Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii Day 2

Monday, December 11, 2017

Today's tour is called "natural Highlight of Oahu". We are starting at Diamond Head Crater, an extinct volcano.

 Trees were planted throughout the crater.  They were lined up like an orchard.

Diamond Head was used as a fortress in the past.  Interesting.

We stopped at so many beautiful places. I took pictures every stop and some through the windows.  Here is the list in the order the tour listed them: Halona Blowhole, Makapu'u Lookout, Hanauma Bay & the Pali Lookout. I'm hoping I will be able to tell the location of everything.

Hanauma Bay

 The dish shape in the size of the mountain fascinated me.

The roots of this tree were mostly above ground and gathered air to feed the tree. We learned that 90% of the foliage in Hawaii is non-native.  That includes this tree.

Above is Halona Cove in the movie "From Here to Eternity" made in 1941. Below also shows the outer edge of this cove. WOW beautiful!!! 

 Above is down the beach from the Halona Blowhole. Below is a close-up of the waves coming in on the lava rocks.

This is approximately where the blowhole is supposed to be.  However, we never saw it blow.  We were told the waves were too gentle today.

Above and below are pictures of the mountains across the highway from Halona Cove and Blowhole.

This was out next stop. We stopped along side the road.

I believe this is Kahauloa Bay in both the above and below pictures.  Below the smallest green looking island is a bird sanctuary.

What a gorgeous view!

Our next stop was the Pali Lookout.

Ugh, this battle looks horrific.

The views from here are absolutely sensational!! See the pictures below.

That's Kailua on Kailua Bay.  What a setting!

 We saw this hen and her chicks on our way back to the bus. Chickens are everywhere in town.  The story is, different groups brought chickens to the islands and many were turned loose. Now all the Hawaiian islands have many ferrel chickens running around.

After we got back to the ship, we decided to take a walk into downtown, which was only a few blocks.

 As we were walking back to the ship, we could see the Aloha Tower and clock while we were standing near this fountain downtown.

 We found this an interesting perspective.  The old building and the new buildings in the same block.

These beautiful trees are all over town.  These islands have been as beautiful as I imagined.