Hawaii...the best vacation ever!

Noel and I had the most fantastic vacation ever. We went to Hawaii to visit our friends, Dani and Michelle, and to celebrate our 5 year anniversary. Hawaii was the perfect balance of activity and relaxation, natural beauty and tourist stuff, and time with friends and time alone. From the minute we stepped off the plane, Dani and Michelle treated us like royalty. They met us with beautiful leis and had a whole week of fun planned for us.

After briefly stopping at Michelle's mom's house, we headed out to Hanuma Bay to go snorkeling. What a great introduction to Hawaii! We saw TONS of different fish, big and small, as well as 2 large sea turtles. The water was warm, beautiful, and clear. I can't imagine swimming in any other ocean after being here.

Getting ready to head out into the bay.

After snorkeling, we headed out for a short hike. The view at the top was beautiful. We loved how windy it always was. We saw "Rabbit Island" (the island in the background) and enjoyed nearly blowing away.

Hanging out at the North Shore. We enjoyed swimming and relaxing here.

We passed several shrimp farms on our way back from the North Shore. This "truck" serves some incredibly fresh and delicious shrimp. If we weren't with locals, we wouldn't have ever known to stop here. It looks a little strange and questionable. But, it is delicious! This was only one of many things that we were so thankful Dani and Michelle knew about. It was so fun to be more like a local than a tourist.

Buttery, garlicky shrimp.

Noel trying his hand at the ukulele. It's common to see people just walking down the street playing the ukulele. We met up with a few other Fuller friends one night who also live in Hawaii and they gave Noel a brief lesson.

We stopped at the Dole pineapple factory on our way to the North Shore and enjoyed eating some fresh pineapple and pineapple ice cream.

Neither of us knew how pineapple grew until we visited the factory. It was really neat to see! How did you think pineapple grew?

Enjoying some fresh pizza after a day at the beach and hiking.

I loved being in the ocean and exploring all the different beaches. I told Noel I wished I could be a fish and swim all day every day. I also wish I could go body boarding every weekend. It was SO fun! We don't have pictures of it because it was raining that day and we were all in the ocean (no one to take the picture), but it's basically like surfing, but on a smaller board on your stomach. There are always great waves at Bellows Beach and I was fortunate enough to catch several of them!...and get pummeled by a few. :)

Shaved ice is really popular in Hawaii. We went to one of the most famous shaved ice places. You can get either ice cream or azuki beans underneath the ice. I tried the beans and they were delicious! They are really sweet. I'm definitely going to try my hand at cooking them at home. Michelle always teases me saying that I must be part Japanese since I like so many Japanese things.

The four of us outside Michelle's mom's house.

From the top of the Pali lookout, we saw Noel's future place of employment...First Presbyterian Church of Hawaii. Just kidding. :) Though it is fun to think about!

After staying with Dani and Michelle for a couple of nights, we stayed in a hotel in Waikiki for 3 nights. We were on the 36th floor, which had a fantastic view. We loved the Pacific Beach Hotel!

Waikiki is the place to surf. There are people there all day, just hanging out in the ocean, waiting for waves. The water is shallow, which I guess is good for surfing. Also, you can rent a board or pay for a lesson there. Maybe next time we'll try this out!

I think this is called a banyan tree. It's really incredible! It's made up of mostly vines, that grow close together and form a trunk.

The tall building in the back is the part of the hotel we stayed in. There are 37 floors and we were on floor 36. So fun!

Dani and Michelle took us to a local favorite sushi place called Genki. We've seen sushi places with the conveyor belt, but this one was much better.
Unfortunately, Michelle cut her hand pretty badly on a glass just before coming here. She probably should've gotten stitches, but made her own bandage instead.

Noel is deciding which plate to grab. At then end of eating, the server just adds up the total based on how many plates you have and what color they are. Each color is a different price. It's a fun way to be able to try lots of different things for a really good price!

Enjoying some Japanese delights!

We went to a water park one day, which was lots of fun! We raced down some of the slides, screamed a lot on the slides, and had the most gourmet picnic lunch packed by Michelle.

After a long day at the water park, we headed to the beach for the sunset. Noel and Michelle ended up tying in a great game of Scrabble!

We fell in love with this local ice cream place, Bubbies. They are famous for their mochi ice cream, which we indulged in 3 times during our stay. They have more flavors of mochi ice cream than I have ever seen. It was so delicious! I call Bubbies the "21 Choices of Hawaii". We tried chocolate peanut butter, azuki bean, watermelon, strawberry dark chocolate chip, guava, mint chocolate, raspberry, and more! I REALLY want to learn how to make it and have been searching for recipes. I found a few for plain mochi and will have to experiment with getting the flavors into it. I'll wait for Michelle to return to CA to help me with that. She and Dani are moving back in less than a month!

Noel hanging out on the balcony of our hotel.

We had some funny injuries while we were there. The first day, I knocked my knee on the reef while snorkeling and got a bruise. I also got hit by the body board and got another bruise. Then, I hit my head on the inside of a tube slide at the water park. I still have a scab! Finally, the last day, Noel got stung by a bee on his knuckle. His finger is still swollen and he can't get his wedding ring on. We laughed a lot about our "injuries".

When having dinner with our other friends from Fuller, Guy and Lori, Lori told us that her dad worked in Waikiki and would take us out on a canoe for free! This was incredibly fun! We paddled out quite far into the ocean, turned around, and caught huge waves that we rode all the way into shore! It was basically like surfing in a canoe. We were able to go out on 2 separate occasions and caught 3 waves each time. The ride was very thrilling!

We recommend that everyone take a vacation to Oahu at some point in their lives. It was the most incredible place we've ever been and we really hope to be able to return some day.

We are also so excited that Dani and Michelle are moving back to Pasadena in less than a month! Michelle's coming back to Fuller to finish her PhD in psychology after taking a leave of absence. We are so excited to have them around again as they were great friends to us ever since we moved here.