Honeymooning in Hawaii: Aulani & Beyond

[topsy]

For anyone waiting to see the pictures from my earlier posts, I am still trying. It seems I have a photobucket error!

 

[topsy]

Wednesday 25th March - Part One

*WARNING – THIS IS A PHOTO HEAVY DAY AND MAY BE SPLIT INTO MULTIPLE POSTS!*

This morning was our last at the B&B and on the Big Island. Today we were flying over to Oahu to check in to Aulani! As amazing as our first week had been, this was the day I was most looking forward to; I could not wait to get a glimpse of the beautiful Disney resort.

We enjoyed a leisurely start, packing up our things and enjoying the last of the delicious breakfasts Steve whipped up for us. I had woken up quite early and toyed with the idea of walking down the road to the beach/cliff top look out we went to the first night we arrived but I ended up just snoozing in bed – a decision which I would regret. At breakfast, the French-Canadian couple staying in the other room told us of an amazing whale sighting they had that morning at none other than the cliff top lookout I had thought of going to! They had been woken up by strange deep sounds and decided to go and investigate. When they got to the lookout (less than a 5 minute walk away), they were greeted by a group of whales just off shore splashing and breaching. They said it was the most spectacular whale sighting they had ever seen. I was so annoyed with myself as I had wanted to walk to the beach before breakfast but didn’t get up so I missed out!





After breakfast we took our time packing up and drove to airport for our 1.00pm flight. Looking back, we should have got an earlier flight to Oahu as the airport is so small we didn’t need to be there hours early. When I booked the flight I didn’t want us to be rushed but it turns out we were ready to go by 9.00am anyway. If we’d booked an earlier flight we could have enjoyed more Aulani time!

On the way to the airport we needed to stop at the post office to ship some Disney/Starbucks mugs to our friends who live in Florida. I figured it would be cheaper to ship from Hawaii than from the UK when we got back home. Luckily for us the post office is located right next to the airport along the entrance road. After this we dropped the car at the rental stand, a really quick and easy process which took no time at all, before heading to check in. I had read on the Hawaiian airlines website that the baggage fee for inter-island flights is reduced if you are a member so I signed us both up for free to their frequent flyer programme before we left the UK. Just a tip for anyone flying between islands and may want to save a bit of money!

Waiting at the airport was uneventful; we grabbed a few snacks and relaxed in what are the comfiest airport chairs ever. They are more akin to garden loungers than firm airport chairs! Boarding was quick and easy, we enjoyed a cup of POG juice in the air before coming in to land at Honolulu airport about 35 minutes later.







View of Mauna Loa (or Kea?) from the plane:





Honolulu airport was really busy, it took a long time for our bags to come through and then even longer for a Dollar rental bus to arrive outside. Luckily it was lovely and warm so we didn’t mind waiting. We picked up our car quite quickly at Dollar, we also did something we never do on holiday – we hired a satnav. I normally just use maps and my sense of directions but I had heard that it would be helpful. I am so glad we did this as just getting to and from the airport was difficult enough! We had a HORRIBLE drive to Aulani, the traffic was ridiculous and it took us nearly 2 hours. I knew the traffic was going to be bad in and around Honolulu but it was worse than I expected.

Soon we were pulling off the road into the Ko Olina resort area. It was beautiful, really quiet with a relaxed atmosphere, a far cry from the road rage driving we’d just left behind! We pulled up to the main entrance and left the car with the valet whilst we checked in. We were greeted with leis by the Mickey water stand just outside and were walked all the way to the check in desk by a lovely cast member who asked whether it was our first visit. I told her it was and that we were on our honeymoon, having been to Disneyland on the way over too. She was really excited for us and introduced us to the girl behind the desk and made sure she knew we were celebrating. Check in was really straightforward, I had rented DVC points for our stay which turned out to be much cheaper than booking a room directly with Disney. I knew I had all the paperwork in order but still had in the back of my mind that something might be wrong as we hadn’t booked it ourselves.

 

[topsy]

Wednesday 25th March - Part Two

At this point I am certain that we received some pixie dust due to being on honeymoon – our room was ready and we were told it was up on the 15th floor, room 1541. We’d only booked a standard view hotel room via points, which according to my research were only on the lower floors certainly no higher than the 8th. We got up to our room and excitedly looked around taking pictures of everything (me more than DH!) and when we went out onto the balcony, we saw we had a partial ocean view too!

