Holiday to Hawaii in Aug 2013: Day 14 – Pearl Harbor

Planning to be up by 6am so that we can get to Pearl Harbor by 7am to pick up our tickets for the start of our tour at 8am. Vick’s snoring away nicely, and I’m bringing the blog up to date.

Starbucks opens at 5:30am so that’s good timing. Managed to get our drinks, yoghurt raspberry peach breakfast pots and out of the hotel by 6:30am. Took ages to get to Pearl Harbor and then joined a massive queue to get in. Most everyone wasn’t even on the first tour at 8am!

Anyway, the USS Arizona memorial was an amazing feature, starting from the film that explains the background as to why the Japanese attacked, and some film of the actual events. Plenty of Japanese there as well. Would have been interesting to understand what they were thinking as they went around the memorial.

Actually, one Japanese guy allowed his mobile to ring and then started a loud conversation on it – this is bearing in mind we had been asked to show respect by speaking in low voices and not using mobiles – given that over 900 US marines had perished in the USS Arizona which was below us. Unbelievable, but I’m afraid typical of some races in our holiday, we’ve found.

Next stop was the USS Bowfin – a submarine which is docked at the main visitor centre site. Not a very popular exhibit, but interesting to see how the submariners lived.

We then caught the shuttle to Ford Island to look around the USS Missouri, and then on to the Pacific Aviation Museum where we got lunch. We got the shuttle back and had a quick scan round the two remaining museums and then threw the towel in just after midday – long and tiring visit, but very enjoyable. A lovely dip in the Ali’i tower exclusive pool followed.

We’re talking about going back to the Cheesecake Factory for tea! Except that Rafa is on the telly!

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