Dole Plantation is one of the most popular tourist attraction on the Hawaii island of Oahu. It is located on Kamehameha Highway and it is about an hour drive from Waikiki. It attracts thousands of visitor each year and parking lot fills up very quickly. So it is important to go there early.
We left Waikiki around 8:30AM and got to Dole Plantation at around 9:30AM since it opens at 9:30AM. When we got there, the parking lot is already 75% full, we were glad to find parking space to park our car. The location of Dole Plantation is really easy to find as well, so there is no way that you will miss it.
When we got there, the first thing is to purchase tickets. There were 3 different activities to choose from. The first was the train ride. The activity required you to ride the train and the train will go around the plantation farm and show you how pineapple is being planted. It also shows you how pineapple juice is made. The train ride is on first come first serve basis, so it will be the best to take the train ride first if you are going for this activity.
The second activity is the Pineapple Garden Maze. We were not quite sure why it is called Pineapple Garden Maze since we did not find a single pineapple in there! The maze activity involves you to find 8 hidden stations in the maze. Once you have located the stations, slide the game card under metal plate and stencil the shape of the figure on the game card. Once you find all 8 stations, rush back to the exit and find out how long it took you to complete. This was quite fun and challenging! We had a lot of fun doing this. Dole Plantation did provide a map of the maze indicating where all 8 stations are so that people can find them easily. Obviously, if you like the challenge, you can ignore the map and try to find all 8 stations yourself. We saw several kids and people ignoring the rules and taking short cuts under the trees. We recommend not to do that since it defeats the purpose of the maze.
The third activity is the Garden Walk. There is this nice small tropical garden at Dole Plantation. The garden has many different tropical flowers and trees planted very nicely around the pond. The pond has a lot of purple lily flowers in it. We found this to be interesting as well since we are from the great white North. We are used to see pine trees and pine cones, but have not experienced any tropical gardens ourselves. The garden is quite small though, so that is the down side of this. After visiting all the activities, there are also several pineapple plants along the outside of the garden. It was just interesting to see how pineapples are grown.
Later we went into the food building to get some food for lunch. The first thing is pineapple ice cream of course! The ice cream is just so good! Unlike other ice creams that we have tried, this pineapple ice cream is not creamy at all. It had a very fresh taste of pineapple and we think it is non-dairy. Other than the ice cream, we ordered a pineapple pulled pork sandwich, which is very ordinary. Nothing really special about the sandwich. We were disappointed that there wasn't any pineapple juice available on that day and thus we could not try some. On the way out, we grabbed few bags of dried mango and it was amazing! First, we love mango. Second, this dry mango is so sweet and refreshing! We loved it! Overall, Dole Plantation is a must visit place for people visiting Oahu and pineapple ice cream is a must try here!
L&L Hawaiian BBQ is a franchise restaurant through out the state of Hawaii. It is not really a fast food restaurant like McDonald's or Burger King. It is more like a restaurant where they actually cook the meat after you placed your order. Since we went to Hawaii for vacation, trying out the authentic Hawaiian BBQ is a must!
We went to L&L Hawaiian BBQ after Diamond Head hiking trail and Koko Crater hiking trail. We were extremely exhausted due to the difficulty of Koko Crater hiking trail. We were so hungry and figured that this is the best time to try out L&L Hawaiian BBQ. We drove to L&L and found that the restaurant is quite small. There were only 9 tables in the restaurant and not many people in there. We figured that most people probably just order take out. After starring at the menu for several minutes, we decided to order BBQ Chicken and Mixed BBQ meal. We ordered both of them as regular portion and this was a HUGE mistake. The regular portion of the meal is huge!
The BBQ Chicken meal came with 3 giant pieces of chicken, 4 scoops of rice, and about 2 scoops of macaroni salad. This is a lot of food! We should have ordered the tiny size of the meal. The menu only offers tiny and regular. The Mixed BBQ meal came with 2 pieces of chicken, 1 serving of teriyaki beef, and 1 piece of short rib! This is a lot of meat! We could not finish the meal at all! For a portion this big, we could probably have this for the next 3 meals! Nonetheless, the BBQ chicken and beef are amazing. I love the crispy texture of the BBQ chicken and the BBQ sauce is sweet. Teriyaki beef is tender and juicy as well. Just the way how it should be. The BBQ rib is really good too. It was chewy but easy to bite the bone off. While we were at the restaurant and enjoying our feast, we did see many people coming in and out ordering the food. So as what we expected, most people just order take out. Although the restaurant is not a fast food restaurant, it was able to serve food to its customers rather quickly. We only had to wait for a bit over 5 minutes to get our food and enjoy the meal! In general, this is a must try place when you go to Hawaii since it offers authentic Hawaiian BBQ experience!
Ramen Nakamura is a restaurant located in Waikiki and serves mainly Japanese Ramen. We were just walking around Waikiki in the evening looking for a place to have dinner and found this place. When we got there around 6pm, there were already few people waiting in line. The good thing is that the line was moving fast and we did not need to wait for a long time.