We dumped our bags in the room before heading down to pick up our car. Because we were staying on points our parking was free for the duration, although I do find it a bit cheeky that anyone staying on property should have to pay for the privilege of parking, particularly when you pretty much have to have a car to get you to the resort in the first place!





























Our Partial Ocean View on the 15th Floor:







SO HAPPY TO BE AT AULANI!!!

 

[topsy]

Wednesday 25th March - Part Three

DH had a migraine coming on at this point, he needs to eat and drink regularly otherwise he gets light headed and tired. He decided to go back to room to rest whilst I explored. We had a dinner reservation at Ama Ama that evening so he wanted to be rested for that. I walked through the main building taking pictures of everything, it was such a sensory overload, I was having a great time! For some reason I seemed to end up in the gift shop (such a shame!) and ended up buying almost everything with Aulani branding that I could see. I knew we may never get out to the resort again so took advantage and grabbed everything I could. I then went to see what the Ulu Café was like and picked up a refillable mug. I only got one between us and we used it loads, it was really worthwhile for us.

































I headed back up to the room with all my purchases (the fact the DH was passed out at the time really helped when I dumped several bags of shopping down on the bed!). I took it easy for a while enjoying the room and balcony before we had to get dressed for dinner. I’d booked our reservation for 6.30pm, earlier than we normally eat, so that we could catch the sunset.



We got ourselves washed and dressed for dinner and left the room a little early so we could enjoy wandering around the resort grounds on our way to dinner. I was especially keen to see the lazy river as I knew that would quickly become my favourite place at Aulani!

 

[topsy]

Wednesday 25th March - Part Four

We arrived at Ama Ama and were greeted by really friendly cast members. We were shown to a table at the front of the restaurant looking out onto the lagoon and beach. This table (and I imagine all of those located along the front of the restaurant) offered an amazing view of the sunset. Overall we had a wonderful meal with excellent service. We took our time and were probably at the restaurant for about 2 hours enjoying the food and sunset.







I ordered the Macaroni Au Gratin (Keahole Lobster, Maitake Mushroom, Fontina-Parmesan Cheese, Herb-Garlic Crust) to start followed by the filet with short rib (I don’t see this on the menu anymore and can’t remember exactly how it was served). DH had the Roasted Kamuela Tomato Soup (with a mini Truffled Brie Cheese and Portuguese Sweet Bread “Sandwich”) followed by the Grilled Kurobuta Pork Chop (Herb-Coconut Rice, Heirloom Tomato Salad, Jicama, Heart of Palm, Baby Thai Basil Malaysian Peanut Sauce). All of our food was delicious and really worth the money. I’ve read all sorts of reviews about Ama Ama and the fact that it is pricey. Yes it is, but we enjoyed every moment and I truly believe in splashing out at least once when you go on holiday because, when else can you?!









My Macaroni Gratin Appetizer:



DH’s Tomato Soup appetizer:



DH’s Pork Entrée:



My Filet of Beef Entrée:



We skipped desert so I can’t even remember what was on offer, I’d pre-ordered a honeymoon cake as surprise for DH. I chose the chocolate celebration cake costing $27 which our server brought out at the end of the meal. They’d written Happy Honeymoon on it and added candles which were a nice touch I hadn’t requested. The cake was good but had obviously been frozen and defrosted as the chocolate covered rice puff balls on side were mushy. Once I scraped them off it tasted much better! In hindsight, I should have ordered a custom cake as I love the variety of flavours you can choose from and the few that I have experienced at WDW have been delicious.







After dinner we boxed up the cake and took it back to our room, walking around the pool areas on our way back. The resort is beautiful at night and there are lots of special, magical touches which we loved (including the shimmering pavement by the infinity pool, it’s like the Epcot walkway with twinkling lights).

























Once we got back to the room we settled into the amazingly comfortable bed for a good night’s rest. We planned to get up early in the morning to hit the adult infinity tubs before breakfast. Overall, this was a wonderful first afternoon at Aulani and we were both amazed by the resort.

 

[alohamom]

Thanks for adding these post Topsy! I love the pillow from Kalepas...

 

[topsy]

Thanks for adding these post Topsy! I love the pillow from Kalepas...

No problem, the rest should be following more quickly now that I've sorted my Photobucket issue! I love the pillow too, I bought it (along with almost everything else in the store!) and have it in our guest room.

 

[topsy]

Thursday 26th March

Our first full day at Aulani!

