering. The kids did enjoy seeing the seals, however, as well as a small herd of deer on one of the many golf courses in this exclusive community.

Not having our fill of drooling with envy over expensive mansions with million-dollar views, we moved on to Carmel. We prowled its streets, picking out which home we preferred above the rest, before driving the scenic, winding (and very long) road through Big Sur to San Simeon, where we came upon a colony of elephant seals lying on the beach beside the road.

The next day saw us drive further south and, after a huge lunch at Pismo Beach in a restaurant with more varieties of pies than you could poke a stick at, we reached Santa Barbara, a picturesque city nestled between mountains and sea. We stayed the night in a motel directly opposite the beach and spent the following morning longboarding (Jack and Liam), chasing longboards (Rhiannon) and strolling the boardwalk and pier (Graham and Rebecca with kids in tow).

That afternoon, we headed to Santa Monica to walk the pier at the end of Route 66 before finally reaching our hotel for our last three nights on mainland USA (whew!)

The following day was spent doing those sorts of things you like to do just to say you’ve done it but probably won’t ever do again, such as visiting:

1 – Venice Beach (boys enjoyed longboarding here, Rhiannon continued to chase them)

2 – Rodeo Drive (where price tags are not shown on clothes in shop windows but we did spot a Bugatti Veyronne which Graham wanted Rebecca to buy him for Christmas)
3 – Beverley Hills (just another expensive suburb)
4 – Hollywood Walk of Fame (saw the sidewalk stars, rest is just plain seedy)
5 – Hollywood sign (stopped for a happy snap before hitting the freeway for the traffic snarl back to our hotel)

Our last full day in LA was spent doing last minute shopping and cursing the traffic snarls. Graham and Rebecca agreed that LA had nothing on San Francisco; a much nicer, prettier and definitely cleaner city. Also unlike San Francisco, LA was not a city they were keen to visit again (except maybe Disneyland. After all, who can ever get enough of the ‘happiest place on earth’?)

So after an early morning flight, we arrived in beautiful Hawaii for the last leg of our trip, completely unaware of the surprise in store for us. When we checked in to our beachside Waikiki apartment block, we were upgraded to a multi-million dollar oceanfront unit (a similar unit in the complex is currently for sale for USD 3 million…), with amazing unobstructed views of Waikiki, from Diamond Head to the harbour.

Once we managed to tear ourselves away from this view, we hit the beach, pool (and for Rebecca, the happy hour Lava Flow cocktails) and shops. We have also hired a car for a day to explore the island of Oahu, where we decided to trek to the top of Diamond Head Crater, a steep trail made even harder in thongs (we didn’t realise how strenuous and long the trail was and stupidly wore thongs and beachwear.) However, we all made it to the top to see the great views over Waikiki on offer. We next drove around the island, stopping for coconut shrimps at a ‘shrimp shack’ on the north shore as well as the surfing (not swimming!) spot of Sunset Beach, before heading back towards Honolulu.

Tomorrow will mean our last day of enjoying the sun and sea of Hawaii before we head to the airport Thursday morning for our flight home to Sydney. It has been a huge trip, quite busy at times but one where we have all seen breathtaking vistas, met wonderful people, and experienced a myriad of activities together which have provided great memories for our family.

See you soon,

from Graham, Rebecca, Jack, Liam & Rhiannon