Arriving at Kauai

We docked in Nawiliwili Bay on the Island of Kauai at 10:00 am this morning. Kauai is the smallest of the 4 main islands covering 552 square miles. Much of Kauai looks just like it did when the 1st Polynesians paddled up to the shore.
The population of Kauai is around 63,000.
Apparently over 60 films were shot in this Hollywood paradise including Jurassic Park and Indiana Jones.

Interesting Fact!!! No building on Kauai is allowed to rise above the level of the coconut trees.

The mountain at the very center of Kauai, Mount Waialeale, receives so much rain each year, that totally unique flora and fauna exist in the Alakai Swamp at its summit. Receiving up to 600 inches of rain per year, Mount Waialeale is one of the wettest places on earth.

A couple of pictures of the island from our deck. Did I mention our deck is 20' by 10'

Jonathan, our cabin steward left us a couple of swans at the end of our bed.

This afternoon we were scheduled to go to the Luau Kalamaku.
This is billed as Hawaii's best Luau. It did not disappoint us at all.
We started with a Plantation Train Tour. This took us around the plantation of Kilohana, touring through fields of sugar cane, pineapple, banana, papaya, coffee, tropical flowers and hardwood trees that illustrate the history as well as today's farming on Kauai.
On to the Luau. The Kalamaku is a theatrical music production expressing the amazing story of Polynesians migration to Hawaii.
First a great meal followed by the production.

This picture is a general idea of the grounds of the plantation.

Jane and Bonnie at our table #342. The boys were probably getting the wine.

An overall view of the setup for the dinner and show.

One of the dancers had a number of the audience on stage to show them how to do an authentic Hawaiian Hula Dance. Bonnie and Jane are at the back but I coudn't get them in the picture.

A sample of the production.

A picture of the cast of the show.

Once the show was over we headed for the bus and back to the ship for a nightcap on our deck.
Did I mention our deck is 20' by 10'.  Haha
Off to bed.

Off to Kona

We sailed overnight around the Big Island and docked at Kona this morning.
The picture below is the shoreline as we came into Kona.

Kona is a word that everyone seems to know, as its synonomous with great coffee and big fish. Kona means "leeward side" in Hawaiian. The Hawaii Island's population is about 150,000. There are many coffee farms on Kona, the only place where Kona coffee beans are grown to produce the 100% pure Kona coffee. The conditions in Kona are just right for growing these rare beans - elevation, constant cloud cover and rich, volcanic soil.

Interesting fact!! The Hawaii Island (The Big Island) is getting bigger by about 42 acres each year because of the continous eruption of the Kilauea Volcano. It's been erupting for 30 years.

While we were at breakfast our cabin steward, Jonathan, left us a new mouse for our computer.
That's me and Jake in the top left corner of the computer screen.

Our ship is too large to dock at Kona so they anchor a little out and use tenders to take anyone ashore who wants to go ashore.
Dan and I headed for shore in the late morning to look for Kona coffee and some local beer.

Below are a couple of pictures of Kona
In the second one, Dan is under that small tree beside the sidewalk

That's our ship out in the bay awaiting our return

Once back safely aboard the ship it was time to decide what to do for the evening.
We had a reservation at Jefferson's Bistro for 7:00 pm for dinner, so we decided to hit the Pink Champagne Bar to start the evening off on the right foot.

We took the 1st picture then realized that this was "The Champagne Bar" so we grabbed our champagne and posed for another fabulous picture.

There was a couple of fellows playing music and singing a number of local Hawaiian songs.
The sound was wonderful.
You can see in this picure why it is called The PINK Champagne Bar.

Time to head for dinner and what a wonderful dinner it was. French Onion or Mushroom soup followed by peppercorn filets for Bonnie, Dan and I, and a cream shrimp dish for Jane.

Up to the Hollywood Theatre for a concert by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons called "oh what a night". The boys seemed a lot younger than I thought Frankie and the Four Seasons would be today but, "what the hell", the show was terrific.

