Two new experiences on a great Hawaiian island.
I’ve been to Oahu at least seven or eight or maybe even 10 times. But I’d somehow never stayed the night anywhere other than Waikiki Beach and had only driven to other parts of the island a couple of times.
This time I decided I needed to see a little more, so I managed short but wonderful visits to the Makaha area and the windward coastal areas between Kaneohe and Turtle Bay.
Punch Bowl Military Cemetery
My Dad and my sister were with me on most of my Oahu visit, so we made a point of doing some things the others wanted to do. For my Dad, one of the things on his list was a visit to Punch Bowl, an extinct volcano crater in Honolulu that’s also a military cemetery. A friend of my Dad’s brother, Allen Bresnahan, was killed just a few weeks before World War II ended and is buried here, so we stopped to pay our respects and lay a flower lei on his gravestone, which we managed to find courtesy of a couple of apps I found on my iPhone. It could’ve taken us hours, but instead it was maybe a two-minute search.
I never met Allen, who died well before I was born. But it felt good to leave flowers for someone who fought for his country and paid the ultimate price. We stood silently over the grave for a few minutes. My Dad, who served in the U.S. Army in the 1950s, then reached over and gave a hug to my sister and I.
The Pali Lookout on Oahu is a great spot to use the panorama feature on your iPhone. JIM BYERS PHOTO
From there it was up to the famous Pali lookout, a high-on-the-mountain viewing area with diagrams that show how Hawaii’s King Kamehameha came to Oahu from the Big Island and won a decisive victory, pushing his enemies over the towering cliffs to their deaths.
For all its tragic history, it’s a stunningly beautiful place to soak in views of the windward coast of Oahu, including the jagged, deep green mountains that march from Honolulu towards the north shore. There are great hiking trails in the area for folks who don’t mind absurd heights and steep, white-knuckle terrain.
I’ve been to Oahu maybe eight times now but this was the first time I remember driving up the windward coast to reach the north shore of the island. I don’t know why I hadn’t done it before but I wish I had.
The contrast to Honolulu is amazing. We spotted a couple of modest high-rises but most of the roughly one-hour drive from Kanoehe to Turtle Bay was old-time Hawaii; small beaches, pretty, off-shore islands surrounded by sparkling water, little clusters of businesses. We were getting hungry and saw signs for something called the Shrimp Shack in Hauula, so we pulled over at Punalu’u Beach Park and walked across the road.
The truck is a big yellow affair that’s parked in front of Ching’s grocery store, itself a great old throwback to simpler times. We paid about $10 per person for plates heaped with spicy shrimp and rice and for piles of fresh mussels. I had a soft drink but my Dad and sister wanted a beer. The only way they can do that is for you to buy your beer inside the grocery store, then take it outside in a paper bag.
Father and son sharing beers out of a paper bag. Talk about sophistication. CHRISTINE BYERS PHOTO
The grocery store has great old photos and a large number of displays about island life and the Ching family.
Not to overstate the point about a trip filled with lovely restaurants and great hotels, but the Shrimp Shack and the drive were definitely one of the highlights of our family visit. Which is a great lesson about travel and not having big expectations and being open to the little things in life.
We stopped briefly at Waimea Bay to get photos of my sister and I (we both loved surf music in the 1960’s and often listened to songs about this famous surfing spot) and drove through the great little town of Haleiwa on the way back to Honolulu.
The day before my Dad arrived on the island my sister and I had taken our rental car and driven from the Four Seasons Oahu resort up to Makaha to see the leeward or dry side of the island. It’s not as lush as the moist, windward side, but the mountains are striking and the beaches go on just shy of forever.
The west coast of Oahu near Makaha. JIM BYERS PHOTO
We wanted a real “locals” experience for lunch so stopped at an old diner in Waianae called Hannara, which has tons of character and serves up ENORMOUS plates of simple food for insanely cheap prices. I had a large serving of kalua pig with two scoops of white rice, a scoop of macaroni salad and a small dish of marinated raw salmon (lomi lomi salmon) for $10 USD.
The road was crowded around Makaha as it was Presidents’ Day weekend and there was a surf competition going on. Things were much more quiet near the end of the road on the west end of the island. But we didn’t mind the stops and starts on the way home, because the locals were having such a great time. There was a woman of a certain age in the passenger seat of the car in front of us as we made our way back towards Honolulu, and people of all ages kept recognizing her (even teenagers) and running to the car to give her a kiss and say hello and ask about her family.
It’s one of the things I love most about Hawaii, so we just relaxed and watched the show.
Hanauma Bay State Park on Oahu. JIM BYERS PHOTO
We also did the short drive from Honolulu to Kaneohe via the east coast of the island, winding our way past Hanauma Bay and then over to the Makapu’u Overlook, a dramatic hunk of rock overlooking the windward coast of Oahu. Unfortunately, we got stuck in a major storm just after leaving Hanauma Bay State Park and couldn’t really enjoy the beaches or the scenery, but it’s a wonderful part of the island that’s an easy drive from Waikiki. I highly recommend the snorkelling at the incredible reef at Hanauma and a shot at body surfing at Sandy Beach, a favourite of former President Barack Obama when he was a kid. I also love the water and sand at Lanikai Beach.
By all means, enjoy Waikiki Beach and Honolulu. But be sure to get out and see other parts of Oahu and enjoy the quiet spots where the locals go.
HAWAII INFORMATION: www.gohawaii.com/ca
