Hawaii – Day 9. Our last day in paradise

Booze cruises, NY Pizza and the Hilton Fire works!

‘You had me at open bar..‘

Aloha!
Today was our last full day on this beautiful island I’d love to call home.

We woke with a sad realisation that tomorrow at 8am we would be flying back home to our busy lives. Don’t get me wrong we dearly missed our kids, fur babies and loved ones – but no one wants an amazing holiday to end.

We woke to a beautiful sunny day and we still had a few things we wanted to explore while also relaxing and taking in our last day in Waikiki.

Our 1^st stop was to the famous Sunrise Shack where the acai bowls came in all colours and sizes. We each ordered a medium original acai bowl and it tasted as good as is looked. A small shop located in the Outrigger Hotel Waikiki with friendly staff, quick service and cool merchandise, really know how to make great acai.

I should have ordered a small as the medium was so filling. But of course I still managed to eat it all.

We then headed up the road to our favourite shopping destination for last minute gifts and shoes.. ROSS Dress for less on Seaside Ave, Waikiki. Make sure you visit a Ross store more than once on your trip, as every day at 3am the store receive a new shipment of new stock, its amazing and so cheap!

After shopping we headed back to the airbnb to drop off our goods and change into swimwear and we made way back to the beach to try out surfing.

You can hire a surfboard on the beach but hot tip, walk a few streets up to Moku Hawaii on Koa Ave Waikiki, it’s a small surf hire shop next to Shorefyre restaurant. This place is much cheaper to hire any size surfboard and gear. From hourly hire to all day hire. We were thinking all day hire, but in my opinion as non-world class pros we are glad we only hired the boards for 2 hours! MAN IT IS TOUGH! I now know why all the surfers are fit and toned, this sport is a massive work out. Don’t get me wrong it was fun! Trent was much more better than me as I was having a hard enough time standing up, some 5 year olds put me to shame. But it was a great experience and we get to say that we (tried) surfed in the famous Waikiki beach. We returned our boards and were craving food badly so we headed to the Royal Hawaiian Center on Kalakaua Ave where there is a huge selection of food in the food court.

Feeling something full of carbs we found a Pizza shop full of NY sized pizzas made to order called SBARRO. $15 got a us a huge freshly made pizza and drink. (Just make sure you collect the correct pizza before you walk away as we ended up with one we didn’t order)  But it was still delicious and so filling, two slices was enough which meant we then had dinner for later on.

Being our last night in Hawaii we wanted to do something fun and looked into doing a sunset catamaran cruise off Waikiki beach. There are a few options to choose from but like many popular attractions its best to book ahead, especially being a Friday night with the Hiltons fireworks going off weekly at 7pm. All the places we called were sold out but luck being on our side again we got a call later that afternoon from Na hoku 2 cruises saying they had 2 cancellations and asked if we were still interested. Of course!

Can I just say, if you are over 18, love an open bar, loud music and a rocky boat full of strangers to mingle with you definitely need to book the Na hoku 2 booze cruise! It was awesome! And unlike back in Australia when they say open bar, unlimited drinks – they really mean it!

So 5pm came around and we headed down to the beach and there was the orange and yellow catamaran, full bar, happy staff with a line-up of all ages waiting to board. The atmosphere was relaxing but also fun, dress attire was casual so you could dress up or dress down, however you felt and the crowd ranged from young 20’s up to couples in their 50s, (which I think the oldest couple were rethinking their decision to board the rowdy ‘sunset booze cruise’ half way into the trip).
As soon as we got on board we were shown where the bar was, what was on offer and the rules were pretty much order whatever you like (mai tai’s where the drink of choice) and keep on coming back until you’re drunk and over board or until the cruise was over.
Tip: Make sure you go to the toilets before you get on the cruise, there are no real toilets on the catamaran. Non lady-like any way.

We set sail at 5.30pm (I think we had 4 drinks each before we even left the shore) and headed out to sea sailing around the harbor before returning at 7pm.

The vibe was great, drinks were strong and all you had to do was enjoy yourself, the view and the music, which of course we did.

Another great place for people watching, talking to random travellers and to see an amazing sunset. If this wasn’t our last night in Hawaii I would had booked more of these cruises while here, it cost $40 each, all you can drink and being out relaxing on the ocean with drink in hand was such fun.

At 7pm we arrived back to shore, I stumbled off the boat in a fashionable manner and I think we headed West to see the Hilton Fireworks. Let’s just say the 15 Mai tai’s we each had kicked in and I was too busy chatting Trent’s ear off to know what we were doing.

After the fireworks we walked back to our airbnb (ok excitedly walking in a zig-zag manner while keeping my dignity intact, is a better description), with many toilet stops along the way, to collect our cold pizza to carry out our final night time ritual of our holiday.
What an amazing trip it was. Full of laughter, exploration, adventure, new memories, ticking things off our bucket list, experiencing new food and culture, growing together as a couple and of course many Kms were walked and may cocktails were consumed in Hawaii. How can we go back to work after these amazing 9 days!

Would I come back to Hawaii again – of course! There was not one bad experience I could speak off, yes I was not expecting to see a large amount of homeless people in Waikiki, but they hurt no one and you get that in any country. I felt safe, food sizes were huge, shopping was great, the people were friendly and we lived like we were on holidays on Hawaii time!

By 10pm made sure we went to bed at a reasonable hour for a good night sleep, as we set our alarms for 3am to be up and packed for our 9 hour flight home to Sydney Australia.

Final thought – this was the life I had dreamed off, Hawaii was beautiful and I will never forget it! We were so happy, relaxed and had amazing luck on this trip, I could do all of this again with this amazing man!

The only question now is, where to next!?

Mahalo x