Aloha O'ahu
Here’s a fun fact for you, gentle reader, the Hawaiian Islands were formed 4.5 million years ago by ancient volcanic activity caused by dinosaurs. Don’t believe me? Then explain these photographs:
As you can see, we barely escaped with our lives!
Ok, I’m just kidding. I know you believed me because I was a science teacher and the photographic evidence is strong, but it’s actually not true. There were and are no non-avian dinosaurs on Hawai’i. (I had to add the non-avian part for all my science nerd friends. Shout out to my nerds!) Buuut, there were lots of things filmed at Kualoa Ranch on O’ahu, some of which included dinosaurs.
Kualoa Ranch
And some of which included polar bears.
Kualoa Ranch
And sometimes giant apes.
Kualoa Ranch
The very gramable Kualoa Ranch aside, O’ahu was an interesting place to start our new lifestyle. We stayed in Haleiwa on the north shore. I was honestly shocked by how green O’ahu is. The mountains are some of the most lush landscape I have ever seen. The beaches are beautiful and the waves are great for surfing. Not that I surf. We even got to see part of a professional surf competition though, and that was very fun to watch.
Surfers at sunset near Turtle Bay
Despite its natural beauty, O’ahu felt like a place of contradictions. It has no shortage of multi-million dollar beach front mansions or roadside homeless encampments. Honolulu county is home to almost 1 million people, but where we were on the north shore felt like being in rural America. There were “keep the country country” bumperstickers everywhere. There is both a large military presence and plenty of vegan spots to eat. We witnessed a lot of chill “aloha” vibes, but every time we rode our bikes someone cursed at us to get off the rode or worse.
It’s not a very big island. I couldn’t get over the fact that to drive from where we were on the north shore to Honolulu on the south shore only takes about 40 minutes, but because it was on the complete other side of the island, it felt very far away.
After a month in Haleiwa, we were excited to see what else Hawai’i had to offer.
