Hawaii! 50th State and 20th Anniversary! May, 2023

Posted on by habsontheroad

Wow!! Now this is an exciting trip to log! We finally get to knock out our 50th state, and celebrate our 20th anniversary at the same time!! It seems surreal. We love that both kids will be able to say they’ve been to all 50 states (and 4 Canadian provinces), all before Tripp is even 14! And with that, here we go!!!

Like Frank Costanza, I’ve got my cabana wear ready to go!

As soon as we got on the plane, the pilot announced that the flight control system didn’t power up correctly, so we had to wait for maintenance people to work on it. They got it fixed just in time for us to get to LAX, where we only barely made it onto the next plane before it left! We were cutting it really close!

LA smog is so bad
We had an awesome plane for our flight to Honolulu!
We had a super smooth flight into Honolulu. It was really exciting to see the first lights on an island as we got close!
We are far away from home!!

WE HAVE OFFICIALLY BEEN TO ALL 50 STATES!! WOOHOO!!!!!!!

It’s weird… You have to get on a bus to get to baggage claim!
It’s funny how similar Disney’s Polynesian resort looks to the airport!
The shuttle driver dropped us off at the opposite end of the check-in desk and our hotel is a huge resort, so we had to drag 6 pieces of luggage probably a quarter of a mile to get to the check-in desk! It’s amazing how many shops and restaurants there are at the resort! Something like 19 of them.
Our room has a huge balcony with a great view of the ocean and Waikiki!

We are completely worn out! It was 3am central by the time we got to our hotel, and 4am before we got to bed! Good night!

Day 2

We woke up wide awake around 7 AM (felt like noon to us), and headed downstairs to eat at the Tropics for breakfast. Amazing food!

The resort is really awesome! So many neat shops with lush walkways all over

This is the Diamond Head volcanic crater you can see from our balcony. We have plans to go hike there this week!
We always try to go to the Old Spaghetti Factory when we travel and this was a neat one to check off the list!!
There are Banyan trees along the waterfront that are really neat! So strange the way they grow.
Our Uber driver told us these are the most expensive condos in Waikiki. The cheapest ones are $3.5 million and the penthouses go for $60 million!! Insane! They are attached to the fancy Ala Moana mall that we walked through earlier today. Lots of really high-end stores! It was very similar to Fifth Avenue in NYC.
We were told this was Elvis’ favorite place to stay in Waikiki. It’s the Sheraton Princess Kailulani hotel.

Day 3

We went to bed at around 8:30 PM last night, still not quite adjusted to the new time zone. We woke up around 3 AM but made ourselves go back to sleep and woke up around 7 AM.

Off to a good start!!
I took a photo through my polarized sunglasses and you can actually see the reef!
This is right outside our hotel! So awesome!

This is neat…. downtown Waikiki are diagonal crosswalks so you can go to the opposite corner of an intersection!

Local breakfast platters at McDonald’s… need to try this one morning! Heck of a lot cheaper than any of the food options at our resort, which average $25 per person.
Grown right here on O’ahu! We are going to the Dole pineapple plantation later this week.
Yummmm
I couldn’t not buy one of these!
Huge snow cones in a bowl!

7 thoughts on “Hawaii! 50th State and 20th Anniversary! May, 2023”

  3. We’re SO happy that you guys are getting to do this! And it was fun FaceTimeing! And thanks too for all the pics.
    We love you all!!
    Mom and dad

    Reply

  4. We think you need to see about one of those penthouses (you know, so we could borrow it once in awhile)
    And Spaghetti Factory??? That’s funny!
    We’ll be looking forward to more pics.
    Mom and dad

    Reply

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