HONOLULU

The Buddhist Temple

Wooden Buddha

Green sea turtles, with people shown for scale

Something different, bark of eucalyptus tree

Despite rain on our arrival into Honolulu the weather did clear to be mainly bright, fairly warm with some showers.

We were booked onto a tour entitled “Oahu’s Famous North Shore” which started with a drive over the Ko’olau Mountains to the Valley of the Temples, location of the stunning Byodo Temple.  This beautiful Buddhist temple is a replica of the 900 year old Byodo-In located in Uji, Japan.  Inside the temple is the largest wooden Buddha carved over 900 years ago and decorated with gold and lacquer.

From the temple we went to Sunset Beach, famous for its huge waves, but unfortunately these waves usually only occur in the winter season, so the sea was fairly flat.

From there we went to Turtle Beach where we were lucky enough to see three of the rare green sea turtles resting on the sand.  They are called green sea turtles because although now protected, they were hunted for food and when they were cut open their body fat was green – they live on a diet of only seaweed.

From there our final stop was to the Dole Pineapple Plantation where you can buy pineapple in all its forms, from ice cream to chocolates to spices.

Honolulu is a lovely place and because there is so much to do and see, one of only a few places we would like to visit again for a holiday. 

At sea now on our way to San Francisco which is the end of the fourth leg.  It is so hard to imagine that in just over three weeks we will be home!

Our clocks go back at 12 noon today (Monday) which will make us GMT -9 and this will continue for the next 2 days so on arrival there we will be GMT -7.