We left Kona around 6:00 pm and are headed for Kauai.
See y'all tomorrow

The Big Island

Sailed overnight to the Big Island (Hawaii)

It was so smooth that we wondered if the ship had stopped for some reason.
This is a picture of the shoreline as we landed at Hilo on the Big Island.

After breakfast we decided to head into the city of Hilo.
Hilo is the oldest port of entry in the Big Island with a population of 36,000 and the second largest city on the island.
Here is a couple of pictures of the streets of Hilo.

Not a lot happening!!

Hilo is the gateway to the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, where The Kilauea Volcano has erupted every day since 1983. Its name means "The Spewing"

Your intrepid adventurers left no stone unturned and ventured close enough to get this picture.

It was quite hot near the volcano, but Dan and I survived and made our way back to the ship, hoping to find a cold beer. We did (with the girls of course) at the John Adams Bar.

Lunch was delivered to our stateroom. It included shrimp, a collection of cheeses, bread, and fruit.
Of course there was a "small" amount of wine included with lunch.

Dinner at the Skyline restaurant and off to the starboard side (right side for you land lubbers).
We are on the starboard side because we will pass the active volcano at 9:45 pm.
This is the best picture I could get of the volcano.

Believe it or not that is Madame Pele, an active volcano flowing into the sea.

Interesting fact: Hawaii became the 50th state in August, 1959.

Tomorrow we are off to Kona, home of the best (most expensive) coffee in the world.

Another day in Maui

Up early this morning for Dan and I as we had to be ready for our Helicopter ride by 8:00 am.
The girls were going to sleep in.

The helicopter ride was fabulous and our pilot explained all the info we needed to know.
The problem is, I probably only remember a limited amount of what she told us.

This picture is the craters on top of the mountain from long ago valcanic action.
Some of the terrain is so other-wordly that NASA used it, to simulate the face of the moon.

You can see from here part of the Hana Rainforest Preserve out to the coast.

Here we see a circular rainbow that can only be seen from the air.

We can see the colour difference from green to brown.
One area gets over 300 inches of rain, while the other less than 24 inches each year.
I will leave it to you to figure which is which.

In this picture, you can see the black areas near the sea. This is volcanic rock from the lava many years ago. Even the sand is coloured black.

This is a photo of our fearlous adventurers, who flew over the mountain to bring back so much info, and so many great pictures. For you uninitiated folks, that is our helicopter in the background.

All that exploring and discovering the rugged coast of East Maui, left your fearless explorers a little parched.
We headed back to the ship to find the women folk for some libations.
We ended up at the Caddilac grill for lunch.

After lunch we went to the Key West bar for a cocktail and to watch the ice sculpture demonstration.
Below is a picture of the result, that the artist finished in 15 minutes.
There it is!!

We spent the next 15 minutes trying to figure out what he sculptured. Apparently it is a fish with the head centre left and the body going out to the right at 45 degree angles.
If y'all can see that, let me know.

A bit of a rest and we are off for "wine tasting"
What more could one want? 4 glasses of wine (2 white and 2 red) plus a glass of champagne, cheese and crackers.

You can see on the left, the heads of Jane, Dan and Bonnie watching the expanations of the various wines. Where was Joe?
He was either taking the picture or off looking for more wine.

Off to a cocktail party with the Captain. Champagne and hor d'ouvres were the order of the day.
We had to disapoint the Captain and tell him we had dinner reservations at La Cucina, an Italian restaurant and had to leave early. He insisted on a picture before we left.

The Italian dinner was wonderful as all the dinners have been. It was a nice quiet romantic restaurant for dining until we saw Kathleen Wynne (or a dead ringer for her) at the next table. Oh well, it could have been worse. It could have been Donald Trump.

After dinner we headed for the Hollywood Theatre for "the greatest moments of Hollywood Musicals" Good show that had music from Cabaret to the Moulin Rouge, Judy Garland taking us over the rainbow and Gene Kelly singing in the rain.

