I miss Hawaii!!!
Okay now that I got that out of the way, here we go with the recap. 
Thursday:
Our flight was at 8:30 in the morning so theBF and I left for the airport at 6 a.m. (you know, just in case, considering it was Labor Day weekend). We got to the airport around 6:40 and had a light breakfast of Starbucks yogurt/fruit parfait with coffee and some water. The two couples joined us (Shirley had a later flight so she was going to meet us in Hawaii) and we soon boarded. The first picture below is of theBF who is eager to land! Sleepyhead slept most of the way through but when we got close enough, he started taking pictures galore. The second picture is of all of us together at the airport thinking of what to do. The third picture is of the beach!
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We were super hungry once we arrived (around 11:40 a.m.) and the hotel check-in wasn’t until 3 p.m. so we dropped off our stuff at the hotel and decided to walk the mile to check out Ono Hawaiian Foods. TheBF and I ordered the kahlua pork and an a la carte order of their famous laulau. The service was great and our server showed us exactly how to eat the food. Our dessert of coconut jelly was amazing, as well. Great service, awesome food, and a wonderful start to our vacation! I have to admit, though, that having Ono’s the first day there ruined it for the rest of the trip because we kept thinking about the food and couldn’t fully enjoy the other restaurants! 
After lunch, we slowly walked back to the hotel and checked in. We booked two rooms at the Waikiki Beach Marriott Resort and Spa for one day because our condo wasn’t going to be ready until Friday. I’m so happy we got to stay at this hotel because it was clean, the view was fabulous, and the bed … oh the bed. TheBF and I spent a great deal of time in the room just hanging out on the balcony enjoying the view while the others explored.
Waikiki Beach Marriott Resort and Spa
Eventually, theBF and I left the hotel and decided to do a little exploring of our own while the others were enjoying the USC-UH game (so many football fans traveled to Hawaii just for this game!). We walked along the Waikiki Boardwalk and tried out the Crepe House. We ordered one ham+cheese+pineapple crepe and shared it. Wow, delicious! The pineapple really added another layer of flavor to the crepe.
Around 9p.m., we all met up in front of the hotel to eat dinner. We used good ol’ Yelp to figure out if there was a great restaurant around the area. Lucky for us, we narrowed it down to a few and we finally picked this Japanese Sushi place! Yoshitsune Japanese.
I couldn’t take pictures of all of our food because my iPhone ran out of battery but the combo meal that D and I shared was outstanding. Because D is part Japanese, our lady of the house definitely did us a favor and gave us very, generous portions! Unfortunately, I was too busy enjoying the food so I forgot to write down what it was we ate! (Missing pictures of the salmon, miso soup, and the tempura.)
Friday:
We started off our day by waking up relatively early to get some breakfast before checking out of our hotel. We heard about Me’s BBQ a couple of blocks away so we had to try it out. It’s a hole-in-the-wall type of establishment and I really did have high expectations but they failed to deliver. My tofu salad (upper left) tasted rancid, and the chicken was so sweet! Too sweet, in fact. Don’t let the picture fool you; the chicken pieces are very thin so as you can imagine, they were pretty dry.
Afterwards, we slowly sauntered over to Iyasume Musubi because we read on Yelp they had great spam musubis! D and I tried the salmon musubi, spam musubi, and a small order of the curry. I didn’t get to try the curry that day but I did get it another day and it was soooo good. The musubis are good but how can you mess that up?! To their credit, they have a LOT of different kinds; I just didn’t get to try any of them.
After the slight food-fest, we took our bloated bellies over to the beach! It was absolutely GORGEOUS and the weather was PERFECT. The sky was so beautiful and blue, and the water was clear and warm. There were many beach-goers present this day, and my friends (and bf) definitely enjoyed some fun in the sun. I, on the other hand, had to go shopping for another bathing suit so I took to the boardwalk by myself. I missed out on the fun because by the time they were done, they had all gone back to the hotel to get our stuff for our move to the condo. (Because check out was at 11 am, we left our stuff downstairs with the concierge before going off to do our wandering.)
After checking into our condo and leaving all of our belongings behind, we took to the streets again and hit up a farmers market they had nearby. On with our fooding adventures! We got some fresh fruit, coconut juice, and coffee. It was a very small farmer’s market but the prices were killer and the pineapples… oh the pineapples. $4 for a bag of pre-cut pineapples!
King’s Village Farmer’s Market
After Farmer’s Market, we decided we needed to get some shave (no d at the end) ice to cool us down! We realized walking to Waiola would take forever so we randomly caught a cab to get there. Our cab driver was this Vietnamese older gentleman who was the funniest cab driver I’ve ever met (and I’ve met quite a few crazy ones). He took us there, waited for us to get our shave ice, and drove us back to our hotel. For a steal of a price! I love Hawaiian generosity!
The shave ice was so delicious. Although they messed up our order (my bf and I ordered mango shave ice with condensed milk but instead, we got that AND red beans?? My friend Shirley was supposed to have the red beans.) How do you mess up something SO simple? I don’t get it. Regardless, it was super cheap and absolutely perfect. The consistency of the ice was divine, and I couldn’t get enough of it. I definitely recommend Waiola to anyone visiting the Waikiki area.
After our shave ice run, we went back to our condo and changed, got situated into our new humble abode, and decided on what to do next. We decided we’d hit the boardwalk at night, and check out a ramen place that was all the rave in Waikiki.
We walked over to the beach and hung out a bit. Took a lot of beautiful photos, played in the sand, and people watched.
The Beach, behind the Royal Hawaiian.
When we finally got to Ramen Nakamura (around 10ish), there was a wait to get in. It’s a small place so the wait can be pretty bad but luckily for us, we were seated within 20 minutes or so. I had the oxtail ramen (mmmm!) without any sides. My bf ordered the oxtail ramen combo which included a side of potstickers. Wow, I tried one and their potstickers are amazing! I usually don’t say that because how can you really mess up a potsticker. Ramen Nakamura definitely hit the right spot with their food.
We were so tired from eating ALL DAY that we somehow rolled back to our condo and passed out. Before I realized it, it was midnight in Waikiki. Are we old or what? How can we be tired at midnight? Well, I guess given midnight in Waikiki is 3 a.m. in LA, we should’ve been tired but still. I guess our excuse is that we woke up fairly early and walked around in the heat all day. Sigh, weak.
Saturday and Sunday recap up next!
