50 States in 57 Years!

 

I have been a little slow in catching you all up on our Hawaii trip and where we are now, but time just flew by and I caught a cold that has me feeling miserable.  I am not well yet but I cannot put this off any longer, so let me get you caught up.

As you know we scheduled a family trip to Hawaii for the middle of September.  This was to celebrate Fran and I being married for 35 years and for both of us to complete our journey of seeing all 50 states in our lifetime.  For me that means it took close to 58 years to do and for Fran it took (not going there) years.  The interesting thing about this is that since we have been doing “Life on the Road” we will have actually completed the 50 state journey in just under 5 years based on our current plan for next year.  We have 5 states left to visit since we began our RV lifestyle and then Hawaii was just a couple of weeks ago. 

Back to Hawaii.  For those of you international travelers I do not know how you do it.  We had to fly 2 hours from Knoxville to Dallas, layover for 3 hours, then fly 8 1/2 hours into Honolulu.  Besides the flight time, Hawaii is 6 hours behind in time zone from Knoxville.  It was a killer for me.  I woke up everyday at 3:30am, but fortunately was able to stay up to a reasonable hour in the evenings.

Our first stop was Honolulu for 3 days.  We stayed at the Hilton Hawaiian Village which is very large complex right on the ocean.  It was nice but obviously very pricey to eat and drink there.  The location made for a nice walk into the shopping district of Waikiki or along the beach towards Diamondhead.

Our arrival at the Honolulu airport

First afternoon and evening was for getting caught up with our daughter and son-in-law from Portland who had arrived a few hours earlier.  We walked on the beach and had a nice family dinner at the hotel. 

Sunday morning I ended up at the bar at 7:00am, because that is when NFL football starts, to have bloody mary’s.  I was eventually joined by the rest of the family as the drink specials were fantastic.  I became a hit with the bartender as all these women (my family) would show up and I would say put their drink on my tab.  Finally when everyone was there he said I was a lucky man and took a picture for us.

Sunday evening we went to a Luau at Paradise Cove.  It was a great evening that included activities, entertainment, food and drinks.  Plus they picked us up and dropped us off at our hotel. 

The ceremony to remove the pig that is cooking in the ground.

Sunset at the Luau.

Monday morning was our bus tour of Honolulu and to go to the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor.  Very moving to see the memorial and the names on the wall.  Great tour of the city through the Punchbowl Cemetery and a stop at the famous King Kammmmmmmmm….(sorry can’t spell it) statue.

Arizona Memorial on boat ride over.

The wall with the names of those that died.

Statue of the king.

Monday night we walked to the shopping district of Waikiki to have dinner at the Yard House.  Following that 4 of us went to the Royal Hawaiian Hotel to have a Mai Tai as our tour book said this is where it was created.  The bar is outside, right on the beach.  The Mai Tai was fantastic as it should be at $14!

Mai Tai complete with umbrella!

That pretty much ended our Honolulu portion of the trip as we left for Maui on Tuesday afternoon.  Here we had booked two condos on the ocean for all of us to spend 4 days relaxing and exploring the island.  The original booking called for a 1 bedroom condo and a 2 bedroom condo, both with garden view.  When we checked in they had not linked the two bookings and for whatever reason decided to upgrade us (without me making a scene!).  We ended up with a 2 bedroom, 2,000 square foot ocean view room and smaller 2 bedroom condo with an ocean view.  The large condo was amazing.  It had a wrap around deck that gave you ocean views on two sides in the living room.

Living room on the right, master bedroom on the left.  It also had a full kitchen and a dining room that could sit 6 people.  This really made the trip enjoyable.  When I would get up each morning at 3:30am, I would open the sliding glass doors and just listen to the waves.

I will summarize some of the things we did on Maui and then throw in some pictures.  Four of us, with me driving, did the “Road to Hana”.  This is a 60 miles trip that involves driving on very narrow and winding road with many blind curves.  Most people take it to the National Park where the Seven Pools of Wonder are located and then turn back.  I chose to continue on and make it a loop of the other side of Maui, where for many miles the road was just gravel (don’t tell the rental car company), but then meets up with the main highway. 

We explored the town of Lahaina which has many shops and restaurants.  Here is where we tried a Shave Ice at Ulelani’s.  It was amazing.  It was much more than a snocone!!

Fran and Kim took a surf lesson and had a great time.  Fran, Kelly, Katie and Tyler did some snorkeling and other beach activities.

We had dinner at the Sheraton Maui outside at sunset to see the cliff divers and then some of us went on to the Pineapple Grill to have pineapple upside down cake.