Good day and its now "off to bed"

Docking in Maui

We docked in Maui early this morning. We are at the town of Kahului on the north shore.
Maui is the most visited island of all the Hawaiian Islands. It is sparsely populated with less than one-tenth of the population of Hawaii. Maui has Haleakala, the largest dormant volcano in the world consisting of hardened lava rising from the ocean floor capped by a huge crater. Maui is the second largest island in the Hawaiian chain. Enough of those boring statistics.
Below is a picture of the island as we were coming into port.

Now I promised some info on our ship. (those who read our blog from the river cruise will know why this is a ship and not a boat)
Our ship is 921 feet long and 120 feet wide with cruising speed of 22 knots.
Guest capacity is 2,186 with 927 crew.
We have 16 dining options, 12 bars and lounges, 3 swimming pools and 6 hot tubs.
Our stateroom came with 2 one size fits all house coats.
Bonnie is wearing one.

Would probably also fit King Kong.

Our room steward Jonathan left us a small gift when he made up our room today.

We spent part of the late morning and early afternoon at the pool near our stateroom and a kind lady from San Francisco offered to take our picture. We originally declined saying we needed the camera to stay in good condition, but eventually relented and the camera did survive.

Drinks are on the way.

We went for dinner at a Japanese restaurant. It is called Teppanyaki and is the kind where the chef cooks at your table. Our table consisted of 8 folks. (Dan, Jane, Bonnie and Joe plus 4 Americans)
What a show the chef put on, and by the way the food and drinks were excellent as well.

We are waiting for the fun to begin.

The chef at work.

The 4 stars of the show with the chef.

Tomorrow, Dan and I are off on a Helicopter tour. Stay tuned.

Boarding the Ship

This morning we headed to the hotel lobby to get on the shuttle that would take us to the "Pride of America." We boarded the ship around 11:30 and of course we headed for lunch at Cagneys, a wonderful restaurant, as the rooms were being prepared and the luggage sent to our room.

Dinner was at a Brazilian restaurant with an unusual salad bar, that was quite interesting, and about a 7 course meal of meat. They brought sticks with different meats to the table until you turned your card from green to red. Then it was time for dessert.

Not a lot to add today as we were preparing to "set sail"

Our room was spectacular as you can see from the photos below.

This is one of the pools near our room.

At dinner at the Brazilian restaurant in the aft deck of the ship, once again I tried to capture the sunset and missed again. I will keep trying.

We left Honolulu at 7:00 pm tonight on our way to Maui.
More information on Maui tomorrow and also I will include all the lowdown on our ship.

Off to Hawaii

Hello everyone.  We met Dan and Jane at the Sheraton hotel on Thursday.
While at the hotel in the evening, we met with Laurie and Rob.  They had been to Las Vegas with Matthew, Jamie and Sarah and all had a great time.   Then Christina Jones, our good friends Lorna and Chris's daughter surprised us with a visit.  We knew she was in the area and were delighted to have her come by to see us.  We got away bright and early on Friday after a night at the Sheraton at terminal 3.  The hotel has a great shuttle to the Air Canada terminal 1 and we were there in minutes.

Checking in was easy and streamlined.

We flew from Toronto to Calgary and then to Vancouver and then to Honolulu. Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge all the way.

The Air Canada staff, (from the pilots, flight attendants and customer service folks) were excellent all the way, including arranging wheelchairs and wheeling us quickly to the proper gate. Bonnie took a wheelchair most of the time as gettting around airports can involve a lot of walking.

Joe did take a picture of the setting sun setting over the pacific as we flew from Vancouver to Honolulu, but it was through the little window on the plane. Gorgeous!

We checked into the Marriott around 9:30pm (3:30 pm Toronto time) and of course headed for a nightcap, tired and a little weary.  Make that a LOT weary.  

Below are a couple of views from our balcony at the Marriott.

Also one that has a little friend who showed up in the morning.

It is Saturday morning and we are off to catch the shuttle to the ship. Hooray!!!