We waited for about 15 minutes and got our seat. The restaurant is small and has about 25 seats in total. All seating areas are around the bar. Nakamura does offer some uniqueness to its Ramen. It has this ox tail flavored Ramen which I have never seen before. We did not order the ox tail Ramen however, since we are not very adventurous about it. Instead, we ordered a Miso Ramen, and a Ramen combo. Miso Ramen is an ordinary Ramen with lots of flavor. The Ramen combo comes with your choice of Ramen, a small bowl of fried rice, and 3 pieces of gyoza. It is a pretty big portion I would say.
We did not find the Ramen to be very special or have better taste than other Ramen restaurants that we have been to. We were not sure why there were people waiting in line to be honest. Perhaps we should have tried ox tail Ramen since that seems to be the signature dish. One thing we find interesting is that this restaurant accepts Japanese Yen! We were curious how that actually work since exchange rate varies. Not sure how the restaurant actually charge the food for Japanese Yen. Overall, this restaurant meets the standard, but it is not really a must try place since there are other Ramen restaurants in the area.
Marukame Udon is a must try place when you visit Oahu! It offers that best Udon that we have ever had! Marukame Udon is located just 3 blocks North of Waikiki so we just walked to there from our hotel. When we go there around 5PM in the evening, there was already a long line up in front of the restaurant. Since we really wanted to try this place, we waited in line. We were originally worried that we will have to wait for over an hour, but the line was moving fast. We entered the restaurant after 30 minutes waiting in line.
The restaurant is a bit different from other ordinary restaurants, where you get seats first then order your food. Instead, at Marukame, you order your food and pay first, then find your seat. We got a curry Udon and a regular Udon. Other than that, we also go some tempuras to go along with it.
The Udon noodle served at Marukame is just amazing! The noodle is really tender and chewy. The noodle isn't over cooked either. The soup broth is amazing too! It got a lot of flavor in it. We would recommend people to order the Udon with just the soup and the would give the most authentic taste. The only issue I have with this restaurant is that it needs a bigger and stronger AC unit! It gets really hot in the restaurant during a humid and hot day. We were sweating while having our Udon! Before we left the restaurant, we also grabbed 2 rice balls for our breakfast tomorrow! Overall, this is a place where you must go to when visiting Oahu! Don't get intimidated by the number of people in line since the line does move quickly!
Koko Crater trail is a straight trail that is built on top of the abandoned rail way. It is located just across from Hanauma Bay. Since the famous Haiku Stairs (stair to heaven) is an illegal climb, we decided to try this Koko Crater trail climb. Tourists don't usually come to this trail and most tourists just do Diamond Head trail instead.
When we got to the trail head, there were many people making the climb. This trail is 1.8 miles long that goes straight towards summit of Koko Crater. Most web sites label it as a trail with moderate difficulty, but I would say this is a difficult trail although it is only 1.8. miles. This trail has a very steep climb and the wooden logs on the trail makes it even hard to climb.
The beginning of the trail is easy and smooth. However, after about 10 minutes of climb, the elevation starts to gain sharply. Every step we took is start to hurt our knees. At around half way mark, the rail way path start to elevate above the ground and we could only walk on the logs carefully to prevent falling down. This is the most dangerous part of the hike. Some people choose to take a detour and go around it via a small path on the side of the trail. After an hour of hard fought hike, we finally reached the top. The view was breath taking and beautiful. We were able to see everything from the Koko Crater summit! We could even see the entire Hanauma Bay from the summit.
There are few bunkers and abandoned huts on the top of the summit. Some people climb onto the rooftop of the abandoned facility. Just be very careful not to go too close to the edge of the cliff since the ground is quite sandy and slippery. We actually saw a boy slipped and fall. Good thing that he was able to grab on to the branch and did not slip further. Going back down the trail is a bit tiring too. For most part, we went down on side ways since the trail is steep. When we got down, our knees were hurting badly. In general, we do not recommend this trail for any beginner hikers. However, if you are an experienced hiker, this is an amazing trail to do and the summit has breath taking view!
Diamond Head hiking trail starts inside the crater of Diamond Head. It is one of the most visited trail in Oahu. Diamond Head is very close to Waikiki and only takes about 15 minutes to get to drive from Waikiki. The parking lot is located in the middle of the crater and the entrance fee is about $5 per vehicle. Some people parked the car outside of the crater and walked into the crater. In this case, the entrance fee is $1 per person.
We got to Diamond Head crater around 8AM in the morning and we are lucky that there are still parking space available for cars. If there isn't any parking space available, you will have to wait outside until one becomes available. So it's the best to go there as early as possible.
The trail itself is not very long. From the start of the trail to the summit, the trail is only 1.6 miles long and most part of the trail is well paved. There is a portion of the trail where you can into the tunnel and it is quite dark in there. Be very careful if you are a tall person since the top of the cave is not very high. Once you get out of the tunnel, there are 2 way to go. For people who are energetic, you can take the path to the right, which is walking up the stairs. The left path is easier and does not involve walking up stairs. We took the path on the right and walked up the stairs. Once we got up there, there is another narrow spiral stair to climb. This spiral stair is quite narrow and it is better to only have people going up to take this route.