Here are some pictures:

Kim surfing!

Sunset from our balcony

The banyan tree in Lahaina.  This is all one tree!

Tyler relaxing at the Maui airport.

  Black sand beach near Hana

Katie and Tyler

Kim and Kelly

What a great trip, except for air travel!  We got to spend it with our family which made it even more special.

Ok, so what is up next.  We are what I will call the wedding march.  We have two weddings to attend in October.  The first is in Kansas City and the second is 2 weeks later in Palm Springs, so we are ON THE ROAD!  The next month will be a familiar route we have taken many times with stops at many of the same places.  First up was a stop in Nashville to visit with our friends the Sherwood’s.  Presently we are in West Memphis, AR at our favorite RV park on the Mississippi River.  This weekend we head to Springfield, Missouri and then into the Kansas City area.

Route:  From Knoxville just put us on Interstate 40 until Arizona where we will cut through the state to Interstate 10 into Palm Springs.

Aloha!

Quick Catch Up

 

We are 5 weeks into our summer hiatus so I thought I would give you a quick update to let you know we are still around. 

We are still in Knoxville and will be until the 25th of September.  Here are some of the highlights of the past 5 weeks:

Knoxville Open golf tournament – This was our second time visiting this tournament, which is a stop on the Web.com tour.  My nephew is friends with the president of the title sponsor so we get access to the hospitality areas which is very nice on a hot afternoon.  We had a great time walking the course and watching the golfers. 

Meeting pro golfer – Three days before the start of the golf tournament a motorhome pulled into the space next to us.  That day the gentleman from the motorhome set up a golf net outside.  I thought it was a little strange as I had never seen anyone do that at an RV park in the past.  I saw him practicing and then leave with his clubs.  It was the next day, when I learned the tournament was in town, that I thought maybe our neighbor was a participant.  On Thursday, the first day of the tournament, I saw him outside and struck up a conversation.  I was correct!  His name is Jarrod Lyle and he is a PGA tour professional who is working on getting his golf game back on track after a fight with leukemia.  He travels to events in his motorhome so that he can bring his family with him (wife and young daughter) and be more comfortable during the tournament.  We had a great conversation over the next couple of days, as he did not make the cut to play on the weekend.  Never know who you will meet “On the Road”!

Special events – we celebrated our YOUNGEST daughters 27th birthday!!!! and our 35 wedding anniversary this past month.  We are actually going to properly celebrate our anniversary with a family trip to Hawaii on the 13th.

Knoxville Art Museum – we visited the art museum in town which was very nice.  For me it was just the right size!  It features works from Knoxville artists which is a nice touch.  For me, the neatest exhibit was a rendering of the Mona Lisa made out of spools of thread that looked like the real painting when viewed threw a magnified ball placed in front of the work.  Hard to explain but when you see it you sort of just stand there and say “how did the artist do that?”  Here is a picture of it I found on Google:

  It is hanging on the wall upside down.  It is about 4 feet wide by 8 feet tall with the spools on wire chain.  The glass ball is about 4 feet in front of the work and presents the image right side up in the ball.

NASCAR Bristol race – Many of you know that I am a NASCAR fan and that my nephew and I use to have season tickets for the Bristol races.  For four years I would bring my trailer to Knoxville and meet up with my nephew and then go onto Bristol, Tennessee (about 90 miles north of Knoxville) where we would camp in the yard of a house near the Bristol track.  We stopped in 2010 because the track had been changed and the racing was not as interesting plus we were living on the road and it was a little more difficult to get back to the area during the race weekends.  So, during this trip I though it would be fun for my nephew and I to go to the mid-week truck race at the track.  It is a shorter night race and not very crowded so it is easier to get in and get out.  We parked our car at the house where we camped and caught up with the owners then went to the race.  Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate and we only got to see the opening race of modified cars and not the truck race, which was postponed to the next afternoon.  We still had great time seeing the track and how much the area has changed since we first visited it 20 years ago.

Boomsday – Here in Knoxville there is big celebration on Labor Day weekend called Boomsday.  The big event is the fireworks on the weekend.  As we did last year we went to view the fireworks with my nephew and his family on their boat.  It makes for a great viewing, from the water, and it is less crowded to get there and get out via boat.  This year the fireworks were cut a little short as a thunderstorm arrived just towards the end.  The storm was not much of an issue and we were able to safely drive the boat back to the marina. 

Next up is our Hawaii trip and then we leave to begin our trip to the west coast.