This morning we woke early and decided to take advantage of the fact that most people would still be in bed. We got ourselves dressed in our swimwear and headed out to explore the pools. We picked up our towels and wrist bands at the stand by Rainbow Reef and went straight to the adult infinity hot tub for pool opening. If I remember correctly, the pools opened around 7.30am. We spent at least 30 minutes in this area before we were joined by a group of guys who looked college student age. We wandered around the grounds a little and dipped our toes in the main family pool before heading back to the room to get washed and dressed as we had a breakfast reservation at Makahiki. One of the best things about being up early and getting into the pools was that I didn’t need to apply sun cream! Being fair skinned, this is something which usually takes up most of my time in the morning so it was nice to just walk out to the pools for an hour or so without worrying about it.

















We made it to Makihiki just before our 9.30am reservation and found a really long line to see Mickey before being seated. We queued all through the lounge/bar area and it probably took us 20-30 minutes before it was our turn. This is not the place or time to get multiple shots with Mickey, which I think was holding us up. This is designed to be a quick photo op, no autographs were allowed. We had our obligatory photo taken and were taken to our table out on the terrace area. The restaurant was exceptionally busy, I didn’t see many free tables and there were people everywhere. Unfortunately we both found the service here to be pretty lacking. Our server was polite but we saw her only once when she took our drink order and she didn’t visit us again until we asked for the bill.























On the other hand, the food was great! Of course buffet food is never going to be five star quality but what we had was pretty darn tasty and there was a brilliantly varied selection to choose from. As is always the case when I go to a buffet style meal, I can never make the most of it as I get too full! During the meal Goofy and Minnie came by, there wasn’t much interaction, particularly compared to our experiences at WDW but there were no children at our table so I didn’t expect a huge amount of interaction. We got some nice pictures which is enough for us.

The sun was shining and the weather lovely so we went back to our room to change for a pool day. We took some time to enjoy the views from our balcony whilst back in the room.











Once we were dressed we headed straight to the new(ish) adult pool and found some chairs to relax in. I ordered a pina colada and we stayed laying there in the sun for an hour or two, with the occasional dip in the pool – which was colder than we had expected!

We spent the whole day just chilling out enjoying all that Aulani had to offer around the pool area. We watched people snorkelling in the reef, I knew I wanted to try this at this point as I am not a huge lover of being in open water (i.e. the ocean) but love to snorkel. DH is also not a very confident swimmer; he sinks unless he is constantly moving so he was a bit worried about this. I thought watching others swim around in there and seeing how easy it was may put his mind at ease. We took several turns around the lazy river and briefly swam around the main pool; the grotto area where one of the slides comes out is pretty cool. We only tried each of the water slides once – when we went on the tube slide as a pair we had a bit of a tumble at the end when we came out into the lazy river. Somehow I fell out into the water and was clobbered on the head by DH’s ankle! It really hurt and gave me a bit of a headache so we never actually went back for another go!













By mid-afternoon we decided to get out of the sun and go back to the room to rest. We stopped by the shave ice stand for DH to grab something as a snack. I had my heart set on a Dole Whip so I went over to the little shop (I can’t remember the names of these places now it’s been so long since we visited!) and poured myself out a cup of pineapple deliciousness. I missed a trick here as it turns out you pay for the pot but pour your own ice cream so I didn’t have as much as I could! DH loved his shave ice, he took it back up to the room to enjoy whereas I wolfed down that Dole Whip!

On the way back to the room we stopped by the spa. The entrance was right at the bottom of the elevator tower we used to get up to our room so every time we came down in the mornings we were hit by this amazing smell of spa - heaven. I knew I wanted to try and book a massage whilst on site and thought the Signature Lomilomi looked great. Here’s the blurb from their website:

Lomilomi – $225.00 (80 minutes)
Relax with this traditional Hawaiian massage passed down through generations by healing kūpuna (elders). Using a hands-on technique, Lomilomi provides a gentle, rhythmic massage, releasing tension, pain and fatigue—while infusing the mind, body and spirit with positive energy, increased circulation and muscle tone.

Although DH initially had huge sticker shock at what the massage would cost, he said that he would pay for it as I had worked so hard to organise the wedding and deserved a treat. I guess I’ve got a good one there! We booked the massage for the following afternoon as we were due to have another lazy Aulani day.



