This morning, we rallied the family up bright and early to do an early morning hike to Mānoa Falls. We’ve been told by local friends to do this hike early in the morning (before sunrise around 6am) to beat the tours/crowds that come after 7am.
When we got to the trailhead, it felt like we had the trail to ourselves. It’s such an amazing feeling to be able to go at our own pace and stop to admire all the beauty around us. We hiked through beautiful eucalyptus and banyan trees and even a bamboo forest to get to the falls! We truly felt like we were in an episode of Jurassic Park or Lost!
The trail was a little damp, but it took about 45 minutes to get to the falls (taking our time), where we stopped to rest and admire the peaceful sound of the falls.
As we were making our way back to the car and almost at the trailhead, we began to see massive amounts of tour groups beginning to roll into the parking lot (do the early morning hike). We quickly made our way out of the craziness, and headed to Over Easy for some local Hawaiian breakfast. In all our travels, we always try to make a point to indulge in the local cuisine. Here we had the Kalua pork hash and local banana, cream cheese & macadamia pancakes…both some of the best breakfast dishes we’ve ever had!
After breakfast, we were pretty full, so we decided to head to the beach to relax. Kailua Beach and Lanikai Beach are right next to each other, but we chose Lanikai Beach because it seemed a little quieter. We all ended up relaxing in the water for most of the time and we brought our mask/snorkel/fins, so we were all taking turns looking at the local Pacific Ocean life…we even saw a Humuhumunukunukuapua’a, which is the state fish of Hawai’i!
It was great to cool off in the Pacific Ocean waters and see some fish we had never seen before (and still can’t pronounce). Just north of Lanikai and the southeast side of Oahu is a Buddhist temple called the Byodo-in temple, which was dedicated to honor the 100th anniversary of the first Japanese immigrants to Hawai’i.
After enjoying a walk around the grounds of the temple, we drove up the windy roads of Tantalus Mountain to see the breathtaking views of Waikiki and Honolulu from the Tantalus Overlook. We enjoy hiking and adventuring like no other, but sometimes (especially when with family) it’s nice to let the car do all the work and just enjoy the scenery.
We ended our night with a nice sushi dinner at Chiba-ken. Great food, great service, and all around great day! We had a full day of exploring the south and east sides of beautiful island, and we’re only on our 2nd day! We have 2 more days here in Oahu before we head to Kauai, and there’s still so much for us to see. Tomorrow, we plan to explore the famous North Shore, so make sure you stay posted!