As many of you know, I finally got to take a "fabulous end-of-treatment celebratory vacation".
I had been planning to travel somewhere exciting in Feb 2006, after chemo & my mastectomy but before returning to work. Unfortunately, the complications I had with my reconstruction made me wary of traveling too far from home. In addition, I saw an opportunity to really add value at work and decided not to delay my March return.
Again, this past spring, I thought about travelling - after my lat flap surgery but before my return to work. A more difficult recovery than I expected + a transition into a new role at work made the timing suboptimal. Rats.
I came to realize that there would always be an excuse not to go. When an excuse to go arose - a wedding in San Diego - we decided to seize the opportunity. After all, San Diego is half-way to Hawaii... we might as well go the rest of the way! To get to Hawaii, we would likely fly through LA, so we might as well spend a few days there as well.
Our trip started in Chicago, where I played in an ultimate frisbee tournament. We left from there Sunday night and flew to LA, where we stayed in Santa Monica with Heather & Jess. On Monday, we travelled around LA a bit, toured Mike's old stomping ground at CalTech, visited Mike's friend Reza, and then headed up to Santa Barbara.
In Santa Barbara, we visited my good friend Jen (her husband, Jim, was in China at the time). We had a lovely dinner downtown and spent the night at their cute home just outside of town. In the morning, Mike went off to play disc golf and I ran to the track at the college Jen works out to do a stadium workout (quite possibly the most rewarding stadium workout ever - from the top of the stadium, I could see across the road to the harbor and ocean - gorgeous). We then headed over to visit my dear friend Sarah Jarvis (and finally meet her darling daughter Beatrice). What a lovely visit. We had lunch in town and walked around afterwards. Of all the places we saw in southern California, I do think Santa Barbara is the one where I could most picture myself living.
Tuesday evening, we drove back to Santa Monica. We took "the scenic route" and stopped for a short hike on Malibu Bluffs.
We met up with Heather and Jess and headed out to dinner in Santa Monica. First we stopped at a wine bar for cheese and wine tasting. Delicious (particularly the 1978 Cakebread Cabernet). We then went to Maxwell's Italian restaurant. Ok, it's not really called "Maxwell's" - I have no idea what it was called. Maxwell, a friend of Jess & Noah's (and now Heather's), runs the place and made the night an evening to remember, so in my mind, it's "Maxwell's". It's a bit unfortunate that I can't share the actual name with you all... because this was, quite possibly, the best meal I have ever eaten. It ranks right up there with Frank's Keys Cafe in Key Largo (lobster fra diavolo + exploding chocolate volcano). Amazing. It's also quite possible that the impression this meal left was enhanced by the wine tasting that preceeded it, but even without the wine, I'm quite sure this meal was the best we had during our vacation.
Wednesday morning, we left very early for our flight to Oahu. After a short flight to San Francisco and a 5 hour flight, we landed in Oahu around lunchtime. The flight approached Oahu from the Northeast and circled 3/4 of the island before landing in Honolulu. What a view from the plane!
We gathered our bags and headed to our home base in Ewa Beach. After weeks of debate between renting a studio apartment on the north shore at Chun's Reef and a beautiful home in Ewa Beach, we went with the home in Ewa Beach (
click here to see the place we stayed and see the photos below of the beach behind our house). The home was gorgeous. The beach was lovely too, though I think in hindsight, we both would have chosen the studio on Chun's Reef. It's kind of ridiculous thinking back to our first view of Chun's reef -- our initial reaction was "this beach is so much better than ours... ours is ugly..." of course, from the photos, it is obvious just how ridiculous that notion was.
We spent 7 full days on Oahu. We bought snorkeling gear so that we could go whenever the notion hit us and managed to snorkel Shark's Cove, Makaha Beach and the lagoons at Ko-Olina (our favorite). We meant to hit Hanama Bay on our last day, but they are closed on Tuesdays. Bummer.
We hit all of the tourist spots - Waimea Bay, Pearl Harbor, Waikiki, Diamond Head and the Polynesian Cultural Center. I even took a surf lesson (I couldn't stop smiling for hours afterwards... this was definitely a highlight of the trip!)
We also visited some lesser known places - a hike to the temple ruins above Waimea Bay, the shrimp trucks in Kohuku, a drive up the Waianae Coast, and a sunset hike up to Makapu'u lighthouse.
On Wed, Mike's Birthday, we packed up and caught an early flight over to Hawaii, "the big island". We stayed at a wonderful hotel in Hilo (
The Dolphin Bay), which I would highly recommend. The accommodations were clean and moderate, but the service was wonderful. The owner spent nearly a half hour with us, talking about what we wanted to see, how long we had and what he would recommend. He also provided coffee, papaya, bananas and delicious cinnamon rolls for breakfast.
Wednesday was rainy in Hilo (Hilo gets more rain than anyplace in the US). We visited the local marketplace, a few waterfalls and then drove to the Southern coast in hopes of some better weather. We found a delightful place to snorkel -
Kapoho Tide Pools - the water here was so much more clear than anything we saw on Oahu. So glad we bought our own gear! There was also a "swimming pool" in
Ahalanui Park that is volcanically heated to nearly 90 degrees.
On Thursday morning, we got up early and headed out for our Helicoptor tour of the volcano. Currently, the volcano is errupting in a place that is only accessible by air (or a full day hike in each direction). Unfortunately, the lava is no longer entering the ocean, but the view we got from the helicoptor was pretty amazing. The photos don't really do it justice.
After the tour, we headed back to the hotel to check out. We stopped at one of the waterfalls to catch it in the sunlight. We packed up and then headed out to
Volcanoes National Park. We spent the day exploring the park, including the steam vents, Jaggar Museum, Halema'uma'u Crater, Crater Rim Drive, Chain of Craters Road, the sea arch, Thurston Lava Tube, and a hike to the Pu'u Loa Petroglyphics field. Phew - busy day! We grabbed a bite to eat, headed back to the hotel (where they had a place for us to clean up, even though we had already checked out) and then went back to the airport in Hilo. We flew to Honolulu and then on to San Diego that night.
We arrived in San Diego and went to check into our hotel. Exhausted from several busy days and then a red-eye flight, we decided to hit the San Diego zoo instead of the Wild Animal Park (even though the zoo is much more depressing than the open, wild animal park). We spent the afternoon visiting with the pandas, zebras, gorillas, elephants and koalas (though many of the animals were taking their afternoon nap while we were there). Dinner was at Casa de Pico, a recommendation from Jack-a-lack. Delicious mexican + margaritas in Old Town San Diego.
Saturday was the wedding in La Jolla. The reception was at Torrey Pines and everything was lovely. It was fun to visit with old ZS friends: Heather, Jess, Bill, Abby, Naoko, and of course, "Pumpkin Head" Jim Adelizzi (the groom).
Sunday, we headed back out to La Jolla and spent the day walking around, checking out the bluffs, the caves, the cove and the seals. A beautiful sunset and a late dinner in La Jolla and then we were off to the airport to catch our flight home to Philadelphia.
LC - this post made reminded me of just how amazing a person you are. It's been so long since we've actually seen each other. And I'm pretty sure our struggles over the last two years have been very very different, but I'm so glad to count you as a friend... Keep on fighting, and head down this way to visit again sometime soon!!!
