Day 5 - Oahu, Hanauma Bay, Hawaii, Kona

Jenny got us up at 5:45am today so that we could get to Hanauma Bay. Hanauma Bay is a coral nature reserve on the other side of Diamond Head and is protected by the State Parks. It is closed on Tuesdays (we went on Thursday) and opens at 6:00am. We have heard that it is very popular and can get quite crowded and churned up later in the day (Thanks Cher). That’s why we got up so early while on holiday! Plus you could argue that it is 8:45am Vancouver time!

We found a parking spot and was told by a Park employee that because we were so early we didn’t have to pay the $7.50 per adult entrance fee. Bonus.

Hanauma Bay, Oahu

The tide was on its way out and the pools were very shallow. The coral was quite beaten up by the thousands of tourists but we did see some cool fish.

We were done by 8:30am as a steady stream of people weaved their way down the hill to stir up the sandy bottom. We ate breakfast at McDonalds spending the $15 we saved. 

We parked the car back at the hotel and then spent our last few hours back at our favorite spot on Waikiki beach. We rented two boogie boards for $5 each and had a blast! The waves are awesome. We picked up a couple of shave ice with ice creams and were all set!
At 3:00pm we headed over to the airport for the short flight (45mins) to Kona on The Big Island of Hawaii.
At this point I would like to say how awesome the hotel, car rental and Waikiki were.The Ilima Hotel is a few blocks back from the beach. That means its not too noisy at night but just a 15min walk through the International market to the beach. It was clean, small and personal and very reasonably priced at $110 per night.Alamo had a brand new VW Jetta for us and everything went super smoothly. The shuttle picked us up right away when arriving and whisked us away literally five minutes after parking when we returned the car.Finally, Waikiki was awesome. Maybe its the time of year. Fewer people travel here is the summer. Maybe it’s more hectic at Christmas and Easter? We found everything to be reasonably priced - we were expecting to get gauged. Shave ice on Waikiki beach was just $4.Boogie boards just $5 and even a steak dinner at the Shorebird, a beachfront restaurant was $99 including tip (15%) WITH three drinks!