Aloha Hawaii - visit to Oahu

Alooooha!!!!!!!!!!! This is how Hawaiians greet you, it means "Welcome" !!!! So today i am going to tell you guys about my recent tour to Hawaii. State of Hawaii has 8 main islands out of which Oahu has the largest city and state capital Honolulu. So we decided to visit Oahu since it has the charm of both the fast paced city life as well as the beauty of the countryside. We flew with delta, since we had accumulated our skymiles, we thought it would be nice to book our expensive hawaii tickets with reward miles. After our tiring long 12hr flight we were glad to be in hawaii and escape chilly cold winter in US mainland . We took a shuttle from the honolulu international airport to waikiki, where we had booked our first 4 nights stay at Hotel Queen Kapiolani. Its better to take a shuttle from the airport if you are staying at waikiki hotels, since it costs only $9 one way and $15 round trip. Our hotel was near waikiki beach, but i would not recommend staying at this hotel, since the room was extremely small and it is nothing like what they show you on the website. They even charge you for the coffee in your room, which i felt was too much. Also in honolulu you have to pay parking charges per night to park your car at the hotel, so add $15 more to your daily stay rate. After nice relaxing night sleep we got over our jet lag and were ready to explore Oahu !! We decided to take a stroll at waikiki beach, gather some information about different tours and get a map of Oahu with different tourist points. The first day we decided to try out their Bus to go to Pearl Harbor from Waikiki. It was a Bad Idea !!!! It took us 1 1/2 hrs to reach pearl harbor and getting back was no different. Fortunately we reached there just in time for the last show of imax movie on the pearl harbor history and boat ride to the monument . So that day we could just do pearl harbor and explored waikiki shopping in the evening. I would say if you want to do budget shopping of all the artifacts, then do not shop at waikiki, North shore shops are much cheaper than waikiki shops, and there you will find much beautiful artiacts as compared to waikiki, but if you wont have time to visit north shore then go to International Market place at kalakaua avenue, it has lots of variety to choose from. On the corner of kalakua avenue we visited Waikiki shopping plaza where we got a chance to watch Hula dancing. If you are interested in shopping at branded shops and high fashion boutiques then visit Ala Moana center, its on ala moana blvd. Further down the road you can also visit restaurant row, its a downtown gathering place for food, lots of road side shows, and movies.
Since we were on a budget trip we had our dinner at a local chinese food truck. I strongly recommend you to try Rainbow drive in (on Kapahulu avenue) for your lunch and breakfast if you are staying in waikiki. Its cheap, its tasty and its local hawaiian !!
After our adventure with their Bus system, we decided to rent a car. I would advice you to book your hotel and car together when you are booking online, since we found out that booking your car after reaching in honolulu is very expensive !!! Its a lot cheaper if you book online coupled with you hotel bookings. Car is a must thing to explore Oahu. Once we got our car we went to Daimond head mountain, its a steep hike but its worth the trouble !! The view of waikiki beach from the top of the mountain makes your foot ache disappear !! Make sure to carry your water bottles with you, and wear comfortable shoes. From Daimond head its a beautiful sea side drive to Hanauma bay. They charge you $5 entry fee to get in and show you a movie on how to protect coral reefs when you are down there snorkelling. This bay has beautiful coral reefs so don't forget to carry your snorkelling gear . They do have a renting facility once you get down there, but its $12 per person. I would advice you to buy a snorkelling gear if you are a frequent snorkeller. From Hanuma bay we visited sandy beach, Halona blow hole, and Pali lookout (again, the view from pali look out is beyond words) since they are all nearby. Next day we went to kailua beach, where you can do kayaking or surf gliding. You can rent a kayak for $25 here at the kailua beach park.
After 4 days at waikiki we had booked our stay at Turtle Bay resort, on the north shore. I would highly recommend staying at north shore for number of reasons. It is slow paced, beautiful and country like part of Oahu. Here the pace is slower and landscapes are greener, surf is higher, food is cheaper, and reefs are prettier. If you can, book your stay at Turtle Bay resort, since all the rooms of this resort have ocean view, and its spectacular. If you are a golf player, turtle bay golf course is one of the top rated golf courses at Hawaii. They also have horse stables here, so you can go horse back riding along the beach. At this resort you have to pay extra $20 per day resort fees, but it includes parking, one hour snorkelling gear, beach towel, access to their fitness center and wireless internet. Food is expensive at the resort but there are number of shrimps trucks at 5 minutes drive from the resort. I would recommend eating at Fumi's shrimp truck their spicy garlic shrimp still makes my mouth water. After reading about Giovannis shrimp truck in all these travel brochures we tried their hot and spicy shrimp and scampi shrimp, we must say it was complete waste of money !! Now we think twice before following the recommendations in these travel brochures.
Our resort was at 10min drive from Polynesian culture center, which is a must see. But do not book their Luau (Luau is hawaiian style dinner), its a waste of money, and the food is really bad. Instead, i would recommend buying their $43 general admission or Admission/show package for $58 (Horizons night show is worth the money), where you can visit 8 different replicas of polynesian villages and it allows you to return to the center within three days to enjoy the villages which you have missed or if want to revisit them . There are lots of fun activities and shows at these villages and it takes almost entire day to visit all 8 villages. Twilight Ali Luau is a total rip off, since they only let you in after 4pm and the dinner seating starts at 5pm, so you have no time to visit more than 2 villages.
I would recommend you to visit Dole plantation in the day time which is at 20min drive from the resort, then go to polynesian center around noon time spend your rest of the day visiting as many different villages as you can, watch the horizons show and next day revisit the polynesian center to cover the rest of the villages. By this way you can maximizes the usage of $58.
Now about Dole plantation, do not take the train tour, there is nothing to see other than open pineapple fields. On the train they play some recorded history of Dole family and how they harvest the pineapple crop ( this information is already displayed on the board near ticket counter) and then play some hawaiian music. Instead of doing the train i would recommend doing the maze visit, atleast its more interesting. Overall do not expect much from your visit to the Dole plantation. Their pineapple ice-cream was good.
At the north shore there are really beautiful beaches like Sunset beach & waimea beach which are good for surfing. During winter time you will see lots of surfers here, its fun to watch them do their tricks. You can also visit Haleiwa historic village. Its a quite little town, with lots of art shops. If you are interested you can book your whale watching trip here, its $80 per person, they gaurantee you will see lots of whales. We didn't do this since we thought it was quite pricy.
For breakfast at north shore, go to Teds Breakfast and Lunch, its only $6.50 for breakfast of eggs with fried rice.
For shopping artifacts there is a wood carving shop near Fumi's shrimp truck, its very cheap and really good collection. You should be able to see a sign board outside saying Unusual beads and glass boat, the wood carving shop is next to the shop of Unusual beads. You can buy lots and lots of nice wooden artifacts like wooden turtles, wooden Tiki, photo frames etc at a very low price.

We had fun at Hawaii, enjoyed the warm weather, did lots of activities, saw tropical beauty and ate lots of sea food.
I hope you guys find these recommendations helpful. My next post will be on our tour of Las Vegas, Bryce canyon, Zion National Park, Glen Canyon and Antelope canyon, all together. It was one amazing trip !!!!!
Mahalo (Thank You) !!