We were all knackered last night and so all went to bed early - 8pm. How weedy is that, especially when on holiday? But I was glad of the sleep and don't think I could even have carried my board this morning, had I not had it.
It rained while we were out in the surf too, which was a new experience, but like yesterday, the surf was not good. However, I can see how surfing is addictive, especially when its sunny and the water is warm. Somehow, surfing off Brighton in November doesn't really compare.
The trolley bus hop on/off thing was on the cards again this afternoon, but the other way this time, through the city and up to China Town. However as we left the hotel, we bumped into a lady unloading parrots from her car. Turned out she'd hand reared them all and they were as tame as tame.
This is such a laid back place that even waiting for the bus is different to waiting for the bus at home.
One of the main streets in Hawaii was originally called Britannia Street, so named by the Brits who visited on warships back in the day. However, its now known as Beretania Street because the locals were unable to pronounce the 'r' s and 'b's, neither of which exist in the Hawaiian language.
In fact, Hawaiian only has 12 letters in its alphabet anyway, so a direct translation of most things seems highly improbable anyway.
The street goes right past the Capitol building, which is a pretty impressive structure, and surrounded by fish ponds so well kept that two men were hoovering the base of it.
No wonder the fish were huddled together in the opposite corner.
We got of the bus there and had a mooch about. It was very hot today, so the shady tree lined walk ways were very welcome. Outside the state capitol building is a statue commemorating Father Damien, a Belgian priest who worked with lepers on one of the Hawaiian islands. He eventually died from the disease too, and was made a saint for his trouble fairly recently. Hopefully, the statue was more caricature than true likeness.
But when you see such memorials, it makes you wonder how - or why- people came here in the first place given that it is so far from anywhere. Did they know the islands were here, and did they know anything about them? Did they know anything about the locals, and if so, what? They must have known about Captain Cook meeting his maker on Hawaii, killed by locals who originally thought of him as a deity. But that didn't stop them whacking him over the head and then stabbing him when he was unconscious, boiling his body to remove the flesh from the bones, but then rather bizarrely, preserving his skeleton just as they preserved the skeletons of their own royalty as if they liked him all along.
There is some interesting grafitti in Honolulu too, but confined to just a few streets.
China Town is just down the road, so we wandered through it, and took a look in the food hall which was full of weird and wonderful Chinese delicacies like live bullfrogs, abalone, chicken feet, and an assortment of horrible looking fish, as well as vegetables.
We found some custard tarts which were delicious, but the taste was somewhat marred for me at least when woman sat down opposite with a bowl of fish heads, which she then started to eat the flesh round the eyes with a fork.
For somebody with a real horror of fish,( me) this was almost too much to endure, but the morbid fascination of watching something so disgusting, won through and rooted me to the spot. She said she loved the taste and offered me some, but I declined.
She was still picking away at it 10 minutes later after we left. Nasty.
By this time, it was early afternoon and we had planned to go snorkelling on the reef in the next bay, but the buses were all over the places because of roadworks.
Then we realised that the bus journey there, plus the compulsory video ( about not destroying coral) would mean that we would have to walk home as we'd miss the last bus. So we went swimming in Waikiki instead. And that turned out to be an excellent call.
Firstly, we found a sea snake lurking in the reef below where we were swimming, as well as some fish.
Only little ones but brightly coloured, darting in and out of the coral and skimming on the current. But then out of the blue ( literally) loomed our mate from yesterday - the giant sea turtle.
Well, we don't know if it was the exact same one of course but it was still giant and still a sea turtle, and he was swimming with us quite happily. Initially, he was grazing on the weeds below us, but then he surfaced and paddled with us, making no attempt to get away nor showing any signs of distress. We were chuffed, especially as we managed to get some pictures.
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