As you can see from the map, I would have to leave early from Waikiki to get over to the other side of the island. Google Maps told me I’d need about an hour to get there. I worked backward to figure out my rising time and thought I was all set. If you recall from an earlier post, staying in Waikiki virtually necessitates using the expensive valet parking at the hotel. I had not used my rental car the day before because that was the day I went to Pearl Harbor. The tour company picked me up for that trip. I also told the valet workers that I needed the car early this day. So, I go down to the lot, present my ticket, and wait for my car. And wait, and wait, and wait…. Meanwhile, I’m doing mental calculations about the time, wondering whether I would entirely miss the sunrise. I asked what was going on, and the young man informed me that yesterday’s workers parked my car in another garage since I didn’t need it that day, and forgot to move it back for today. Finally, the car arrives, I load my gear and take off. Several people had suggested I drive over H3 to get to Kailua; time required that I save that route for the return trip and take Highway 61 instead. I pulled into the Kailua Beach parking lot with only minutes to run down to the beach and set up my tripod and camera. I had planned on the next beach down the way, but sometimes you just take what you get. Here is the best shot of several. The small aperture causes the sun star.

After the sun was up I watched some people enjoy the ocean–kayaking, swimming, and just walking the beach, a very popular activity. Then I drove back to Waikiki through H3 and discovered why that route was highly recommended.

Click on images to see them uncropped and full-size

Visiting Pearl Harbor is essential if one has made it to Hawaii. It is such an iconic place and plays such an essential role in US history. Be advised, however, that just showing up on your own will probably end in frustration. The most desired visitor destination is the Arizona Memorial, a structure built across the remains of the USS Arizona, site of the greatest loss of life for any ship in US history. Pearl Harbor, including access to this memorial, is run by the National Park Service (NPS). The only way to set foot on the memorial is to take the ferry run by NPS. Tickets are controlled, and the number of visitors allowed at one time is limited. The best way to visit Pearl Harbor as a whole, and to be guaranteed of having a ticket on the ferry to the Arizona, is to take a commercial tour. A variety of vendors and options is available, but not all options are offered every day and at every hour. Also, not all tours include a ticket for the ferry ride; they offer a view from a boat instead. I had one day available for my visit, which limited me to an all-day tour with stops at the Arizona, the submarine museum, the air museum and the USS Missouri battleship. Another thing to keep in mind about visiting Pearl Harbor is that you cannot carry a camera bag, a backpack, or even a purse. Any sort of bag has to be checked (for a hefty price), then reclaimed at the end of your visit. Cameras are permitted, provided you carry them, but changing lenses is discouraged, even if you can fit that second lens in your pocket. Because I needed to use a walking stick and carry a water bottle, I chose simply to use my Google Pixel 7 phone for these photos.

Click on images to see them uncropped and full-size

The first stop was the Arizona Memorial, built over the sunken battleship. At about 8:06 am on December 7, 1941, a 1,760-pound bomb penetrated the front of the ship, detonating an ammunition magazine. The resulting explosion set off a fire that burned for two and a half days. One-thousand one-hundred seventy-seven officers, sailors, and Marines perished. Because this loss of life was so massive and so dramatic, the decision was made never to remove the sunken vessel. Consequently, the memorial was built over it as a shrine honoring the fallen service members. Remarkably, to this day, nearly 80 years later, about a gallon of oil leaks up from the ship every day. At the far end, opposite the ferry dock, the wall lists their names. One hears conversation as one proceeds through the exhibit, but that section is shrouded in silence.

Upon returning to the Visitors Center, we had the option of visiting the submarine museum and had access to the USS Bowfin, a sub that was fully commissioned in 1943 and fought in both World War II and the Korean War. Also in the Visitors Center is a map of the war in the Pacific, embedded in the walkway. It gives a good sense of the enormity of that ocean. Following the submarine museum, we went to the Air Museum, where we had lunch. We were then free to walk around and look at the variety of planes and jets on display.

After the Air Museum we went to see the USS Missouri, site of the signing of the peace accord between the United States and Japan on September 2, 1945. The war was finally over. The Missouri was launched in 1944 from the Naval Shipyard in Brooklyn and entered the Pacific in 1945. After World War II, the ship participated in the Korean War and the Gulf War. The ship was decommissioned in 1955, but called back into action in 1986. Finally decommissioned in 1992, the ship found its current anchorage as a museum in 1998.

