Where I spent the last five days

[swan_tower]

My parents need to have fortieth anniversaries more often. ^_^

Comments

[kurayami-hime.livejournal.com]

I mentioned to your husband upon his posting of pictures that it has been snowing here. The snowing has stopped, but the cold hasn't. If you need me, I will be hiding under blankets and thinking longingly about building with insulation. :P

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I have considered and discarded several responses that begin with "If it's any comfort," because it probably isn't.

So, um. Yeah. Stay warm?

[kurayami-hime.livejournal.com]

That should have been "buildings", but I figure you knew that. Or assumed my fingers were frozen so anything even half resembling a sentence would be considered a win.

It's actually not all that bad here. I could turn the heater up and not be energy efficient, or I could just continue drinking excessive amounts of tea. I bought an electric tea kettle. This means I can have tea ALL THE TIME without even needing to leave my room as there is a sink here. The fact that the kettle looks like a deranged sea porpoise (only noticed after acquisition) makes it even better.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Heh. Forty-one is also an excellent number, and worth celebrating. You might point that out, in a nudging kind of way.

[akashiver.livejournal.com]

Oh, that looks nice.

[shui-long.livejournal.com]

You're just trying to make us jealous ... and succeeding.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Don't think we didn't . . . <g>

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

It was absolutely lovely.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

:-)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I think there may need to be pics of the deranged porpoise kettle.

[spiffikins]

oh how lovely!

Would you be willing to share the name of the hotel and area you stayed in, and what you liked/didn't like about it? I really want to go to Hawaii this year, and haven't a clue how to find a good hotel/area :)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Definitely! We were at the JW Marriott Ihilani, in Ko Olina, on the southwest corner of Oahu. It's part of a whole set of hotels and such down there; they've built a set of four artificial lagoons (the fourth of which is visible in the distance there), in which you can swim and such. There's also a marina at the far end of the lagoons, from which depart trips for whale-watching, snorkeling, and so on.

The hotel itself was nice, though I wasn't impressed with the quality of the food at most of the restaurants, given the price they charge. Also, that's the extreme leeward corner of the island, meaning it doesn't get a lot of rain, so the natural landscape is much less verdant. However, it's also less windy than the north shore (where all the good surfing is) or the windward side, and if you rent a car, it's very easy to drive all over Oahu. It's a LOT quieter than Waikiki, which was a selling point for us, but may not be as much so for others with different tastes.

Maui is also very nice; when we went about twenty years ago, that's where we stayed. I don't remember much about it, though, other than "sand and sea and sun" and other such obvious things. :-) It's better for whale-watching, is all I know, because it's right alongside what amounts to the major whale highway down from Alaska.