Ugh, Honolulu

I was lucky enough to get selected by work to present at a conference in Hawaii. Of course, this involved three flights totaling about 24 hours of flying time and shifting 12 time zones. Surprisingly, I held up pretty well and only suffered from minor jet lag. The conference was in Honolulu, and the hotel was right on the beach in Waikiki.

From Honolulu

The hotel did not impress me, but it was awfully expensive and thought nothing about charging over $20 each for parking and continental breakfast. Needless to say I skipped on breakfast. Waikiki itself is slightly interesting but, like the rest of Honolulu, is not to my taste. Honolulu is too crowded, with too much traffic, slightly run down, and devoid of nature. The same could be said for Waikiki. Despite its famous name, the beach is only ok. The sand is nice, it stretches a long ways, but it is built up to the edge by hotels and covered with bums at night. Further inland is just a bunch of pricey designer clothing stores and a couple of restaurants. No thanks.

I managed to sneak away early a couple of days and drove around to some things on the edge of the city, most notably Diamond Head. All the signs at Diamond Head warn you about how steep and long the climb is and how you will probably barely survive the experience. In fact, it is a gentle path plus a few long staircases that all told take about 30min to get up without breaking much of a sweat. The view though, is worth twice the effort.

From Honolulu

From Honolulu

It would be beautiful at night, if it were open. Like everything else in Hawaii, it closes by 5pm. Everything from parks to musuems to scenic overlooks seem to close by 5pm at the latest. Opening times aren't particularly early either. It's frustrating and makes it hard to do anything.

The last stop on the island was the Arizona Memorial. The website suggested that there might be a long line, but things were pretty light when I got there.

From Honolulu

From there, it was off to the airport and over to Kauai.

Note: Picasa seems to be inserting links to the album with each picture, doing away with the need for my usual link at the bottom. I think I will try this for a while, if you like or dislike, let me know.