Day 17

Well we are back and it wouldn't be complete without a drama on the last day.  More of that later.

The flight was on time, we arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare, having our body clocks still on New York time made it easy as we went to bed at 9:30 Hawaii time, which was around 3:30am according to our body clocks.  Waking at 4:30 was like a 10:30 sleep in.  Out the door at 5:30 for out pick up at 5:45.  They were late, but at least they came this time.  We had 7 Check in suite cases compared to the 4 we left with and 5 carry on suitcases (one of mine was my medical gear).  First time ever a Hawaiian staff member argued with me about my carry on, I was not having a bar of it, if they do not know their own policies, that is their problem not mine.  However in future we (Lorraine and I) are going to revisit how we do it to make it less of a problem.

On board the staff were good except there were lots of young children.  As a family we were split across the aisle and both groups of us were not spared screaming toddlers and selfish people behind us.  Whether it was kicking of the seat. screaming or just plain selfishness it was a fairly forgettable flight.  Was bothered me most was the family behind me had two rows and put the kicking screaming kid in a position where it impacted on someone else, instead of having the child kicking their own seats, they felt it okay to impact another persons flight.  A few choice loud conversational words had that sorted, unfortunately a long way into the flight though.

Australian Customs was a breeze, having ePassports with facial recognition helps.  The only issue being our black nut Lei's which we declared, a simple sniffer dog perusal had us out an back in Brisbane.

So the drama we had was at Honolulu airport.  We had  breakfast, Burger King unfortunately, there's not a lot of choice.  Just about to head to the gate (75 minutes to boarding, 2 hours to flight time) when I have this sinking feeling I have forgotten something.  Open my medical case and yes, my needles are not there.  They are in the hotel room refrigerator in their cold bag.  A quick call to the hotel has them saying they can get the bag, but I will have to collect.  I ask why they cannot send a taxi driver with it?  No drivers won't do that in case they don't get paid.  Realising that they will probably screw it up anyway, I say I will come and collect.  I know this is going to hurt as last cab fare was $50 with tip, so this is staring down the barrel of a $100 45 minute ride.  So back out through security, in a cab and off we go with Miss Daisy behind the wheel.  Get to the hotel and its $49, go to reception, grab the bag and yes they didn't get everything, they did screw it up, there's no freezer packs (which I told them about), so grab a room key, race upstairs, grab the freezer packs, back to the cab.  We agree on a $100 fare.  But she doesn't start the meter, I could care less, she's welcome to the unmetered amount. 

Now herein lies the real problem.  Being the pedant I am I had run all of our USD cash down to enough so that I was only carrying tip money for the Transfer driver and some $1 bills for spending at the airport.  My cash card had no funds left for this sort of fare (still waiting for a Citibank hold to be released), all I had was Lorraine's credit cards which I grabbed before leaving the airport (knowing I had nothing), along with her driver's license.  Really hoping the driver would just swipe the card without looking or caring.  She did.  So $100 later and about 50 minutes later I'm back.  Luckily I had a sympathetic TSA guard who let me dodge the long queue of people at security after I told them my story.  I went back through the same screening area as the guards knew me (having a pacemaker means very personal attention at screening points if you get my drift).  So that was expedited, now it was just the walk to the boarding gate.  Naturally we were on a flight boarding at the gate furthest away from check in meaning a nice long hobble walk for me, almost tripping over my own feet a number of times.  A quick pit stop for the toilets, then another to purge my final $6USD on bottles of water to arrive at the boarding gate at 9:10am for a 9:15am boarding.  WOW, what an adventurous morning.  I'll never forget this trip, that's for sure.

Anyway the obligatory photos.

Sean & Lorraine

Day 17
Day 16
Day 15 and videos
http://youtu.be/mB9_Lr1-ULQ
http://youtu.be/Jp82R30hPwQ
http://youtu.be/gpoa6l4-Q6M
Day 14
Day 13
Day 12
Day 11
Rest of Chief's Luau videos
http://youtu.be/XURpdBxRtnU
http://youtu.be/XmxYN8Mqiv8
http://youtu.be/F6S8MCjMl2Y
http://youtu.be/onfa_PjLYiY
http://youtu.be/rt5UH7EIexs
Day 9
Day 8 plus Video of the Wedding
Day 7
Day 5/6
Day 4 Photos and videos
http://youtu.be/Fhm-bt4ZIgs
http://youtu.be/burf7_6_uU4
http://youtu.be/CfDxYYOZm8o
http://youtu.be/DVkzfa9jcjc
http://youtu.be/dQYTj6lxUBw
Day 3 Pearl Harbour + more
Day 2 Holidays
Day 1 USA