After visiting the spa we made it back to the room. I got changed and left DH to relax and finish his Shave Ice whilst I went to front desk to ask about the cleaning services for DVC rooms. I know that when you stay on DVC points you typically on receive trash and towel service every 3 days but I really like the ‘hotel’ feel of walking back into a fully cleaned room every day. I asked whether they could do this for us and understood that there would be an additional charge (I think it should have been about $20-30 per day extra). The lady on the desk was really helpful and said no problem. I’m not sure whether she gave us some extra pixie dust or forgot to charge us but when we checked out there was no additional charge on our bill for the extra cleaning?! Whilst I was at the desk I asked for some extra toiletries as we had missed the ‘extra’ clean that day and had used all the coffee sachets for breakfast and the shampoos etc. following our swim earlier in the morning. She gave a boat load of goodies and said she’d make sure there was a note to refresh these each day for us – she was great!

We spent a couple of hours in the room and on the balcony soaking everything in, we also wandered around the shops again and stopped for a while in the lobby area to enjoy the atmosphere. One of my biggest regrets is that we didn’t try out any of the Menehune trails – this would have been a good time for that. We also never spent any time in the evenings at the bar area listening to the music which I had always planned to do. We were just so tired from our whirlwind two weeks we crashed out in the evenings! Maybe next time….!

As it was Thursday we knew there would be a Starlit Hui so we went down to the quick service in the middle of the pool area and grabbed I think a hot dog and fries for me and chicken strips with fries for DH. We sat by the pool and ate them before heading over to join the line for the show, between Ama Ama and Auntie’s Beach House.

We didn’t have to queue for long before they started letting everyone in. We picked up a mat and were directed to the far side of the lawn, probably about half way back by the time the show started and the lawn had filled up. There as a really rude guest next to us who decided to move a chair from the back of the lawn and sit in front of a load of other guests, basically blocking their view because they were on the floor on a mat, just like everyone else. A cast member politely asked him to move to the back if he wanted to use a chair and he flipped out. He said he’d had knee surgery and shouldn’t be made to move etc. The cast member offered a compromise and said he could stay on the chair but would have to move to the edge so as not to spoil anyone else’s view, he eventually did but not before his whole family made sure we all knew how outraged they were!









Overall this show was cute and good fun, however I wouldn’t watch it again if we re-visited. Unless we were going with other people and they wanted to watch it. There was a good mix of ‘traditional’ dancing and storytelling alongside Disney characters and some pretty far out guys on guitars/ukuleles. It was also pretty chilly out on the lawn as there was a strong breeze that evening; I wish I’d taken a cardigan to wear. At the end it turned into a bit of a character dance party for all the kids so we packed up our mat and called it a night.

We’d had a great first full day at Aulani and couldn’t wait for the next – another lazy day at the resort.

 

[westcoastfldisneygirl]

I love your update and your photos. All of the food looks delicious!

 

[jtba]

love seeing all your photos! we just came back two days ago and reading your trip report is bringing back all the happy memories!

p.s. sorry to read about your experience with the rude guest at the starlit hui! some people... grrr....

 

[topsy]

Friday 27th March - Part One

We awoke this morning feeling relaxed and refreshed. The whole time we were at Aulani we both just felt so at ease and comfortable, we both thoroughly enjoyed being there. We had plans for breakfast at Ama Ama this morning so we got up and out at a leisurely pace ready for our reservation at 9.00am.

We were sat right away, at the same table we had been sitting at for dinner on our first night. The shades were up and we had a wonderful view out across the lagoon. This was one of my most favourite parts of our honeymoon – we just felt so relaxed and in our own little piece of paradise together. Breakfast was amazing, pretty simple but perfectly executed. I ordered a POG mimosa (I have GOT to make one of those at home soon!) and DH ordered coffee. For our food order DH had an American breakfast with eggs, potatoes, bacon and toast. I opted for eggs benedict and we split a side of fresh pineapple, which was really fresh and delicious. Our server told us that they offer a different type of eggs benedict each day and today’s were regular, however when they came out there was a load of cheese on the muffin! I’m not sure how eggs benedict are served in Hawaii usually but in the UK there is never cheese involved?!















After breakfast we decided to wander around the beach and dip our toes in the lagoon. We had hoped to walk along the coast path and look out for sea turtles and the seal which we’d heard may be around but the path was closed due to the Marriott next door having a complete overhaul. I understand now that it has been turned into a Four Seasons resort?! We wandered around the lagoon a little towards the church (to the left) and enjoyed looking back towards Aulani, admiring its beauty.







