Our tour guide Cousin Maiya led us on a great adventure that gave us taste of everything and helped to shape our agenda for the rest of our time on Oahu.
I would emphasize that this tour is ideal for first time island goers, especially at the beginning of your trip. Some of the stops are short, some were at places that are decidedly tourist traps, and some were awe inspiring views of the island. Through all of them Cousin Maiya was full of interesting information about the island and what we were seeing. He provided great tips on the best way to come back and spend more time at stops that we enjoyed or other locations that we were just cruising past. He even knew the bus route numbers for several locations. I really can't say enough about how amazing a tour guide he proved to be.
I found the trip exactly as advertised. It is a tour of a substantial part of the island. It is not an in-depth tour of any one location listed on the agenda. It helped us to figure out parts of the island that we wanted to go spend more time at and other locations that we now knew we wouldn't want to waste our time on.
For those that are interested, a more detailed play-by-play of the tour is below.
The tour started at 7:00 and we had to walk about 4 blocks from our hotel to the pick-up point. Cousin Maiya was cracking jokes as we walked up with the glazed over look on our faces of a tourist that has no idea what they are doing. He very quickly put us at ease.
First stop was to catch the sunrise, followed by quick trip to the viewpoint at Diamond Head. After a few more stops at places like Lanai Lookout, Eternity Beach, and Halona Blowhole, we wound our way north to Makapu'u Lookout then on to a shopping/restroom stop where Cousin Maiya provided us with complementary Poi donuts, water, and coffee.
Feeling refreshed we continued on to Kualoa Point for views of Chinaman's hat then on to a macadamia nut farm, where the wild chickens outnumber the tourists. Here again there was free coffee and enough mac nut samples to make anyone think twice about the need to hit an ABC store to get your fix. Here Maiya also handed out menus and had us make our lunch selections.
Lunch was at a roadside shrimp shack called Fumi's. The food was great and fresh as the shrimp shack is also a shrimp farm. Thanks to Cousin Maiya's calling in the order ahead of time, we just had to saddle up to the window and our food was waiting. This was also the our first opportunity to get Dole Whip which I failed to capitalize on much to my chagrin.
Post lunch we hit another roadside attraction for some fresh fruit, coconuts, and deep fried bananas. Cousin Maiya also pointed out a must visit of Joe's Bakery. Fortunately for those that don't have a car Joe's is available in most grocery stores. The haupia chocolate cream pie is ridiculously good. As was their Shoyu chicken.
Next up was a snorkeling stop for about an hour and half in Waialua Bay. The reef had tons of fish and the odd sea turtle here and there. For those not interested in snorkeling, Cousin Maiya took them into Haleiwa for some shopping or a stop at Matsumoto Shave Ice.
After getting picked up from snorkeling we headed to our final stop at the Dole plantation. Here we finally encountered Dole Whip. Pro-Tip: Go to counter #3. It is on the back side of the concession area. Everyone crowds in for the lines of counters #1 & #2 and spends 20 mins just waiting in line. We waited about three minutes for pineapple sorbet that is worth the price of the flight to Hawaii. This was really the only stop that I wish we had a little more time at, but overall my needs for the plantation experience were met.
After that we headed back to Waikiki. We were back at the hotel by 3:00 PM with the rest of the afternoon to enjoy sea, sun, and suds.