Waterfall hike and sailboat ride

Devin and I are still adjusting to the time change and so we were up before the sun today. We ate leftovers from the Hukilau Cafe for breakfast and spent the early morning hours looking through and enjoying all of the pictures from the wedding that people have posted.

The tour bus picked us up at the Hilton in Waikiki and we joined 7 other passengers and our tour guide Brian. He told us a little about Hawaiian history as we drove to Pali Lookout. The lookout is

over a 985 foot cliff and is where King Kamehameha and his warriors defeated the O'ahu in 1795 by driving them over the cliffs, thereby, uniting the Hawaiian islands. We took pictures of the wonderful view and then boarded the bus again to drive to our hiking spot. We hiked through the rainforest of the Koolau Mountain Range on our way to the Likeke Waterfall. One of the first things we got to do was swing on a vine Tarzan style which was one of my favorite parts. On our hike we saw kukui

nuts, hala trees, sword ferns, holly, orchids, hau trees, birds nest ferns, African tulip trees, chickens, and a noisy bird called a white-rumped shama. Sadly, most of the plants and animals we saw are invasive, but the are still very beautiful. We also saw a old water tower (used for the golf course) that was used in the TV show Lost for the Dharma initiative research station. On the way back to the hotel we drove through downtown Honolulu and we saw the Iolani Palace which is the only palace in the US, a statue of Queen Lydia Lili'uokalani who was the last reigning monarch in Hawaii, and the Hawaii Convention Center which was also used in the filming of Lost.

After we returned from our hike we ate lunch at a Chinese Buffet which was delicious and I ate way to much. It was a busy day for us because right after that we headed to the Marina to meet Tom who is captain of the Ishi, a 55 foot sailboat. He works for the University of Hawaii doing research as well as doing eco tours. We waited on the boat for a while for a friend of his to join us and he showed me a couple of chords

on the Ukulele and played a couple of songs. After we left, almost as soon as we were in open water, we saw a pod of humpback whales. This is the first time I have ever seen whales in the wild. We kept sailing until we reached Turtle Bay. The water was about 20 - 25 feet deep and fairly clear. We jumped into the water to go snorkeling and saw schools of trigger fish, yellow tang, other tropical fish, but best of all sea turtles! I dove down to take a closer look and they just looked at me not concerned at all about my presence. After getting out of the water I was cold so I curled up and took a nap (it was also about 11pm Florida time). Devin did some fishing but didn't catch anything. We stayed on the boat listening to Tom play the ukulele and watched the sun set which was beautiful. Then we headed back in to the marina. Tom had some great recommendations for places to go in Waikiki but Devin and I were both exhausted so we drove straight home and went to bed.