Much like yesterday we went back up to the room to change into our swimwear for the day. Today we were going to try some salt water based activities! We splashed around in the main pool before heading down to the beach area and signing up to hire a kayak. They had a bit of a wait list so told us to go and enjoy the beach for 30 minutes before heading back to the booth to check in. We hired the kayak for an hour; I think it was really reasonable at $29. The kayak’s and paddleboards have to stay within the lagoon which may seem a bit boring but we really enjoyed ourselves. The lagoon is larger than it looks and we had no trouble paddling around for the hour. After kayaking we stayed in the lagoon for a while longer swimming, floating around and taking it all in.

Eventually we decided we needed some lunch, I’m pretty certain we grabbed something from the quick service kiosk by the pool (Mama’s Snack Stop I think?), probably chicken and shrimp. We found some tables by the snorkelling reef and watched people swimming around with the fish as we ate. I knew I really wanted us to go snorkelling but DH is not a strong swimmer and was quite nervous about it. He has no body density so sinks unless he constantly treads water. I assured him that the life jackets should give him plenty of buoyancy. We finished eating and he agreed to give it a go! We timed it really well as there were only a couple of other people in the lagoon whilst we were in there. I’d read it was quite cold but was pleasantly surprised. Sure it was colder than the lagoon and swimming pools but nothing we couldn’t handle! We both really enjoyed the snorkelling and had fun trying to find the little Menehune hiding on the bottom. Despite his reservations DH actually enjoyed himself! I know you can get a pass for multiple snorkel sessions but I think just the once was enough – it’s not like out in the ocean where there’s the possibility of seeing different types of sea life each time.



















Continued in next post...

 

[topsy]

Friday 27th March - Part Two

After our snorkel it was pretty much time for my massage so we walked over to the elevator tower. DH went back up to the room to nap/relax and probably watch some TV, whilst I went ahead to the spa. I knew I wanted to arrive a little early to enjoy the spa garden. Let me tell you, this spa was so beautifully decorated. I was shown into the changing rooms to get into my robe and then led through to the garden where they made up a body scrub for me to use and take home, it smelled delicious! I explored the garden area for about 30-40 minutes; some of those showers are really powerful! Eventually it was time for me to be collected for my massage. Now I don’t remember a lot about this massage as I think I fell asleep but I do know it was one of the most amazing treatments I have ever had! I was allowed to choose a lotion for the therapist to use but couldn’t decide so they mixed two scents for me; coconut and mango. It was heavenly and smelt so tropical. I only wish that DH had come with me to share in the experience but massage/body treatments just aren’t his thing and he wasn’t allowed to come in and explore the garden area without having something booked.





























After my treatment I took my time getting dressed and heading back to the room. I made a detour to the shop (again!) to look for a charm for my Pandora bracelet, I collect charms for every major event or trip I take and wanted one to remember Hawaii. I didn’t find any that I was crazy about but did find one which was ok and as I wanted to buy one when I was actually in Hawaii so I bought it and went back to find DH. He’d had a great time watching his ‘man shows’ on TV!

By now it was early evening and we needed some dinner. I’d read great things about Monkeypod which is across the street from Aulani so we decided to walk on over and see if we could grab a table. On the way, we took a detour to the lobby and shop area so I could point out a few cool things I’d noticed earlier to DH. This is when we came across a second shop, just around the corner from Kalepa’s Store. I can’t recall the name but it was a shop specifically for clothing and accessories and looked higher end than the Disney branded merchandise at Kalepa’s. It was here that I found a much larger selection of Pandora charms and found one that I completely fell in love with! It was a cute glass charm with white orchids which looked really tropical and much more ‘Hawaii’ than the charm I purchased earlier. Luckily I still had the receipt and the charm on my bracelet so the sales lady graciously let me exchange them. Anyway, something to note – there is another shop at Aulani!

