Mahalo Kona, Aloha Waikiki

 Aloha friends!  What a day it has been?!  We had another great night's sleep and woke up bright and early (7am and 7:30am) to another beautiful day in Kona.  Our check out was 11am so we ate breakfast and enjoyed the last of the views 🏖🌴 before showering, packing, and heading to the airport.  We returned the rental car and then they shuttled us to the Kona (KOA) airport where checking our one bag was quick and easy.  We were leaving out of Gate 4 - that's one of 5 of the KOA open-air gates.  The breeze and shade made the wait not bad at all.  We walked out to the plane, took the ramp up, and found our way into the exit row (window - no one in the middle 👏 - aisle) for the extra leg room and enjoyed the 30-minute flight back to Honolulu (Oahu island).  

Our Uber driver (Lawrence, a military veteran from NY who has lived on Oahu for 40+ years) took us to the Hilton Hawaiian which is a beachside resort-type property with shops, restaurants, and 3 pools right on the property.  Is this real life?!  We check in and things get better.  He asked if we wanted to upgrade to the Rainbow 🌈tower - the one from TV you guys - we said yes - YOLO!!!!!!!!  😂😂  We walk into our room and it has TWO balconies!  We have the doors open to both at the same time and the cross breeze is amazing.  Look at this view!  💝 We cannot believe we'll be here for the next 6.5 days!

We broke ourselves away from the room and made our way to get some food.  We stopped at a shop first and Chris (C) now has two shirts made in Hawaii - aka Hawaiian shirts 😏 or it is a double Hawaiian shirt or a Hawaiian-Hawaiian shirt and LouAnna (L) has two dresses also made in Hawaii...you get the idea.  Watch for them to show up in pics this week.  😉  We passed a tattoo shop and LouAnna was pretty sure that's where she wanted to get inked up before returning home.  First, food.  So, we found an Italian place close by that had a trio of bruschetta that L wanted to try.  Dinner choices were: mushroom risotto with shrimp for L and C got the 12oz rib eye.  Yummy and the service was really good and fast. 

We stopped back by the tattoo shop and set up the appointment for Sunday morning.  Let's go!  We walked around more shops, snap a few photos, then take the leftover risotto back to the room and then put on our swimming suits and head to the beach.  Let's get C into the Pacific Ocean for the first time, already!  The beach is sandy and the water is warm.  We took a sunset stroll along the beach - are we in a Hallmark movie?  Plot: Simple but adork'able midwestern couple go to Waikiki for the first time - stop me if you've seen this one.  

Alright, LouAnna has her conference starting tomorrow.  We need to get to sleep.  Goodnight moon, from Waikiki.