After the spiral stair, we were inside a bunker. The bunker has the view to Waikiki. In order to get out of the bunker without going back down the spiral stair case, there is a very small opening where we had to climb through. Then we continue to walk up the trail and finally reached the top of Diamond Head and there were tons of people! The top of Diamond Head provides 360 degree of view and we were able to see the whole crater and Waikiki. We were also able to see the light house at the coast, which is pretty cool. Overall, Diamond Head trail is a place that you must go to when visiting Oahu. If you can, we recommend you to go there as early as 6AM to see the sunrise!
Giovanni's Shrimp Truck is a famous (if not the most famous) food truck on the island of Oahu! It is located near the town of Haleiwa and it is about an hour of drive from Waikiki. Since we are from Portland, which is a city with tons of food truck, this is something that we definitely need to try.
Giovanni's Shrimp Truck is located on Kamehameha Highway. We got there around 2PM and it was extremely difficult to find a place to park the car. It took us around 30 minutes to find a suitable parking place and we had to park the car 10 minutes down the road and walk back to where Giovanni's is. We saw many tourist taking bus to get here, but we do not know how long it actually took them to get here. When we got to Giovanni's, the ordering line was long. We waited in line for 10 minutes to get our order placed. There wasn't much choice on the menu to order and we just ordered scampi shrimp and lemon butter shrimp.
After 30 minutes of wait time, we finally got our order. The scampi shrimp smells so good since it is flavored with garlic. Both dishes came with 12 shrimps in each plate and shrimps were cooked perfectly. Scampi shrimp has a lot more flavors due to the garlic of course, but we did also enjoyed the regular butter dip shrimp. The rice on the plate however, is quite disappointing. It does not taste good at all. We did not even finish the rice. We looked around and the Japanese tourists beside us think the rice was cooked poorly as well. The dining environment around the place is not as good as we would want. There were tons of flies when we were having the shrimp. It was really nasty. Thus it was difficult for us to enjoy the shrimp slowly since we just wanted to finish the shrimp and get away from the flies as soon as possible. Overall, the shrimp is amazing from Giovanni's. The only downside is the rice and it is extremely difficult to find a parking spot there. We recommend to drop off someone and order the food first, and then look for parking. This way you don't actually waste time on both looking for parking and waiting for food. The amount of flies there was a problem too but hopefully that will be addressed in the future.
Hanauma Bay is one of the best snorkeling place on the Hawaii Island of Oahu! It is located at SouthEast side of Oahu Island and attracts thousands of visitors every day. Hanauma Bay is very close to Waikiki and very accessible to the tourists. It only takes 20-30 minutes of drive from Waikiki to Hanauma Bay. Many hotels at Waikiki even offer shuttle bus to go directly from hotel to Hanauma Bay. City of Honolulu offers bus ride to Hanauma Bay as well.
If you decide to drive to Hanauma, I recommend to plan to get there before 7:30. We left Waikiki and headed to Hanauma Bay around 6:30AM and got to Hanauma Bay just a bit before 7AM. The parking lot is already half full and many cars were coming in. The parking lot fills up very fast and once the parking lot is full, the guards will not let anyone else in. Thus it is better to arrive early. Besides, if you arrive before 7, there is not parking fee!
Once we get to Hanauma Bay, the entry ticket is $7.50 per person. Then visitors are required to watch a 9 minutes long video about Hanauma Bay and things to be cautious about. If you have visited the place and watched the video in the past year, you can skip this video and head down directly to the bay. The walk down to the bay is pretty easy, but may be difficult for elderly people. There are rides for people to take and it will take you all the way down to the bay. The ride cost around $1.50 each way if I remember correctly.
At the bay, there are fins and goggles that you can rent. Thus you do not need to worry about bringing your own snorkeling gear. There are also lockers for rent, but those lockers are tiny! We only put valuable things such as wallet and keys at the locker. We brought the rest of things to the beach with us. We went on a Saturday and the water was calm. The water is some what clear, but does not offer the best visibility. Snorkeling was still fun however. We were able to snorkel around easily and got to see various species of colorful fish. Most fish can be found around the area with coral. We even saw an eel snailing through the bottom of the ocean floor! Remember not to touch anything here!
By 9AM, it started to get crowded and more people were coming in. The water was getting less clear due to the amount of people moving in the water and stirred up the sand. So if you want to get a clear shot of the fish, it is better to arrive arrive early in the early morning. When we head back at around 11AM, the parking lot was full. We saw many cars trying to come in to Hanauma Bay but the guard told them to turn around. Thus arriving early is very important! In general, this is a great place to do snorkeling on Oahu! Remember to bring a GoPro to capture all the cool fish in the photo when you snorkel! Also, keep in mind that Hanauma Bay is closed to public on every Tuesday.
