Hawaii Day 4

We decided to rent a car so we can drive to the hikes we want to do. After researching the options we ended up renting a complete piece of shit from a nearby gas station- a 1990 toyota corrolla which cost like 220 bucks a week including tax. I knew something was off when we drove off the lot and the steering wheel was literally turned 30 degrees to the left- serious alignment issue. We went for our hike- more on that later and came back to flat tire- we put some air in and got replacement- 91 corrolla that has been fine. We did one of my favorite hikes (can't remember name) that is the trail above the Manoa falls. It goes through numerous bamboo forests and leads to a killer view. After we sorted out our tire issue we had Udon at http://www.yelp.com/biz/jimbo-restaurant-honolulu which has truly authentic Udon and killer tempura. Amy was very impressed by it. After our hike we did some lounging on the beach with homemade mai tais and then headed to http://www.yummyhawaii.com/yummy.htm which is a fast food korean bbq place that is really good.

Hawaii Day 3

We did very little today- sat by the beach and had mai tais and had a killer ramen lunch. it was great. Very little to write about. Oh and we had massages at http://www.themassagespecialists.com/. This place was quite the find on yelp- very cheap and excellent massage therapists- it was so good.

Hawaii Day 2

We woke up early and headed to the http://www.halekulani.com/ hotel- to meet up with some family friend's of Amy's whose trip to Hawaii coincided with ours. This is the only 5 star hotel in waikiki and it's really beautiful and is a fantastic place to have breakfast as the restaurant has a great patio with a killer view. We all ate the same thing- a version of eggs benedict with kahlua pork (the well known traditional hawaiian pork) that was really good. After breakfast we headed to the North Shore with my buddy Raymond and on the way stopped at http://www.leonardshawaii.com/ to get Malasadas. A malasada (or malassada) is a Portuguese confection. They were first made by inhabitants of São Miguel Island, part of the Azores. Malasadas are made of egg-sized balls of yeast dough that are deep-fried in oil and coated with granulated sugar. A popular variation is where they are hand dropped into the oil and people have to guess what they look like. These are one of those culinary delights that is extremely simple and extremely good. Amy of course loved them.

We stopped at Sunset beach- http://www.northshore.com/hawaii/sunset-beach-hawaii.asp for our first real beach experience. It was super hot and sunny which was great given the lack of summer weather in New England this summer.

From the beach we headed to Romy's shrimp truck and had some tasty prawns. This was followed by a shave ice in Haleiwa.

In the evening we went to Sushi Sasabune http://www.yelp.com/biz/sushi-sasabune-honolulu and had an epic sushi meal. If you sit at the sushi bar you can't order what you want- the sushi chef makes things and gives them to you and when you are full you tell them to stop and recieve your bill which is a shocker. The sushi was incredible- we had toro from spain, scallop from boston, salmon from new zealand, killer yellowtail, squid from japan that was stuffed with crab. It was definately one of the best sushi meals I have ever had.

Back in Hawaii day 1

Its sort of ironic that my last posting occurred when I was leaving Hawaii and heading back to the northeast and here I am writing again in Hawaii. We arrived on Friday at 3pm and took a very expensive cab ride to our hotel: http://www.sheraton-waikiki.com/. Due to the economic climate we got a ridiculously low rate to stay here. We got a free room upgrade because I have platinum status with Starwood Hotels. We dropped off our stuff and promptly headed to get ramen at http://www.menchankotei.com/index_E.asp which was great. We quickly fatiqued by 5 pm and took a brief nap and then then met up with my buddy Raymond and had a low key evening at his place after taking a very nice walk along waikiki beach.