We walked by this cute artwork in one of the hallways by the shop:



So on we went to Monekypod, the walk was nice and only about 5-10 minutes. Unfortunately when we got there the place was crazy busy. They couldn’t seat us for over an hour so we decided to head back to the resort and grab dinner there. We did however make a reservation for the following evening so that we didn’t miss out. On the way back to Aulani we stopped to admire the splendour of the resort from the roadside and noted how you could actually drive right by as the signage isn’t overly obvious. I also made DH stop at every Frangipani flower (I think that’s what they are?!) we passed as I love them so much, the smell and how pretty they are. We just can’t get hold of them at home so I wanted to soak them in! For dinner we ended up going to Ulu café and taking food back to our room. I had a full size pepperoni pizza (thinking I could have some cold the next day for lunch) and DH picked up some kind of pork plate I think. We spent the evening on the balcony enjoying the warm air and made sure we had an early night as we had plans to be up and out the next morning exploring the island. Yes, we ventured away from Aulani for the whole day!









Up next....Touring the Island!

 

[topsy]

Saturday 28th March - Part One

Having experienced two wonderful days at Aulani we thought we had better venture a little further afield! Originally, I had planned to spend our first two days on the island touring around and finish the trip with our last days at the resort. However I discovered part way through planning that it was spring break and that may make the resort extra busy at the weekend. Add to that the horrendous mid-week traffic we’ve all heard about and you’ll understand why I changed this around.

Our plan today was to do a whistle stop tour of the island, driving around the coast and stopping anywhere that took our fancy (along with a few pre-determined stops). The first stop – a morning hike at Diamond Head.

We were aiming to leave early to get to Diamond Head at sunrise, long before the hordes of tourists arrived. This was not to be. We were enjoying the resort so much we wanted to squeeze every last moment we could out of Aulani. We slept in a little but still managed to grab a few pastries and some Malasadas (not great) from the Ulu Café and got out on the road by 9.00am. We followed our sat nav to Diamond Head, drove through the tunnel cut into the side of the crater and came to a standstill at the parking area. They have a queue of traffic which leads to an entrance booth. If you’re lucky enough to get past that they direct you to a holding queue where you wait until another car leaves. When we arrived, they were turning cars away at the booth. So we drove back out through the tunnel and pulled up just the other side by a small parking area to try to work out our next move. As luck would have it, a car was pulling out of a space. Looking around, I could not see any parking restriction signs, ticket machines or wardens so I took my opportunity and parked up. Having read lots of warnings about car break-ins, we were careful to always put the sat nav away before stopping, so nobody could see that we stashed it in the glove compartment. We also didn’t carry much else in the car besides water.

We made the short walk through the tunnel back to the parking area where we had a quick comfort break. A note of caution – the tunnel is narrow and there isn’t much space for pedestrians so make sure you are careful if walking through!





By the time we began our climb it must have been about 10.30am, still a little bit before the midday sun. I think it took us about 30-40 minutes each way up and down and although it was early, it was still very warm. I would definitely recommend you take plenty of water, a hat and lots of sunscreen. It was also quite busy; we followed a long line of people all the way up. I am so glad we did this hike as the views were lovely. I had read in a previous report that Hawaiian weather can change very quickly and can also be very different depending on where you are on the island. Our photos show this beautifully. We were in glorious sunshine whilst the whole Waikiki area was covered in cloud and fog.





























We stayed at the top for a while taking in the views but this area was really congested so we were soon on our way back down. We made our way out to the car (having had a quick toilet stop and filled up our bottles at the water fountains) and drove off in the direction of Hanauma Bay. In our original early morning plan we had intended to watch the sunrise from Diamond Head and then go on to the bay to go snorkelling before the crowds poured in. Obviously this was not to be as it was now after midday and there was a large amount of traffic in the area, mostly being diverted away from Hanauma Bay.

Continued in next post...

 

[topsy]

Saturday 28th March - Part Two

We drove around the coast stopping briefly at various scenic points as and when we could. We got to the piece of land offshore which looks like a rabbit (I can’t recall the name) but the parking lot was full so I stayed in the car whilst DH hopped out to take a picture. I then caught sight of the island as we drove on, it does indeed look like a rabbit’s head!



Unfortunately the weather wasn’t brilliant today, the further north-west we drove, the foggier and wetter the climate became. I was really looking forward to going to the Nua Pali Lookout having seen some gorgeous photos on Captain Oblivious’ trip report. However when we got there we couldn’t see a thing as the fog was so dense. So on we drove in search of the Kualoa Ranch aka. Jurassic Park! The weather was really miserable and we didn’t fancy booking onto any of the excursions at Kualoa Ranch so we pulled up at a beach park just opposite where we had a comfort break and briefly paddled in the water. The hills were behind us and are awesome to look at; you really can’t help but think of Jurassic Park when looking at them! We had a really good view of the piece of land known as the Chinaman’s hat from here, I’m afraid I can’t recall the official name.