Enjoy these images as you take a virtual tour of Pearl Harbor.

When I was there, some people were paying their respects to the fallen, visiting individual graves to leave flowers or musing over the many mosaics that depict various battles in the Pacific. Here are some images of the mosaics and the general layout of Punchbowl.

After a respectful time of reflection at Punchbowl, I continued up Mount Tantalus for an overview of the Honolulu area. This map indicates the location of the Mt. Tantalus overlook. The following image is a panorama created from 21 images taken looking south. Compare the top image with the one beneath it to identify the six sections of the image. For a closer look at any one, choose it from the gallery below. You can see the famous Diamond Head on the left all the way over to Honolulu airport and Pearl Harbor on the right.

After thoroughly enjoying the vistas from Mt. Tantalus, I drove over toward Diamonhead. You cannot drive into the park at the top without a reservation, which I did not have. However, there is a small overlook and parking area right before entrance to the park. Here are a few images from that location.

Finally, here are all the images suitable for this post. There are a couple more from the drive up Mt. Tantalus, as well as a portrait of the wild chickens, which are the majority population of Kauai! Enjoy.

Here are a few pictures from my adventure. For most of the flight to Seattle we were above the clouds. However, crossing the Sierras proved differently.

I did finally reach Honolulu, on the island of Oahu. Courtesy of Google Maps, here is an overview of the Hawaiian Islands and the island of Oahu. Honolulu is in the center of the southern part of the island, and Waikiki is on the south shore, east of Honolulu, along H1. Yes, Hawaii does have interstate highways. H1 for this post, but H3 coming up in a few days.

Waikiki is a busy place, full of hotels and people a lot younger than I am. Parking on the street is nearly impossible, so customers of the Marriott (and other hotels) are virtually forced to use the expensive valet parking. That caused me a bit of a problem a couple days later, but that tale is for another post.

Here’s what the view from my hotel room looked like–looking left or right, day or night. Nothing but hotels!

Weary from travel, I gratefully slid into bed around 10:30pm local time. I was too tired to calculate how long I’d been up, and decided to trim down my ambitions for sightseeing the next day.

Here are all the images for today’s post. By the way, that tree on the right in the Parking photo is native to Hawaii, and was of enormous importance to the first humans who settled on the islands. More on that later. Enjoy!

All was not drudgery, however. First, I became friends with a neighbor couple, who were extremely helpful. I wanted to thank them, and pondered a long time about what would be an appropriate gift. They love their land and the quiet, rural location where it is located. I also wanted to take advantage of the relatively dark skies and open vistas that the Eastern Shore provides. So, I concluded that a photo of the Milky Way arching over their home would be well-received as a gift and provide me the opportunity to improve my astrophotography skills.

Some research showed that an early-morning (that is, 2:00 or 3:00 am) would be a good time to collect images. (Astrophotography can lead to sleep deprivation.) I ended up making a two-row panorama of eleven images each. That became a rather challenging processing task, getting everything to line up. But, I did have success, and made a print 18″ wide to give to them. Here is the result:

My second astrophotography idea came when I researched about Harriet Tubman, whose home territory is Cambridge. The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitor Center is located nearby, bordering Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge. I read that Tubman followed the North Star (Polaris) when leading her many groups of slaves to freedom in the North. I thought it would be fun to make an image of star trails around Polaris at the Visitor Center. That, of course, meant being there at night, and a cloud-free, Moon-less night at that! Given that I wasn’t living in Maryland, just working on my friends’ house–located an hour’s drive away–it was a while before sky conditions coincided with my ability to be present. The first attempt came in April, but was thwarted by too many planes and incoming clouds. Facing North from the Visitor Center meant pointing in the direction of several major airports. The second, and successful attempt came in June. By waiting until the wee small hours of the night (ironically, June 19th) I was able to minimize the number of planes crossing the field of view. Processing this image was also a challenge. Lights at the Visitor’s Center are not friendly to photographers, as the director had alerted me when I secured permission to be on the grounds after hours. So, the star trails were stacked from more than an hour’s worth of imaging, and the foreground part of the image was made earlier in the evening. Here is the result. I had a 12″x18″ metal print made to donate to the Museum.