Today we had a plan that required the ship to arrive at port on time (maybe even early) so that we could catch a cab or an uber to visit Pearl Harbour and use our preassigned ticket time of 9 am. The ship wasn’t cleared to unload passengers until 8:20 am. We had what I thought was to be a 15 minute cab ride to the USS Arizona. That turned out to be a 25 minute cab ride and we arrived at the gate at 8:50 am and had to hustle to get where we needed to go. We arrived at 8:59 when the last call was made for the 9 AM boat ride out to the USS Arizona. The ticket taker asked why we were cutting it so close! We didn’t have a second to spare - but we made it!
And so we visited the site where 1700 men are buried at sea within the USS Arizona. It was appropriate that we were visiting this site on Canadian Thanksgiving - because we have a lot for which we can be thankful. That fateful day, December 7, 1941 Japan mounted a very successful attack on the US naval fleet and over the course of two hours decimated much of the military strength of the USA and killed 2400 men in the process. Though the US was trying to remain neutral at the time (and in fact just the day before President Roosevelt had sent a telegram to Emperor Hirohito of Japan, encouraging peace between the two countries), the day after the attack on Pearl Harbour, Roosevelt acknolwedged this was an unequivocal act of war.
The Pearl Harbour Monument is beautifully developed and free to visit (the tickets we secured charged a nominal $1 administrative charge to book the time slot).
After Pearl Harbour, we took public bus #40 ($3 charge for adults) to the Ala Moana shopping mall. J was trying to find a snorkel - and that was a bust - in the city of Honolulu!!! We bought reef friendly sunscreen then walked to pier#2 where our shipped was docked. It was 28 C today with high humidity so we were dripping with sweat after our walk back to the ship, that took maybe an hour.
We gratefully boarded the ship and appreciated the air conditioning! After phone calls to my family, we got dressed for a ‘dressy’ dinner. And how wonderful, they had a full Canadian Thanksgiving dinner on the menu! We both ordered the butternut squash soup and turkey dinner with all the trimmings.
This is an overnight stop in Honolulu so the ship is a bit quieter. As such, they only had one evening show featuring Polynesian dancers and drummers and the theatre was packed 25 minutes before start time!
Tomorrow we have an early start with plans to hike Diamond Head!
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