HONOLULU, HAWAII

January 15,16 

We arrived in Honolulu Sunday morning with perfect weather greeting us.   It was great seeing land again after so many days at sea (longer because we had to skip our stop in Santa Barbara due to the storms).

We toured the Pearl Harbor Memorial - a very moving experience:   On December 7, 1941 ("a day that will live in infamy"),  Japanese planes from 4 aircraft carriers made a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor which was home to the bulk of the US's Pacific naval assets.   2,400 Americans died that day....mostly young men; another 1200 were injured.  19 ships were sunk or damaged and 350 planes were damaged or destroyed.   It was a total disaster that 'poked the sleeping bear".   Sunday night we watched the movie Battle of Midway where Admiral Nimitz and a bunch of young heroes began delivering payback.   Many historians regard that decisive battle as the turning point of the war.   

As we visited the Memorial we had fond thoughts and memories of JT Craig, Veras's oldest brother.  He came to Pearl Harbor shortly after the attack.   As part of the US Navy's Weather Service, he provided prevailing wind and weather data that was used to establish the positioning of new runways for Hickam Military Airfield (now part of Honolulu International Airport).

On Monday we took a scenic walking tour of WALMART.  Actually the walk to and from was 5 miles, so we definitely got our steps in and Vera is nearly back to full strength.   We needed to replenish some stuff and this was our last visit to a US store until May.   (David, I waited too long to book a Diamond Head hike...so we'll have to come back for that one.)

One of our unexpected observations:   there are lots of feral chickens, roosters, hens and chicks running around the streets of Honolulu looking for a handout.   

We enjoyed our brief visit to Hawaii and now we are off to Bora Bora.   

                                   Map of Pearl Harbor.   Battleships in red anchored off Ford Island 

                                  One of the 3 anchors of the USS Arizona which was blown up and sunk

                                        Memorial to the WW2 submarines.   52 were lost (sunk) during the war

                                            Replica of one of the Japanese Aircraft Carriers

                                               Rainbow in the mountains outside on Honolulu

                                             Honolulu skyline as we are leaving

                                            Diamond Head





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