Day 4 - Pearl Harbor and on to Maui

Pearl Harbor today, then on to Maui. We got to Pearl Harbor around 8AM after having some difficulty in finding the right road (yes, I know, recurring theme) and even though we thought we had left early enough, we parked and saw a 150 yard long line waiting to get tickets. Luckily, the line was moving pretty well and we got our ticket for the 9:45AM viewing of the memorial. We got the audio tour and listened to that as we browsed around the exhibit and museum. The whole area is extremely moving and really makes you think about what all of the soldiers died for. The audio tour also had some of the survivors talking about the attack, it was just amazing. I would definitely recommend purchasing the audio tour. It explained the exhibits in depth and the personal stories were amazing.

Just before we were ready to go to our show and boat ride to the memorial, we realized that our camera battery was low and we had only brought the one camera. Before going out to the memorial, they show a movie about the attack and it really sets the tone for the visit. We took the boat ride out and wouldn't you know it, the camera completely died. So, unfortunately all of the pictures of the actual memorial are mental only. We did get some pictures from the shore, and some post cards of images from the memorial, but not quite the same.
We didn't really realize how much time we would spend in the sun at Pearl Harbor, so we weren't very diligent with sunscreen. Dan's nose ending up burned and blistered a bit. My arms and the back of my neck got a bit pink, but not terrible.

After we had finished, it was too late to really do anything before heading to the airport. So, we grabbed some lunch and returned the rental car before checking in and waiting for our flight.
Our 35 minute flight to Maui might have been the loudest ever because we were sitting right next to the engine and it was vibrating the entire seat. After a windy landing at Kahului Airport we picked up our rental car (Sebring Convertible) and headed to Kihei and our condo at the Kihei Akahi.

We had found the condo on VRBO (C310) and we were pleasantly surprised to find that the view of the ocean off the lanai was actually very nice. For the price we had expected a “partial” view of some part of the ocean. The condo was right off the main strip of Kihei so there was a bunch of restaurants and shops right down the road and the beach was 2 minutes away by foot. We grabbed some dinner at Maui Taco’s (excellent burrito, not great tacos) and then grabbed the beach chairs to witness our first Maui sunset. There is just something so relaxing about sitting on the beach, listening to the waves crash and watching the sunset. The only problem is that the island of Lanai gets in the way of the sunset, so that it actually sets behind the island and the inevitable clouds above the island.

Off to bed and ready for an easy day tomorrow.