I am so glad I am able to see more of Oahu on this trip! The last time I was here in '83, we spent the entire time in the Waikiki/Honolulu area, so I knew that THIS time we'd try to set out and see some of the other wonderful things the island has to offer. So yesterday we made our way up to the wild and windy North Shore. It was a very pretty drive up to Sunset Beach, through rural fields most of the way.
How fruitily mortifying: until yesterday, I thought pineapples grew on trees. This photo proves me wrong. Dehhhhhh.
First stop: Ted's Bakery for some lunch. This is a very tiny and down-home place, a former gas station I believe, where you pick up your drinks, order your food, and wait outside at one of the few picnic-type tables. There were tourists like us mixed in with locals, which was nice, because we got to share our table with a friendly guy from the area.
They had SO MUCH great food there, it was hard to pick, so we asked the nice woman at the register to pick out 4 pastries for us, and they were SUBLIME. Oh my gawd, this Hawaiian bread is just incredible: sweet and light, completely unique. A slice of pumpkin cream pie was also shared and it too was wonderful. For lunch, I ordered the "Loco Moco" plate, simply because I liked the name. It came in a closed take-out container, and I swear must've weighed about 10 pounds. This is what it looked like.
Do not fear. The Loco Moco is three HUGE scoops of rice (and very good rice, I must add) with a hamburger patty, a fried egg, brown gravy, and a side of macaroni salad. It was delicious, but enough for three meals. Note to self: share food all the time in Hawaii. After all this excitement, I went to find Ted's Bathroom. I found the right one. I wasn't the face who broke the mirror.
Back in the car to Sunset Beach. As expected it was super-windy, with waves that were excellent for surfing and ridiculous for swimming. We lucked into seeing a bit of a surfing competition going on, featuring some very very badass teen girls. I could not get over how they dealt with this very serious surf. I would've died five feet off the beach. Impressive stuff. Sorry the video isn't better -- it was too sunny to see what I was shooting and I was getting whipped with vicious sand blasts every so often, which felt like a tiny gun peppering you with teeny stingy pellets. But you get to see some lifeguards doing lifeguard stuff! (Song is "Do The Surf" by Trudy Van & The Realm)
After the competition was over, we went down the road a little bit and spontaneously pulled over and parked at the very intriguing Pupukea Beach. We'd forgotten to bring the snorkling gear, but did remember our swimsuits and water shoes, so we made a quick change in the restroom there and made our way down to the red sand and scrub ground to a tremendous playground of lava rocks, and shallow, warm, crystal clear waters. It was awesome.
I'm still giddy about the new camera and its underwater capabilities (Panasonic DMC-TS3). Since I didn't have a snorkle I just shot these by holding the camera underwater, hoping there would be something to photograph, and pressing the shutter. Here's a very short video demonstrating this totally professional technique.
Watching rain coming in was awesome.
I gave the camera to MissEight for awhile and this was staring me in the face when I went to process the photos tonight. I would ask her about it now, but she's sleeping. I don't know what it is. I'm going to call it Frog Crab.
Time to wind it up -- more from the North Shore soon!
© Copyright 2008- Marianne Spellman