Traveling with the Grobmyers March 1, 2024 Day 3

 I’m about to adjust to the four hour time difference but I had an early wake up call this morning for the Circle Island Tour. This is a great way to see the island and all the different things it has to offer. Then if you have time to go back and spend more time at a location you can. We packed a lot into one day and learned lots too.

So the first thing I am going to share with you is that cactus and roses have no thorns in Hawaii. There are no natural predators here. Also crabs and lobsters have very short pinchers for the same reason. 

We made several stops along the way to see the coast.

Our guide today was Aka. He is 100% Hawaiian and he loved sharing his culture with us and other tourists. He sang Hawaiian songs, taught us how to pronounce the Hawaiian word for things, and shared the culture of the islands.

He is blowing into a Hawaiian instrument. And yes he was barefoot all day long.

We visited the Byodo-In Temple. The Temple was given to the Hawaiian island from Japan. There is a bell you ring by pulling back a tree trunk. A beautiful black swan and what seems like hundreds of koi fish. We even found a little turtle. The grounds were beautiful with lots of greenery and flowers.

These mountains might look familiar to you if you have watched Jurassic World, King Kong or maybe even Good Morning Vietnam. There will be more about movies made in Hawaii in the coming days.

Chinaman’s Hat island. Then the concrete wall is left over from World War II. After they were bombed st Pearl they built this concrete barrier and ran barb wire through it to prevent someone from coming ashore.

We stopped for lunch at Tanaka Shrimp. Their garlic shrimp were very good.they raise their own shrimp in three different ponds. Regular, jumbo and prawns. Our shrimp was jumbo and they were huge and very fresh.

This high school might look familiar to you. Last year’s American Idol winner, Iam Tongi returned home and his high school football team celebrated with him his success on the show.

We stopped at an area that you could snorkel if you wanted to. It is also a place you might see a sea turtle or two. And guess what, we saw one on the beach. It is against the law to get close or touch them because they are endangered. He never moved while we were there. I think he was enjoying sunning himself. We saw another one in the water that would pop his head up every now and then.

No trip to Oahu is complete without a trip to the Dole Plantation and a Dole Whip. Now I know you can get them in the Disney parks but these are just a little different.

We saw some eucalyptus trees and also some rainbow eucalyptus trees. The rainbow trees are all different.the colors show differently on each of them.

Our last stop of the day was a coffee plantation. So these pine trees are called Cook Pines because Captain James Cook brought them to the island.they plant them surrounding a coffee field to protect the plants from the winds.

I saw lots of really pretty birds today. There are chickens and roosters everywhere. They are very bright and colorful.

Today’s flora and fauna.