We spent probably about 30 minutes here before driving on towards the North Shore in search of sea turtles! I’d read in one of the Lonely Planet guide books I had with me of a beach where turtles usually appeared throughout the day. Again, I’m afraid I don’t remember the name of it but there was no official parking lot in this area so we just pulled up on the side of the road as everyone else seemed to have done and found a narrow walk through to the beach between some houses. i should point out that it took us ages to drive to this area, the traffic really was awfully slow. We couldn’t ever work out why as it didn’t necessarily seem that dense, it just wasn’t moving very quickly at any point of our island tour (particularly around the North Shore) and became quite frustrating.

When we reached the beach the weather was becoming more overcast and a little drizzly. There were no turtles up on the sand but we did see a few frolicking a few meters out in the water. They were difficult to spot as they blended in so well with the large rocks along the shoreline but every now and then they’d pop their heads above water! It would have been amazing to see them up close on the beach to really appreciate how big they are. At one point we got soaked by a huge wave which didn’t look that big but splashed us all the way up to our t-shirts. My shorts were soaking and they felt really uncomfortable from that point on. I think the sand got into them and along with the salt water my thighs really rubbed together quite painfully. I’ve just realised that all sounds very negative! Despite the hiccup with the wave and the dull weather we were enjoying our day and made the most of our time on the beach watching locals surfing and paddle boarding.









After about an hour on the beach (I wanted to stay longer convinced that eventually a turtle would come up to the sand!) we decided we needed to get going if we were going to make it to the Dole Plantation before it closed. DH was getting a migraine as we hadn’t eaten since breakfast. The drive to the Dole Planation took about 30 minutes and was pretty painless. We arrived, parked up and went straight to the food counter. I was only looking for one thing – the ice cream. DH went off to buy something more substantial for himself and we met outside to eat our treats. Now I do love the Dole Whip but I love the WDW version even more where it is mixed with a swirl of vanilla, I think it just gives a good balance. We finished our treats and explored the rather extensive gift shop. We bought chocolate covered macadamia nuts for family (we should’ve bought a load for ourselves too – they were yummy!) as well as some dog toys and puppy treats for our dog and his litter mate who were turning 2 years old the day after we returned from our trip. I think because we were so uncomfortable in our wet, sandy clothes (and weren’t clever enough to bring spares!) we didn’t stay long here. We walked around the gardens but didn’t go on the train like I had originally planned. It was a shame but I think it would have been pointless paying out for it as neither of us was in a great mood at this point. All we wanted to do was get back to Aulani, get washed and changed and relax some more.



















When we got back to the resort we enjoyed changing into fresh clothes and had a drink out on the balcony. We really made use of the one refillable mug we purchased on our first day there. One seemed to be plenty between us, we just refilled it perhaps more often than if we’d bought two, but those things are pricey and we didn’t need more mugs filling up our cupboards back at home! It wasn’t long before our Monkeypod dinner reservation so we slowly made our way across the street, both really hungry for some good food. I’d read lots of great things about this place on the Disboards, mainly that it was somewhere close at a reasonable price (most people seem to be put off by Disney’s prices for food at Aulani). However, we must’ve missed a trick in not arriving early enough for happy hour which I think is where the deals are to be had. We didn’t find it cheap (especially in comparison to the quality and quantity of food we’d had at Aulani) and were surprised that the main dishes didn’t come with sides; you had to pay extra for those. Regardless, the food tasted good and our server was nice. We both had burgers with fries and were tempted by pieces of pie for dessert as we saw so many being brought out to tables around us. We also sat outside which was lovely, listening to the live band. This probably won’t win me any popularity points but I have to say, if I visit Aulani again, I don’t think I’d return to Monkeypod. It just wasn’t what I was looking for and I think has become really over rated. We enjoyed our dining experiences at Aulani much more. After dinner we pretty much called it a night, after wandering around the pool area a little and enjoying the beauty of Aulani at night.









Next up – visiting Pearl Harbour and our last few hours at Aulani!

 

[scrappydew]

I have enjoyed your trip report! Looks like you had a great time.

 

[topsy]

I have enjoyed your trip report! Looks like you had a great time.

Thank you, we really enjoyed the trip! One day I will return to finish the report and upload the missing photos. I've got a 9 week old baby so don't have a lot of (actually, any) free time!!!