Sunday Afternoon at "Duke's"

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Waikiki Beach from across the water
Nancy from Toronto - a "good sport"
The crowd at the Barefoot Bar
Approaching the Barefoot Bar from the beach
Henry and band rocking out at the Barefoot Bar
Sunset from the Barefoot Bar / Two Boats "Kiss" the sun

Duke's barefoot bar, named for the Hawaiian legendary surfer and Olympic gold medal swimmer, Duke Kahanamoku, is located beachside in the Outrigger Waikiki Hotel. Every Friday, Saturday and Sunday afternoon the bar hosts concerts on the beach. Yesterday, local favorite and Grammy winner Henry Kapono cranked up some light rock including plenty of Eagles, and of course, Sweet Home Alabama, to a wild and adoring crowd of dancing and singing surfers, outrigger canoers, sunbathers and bystanders for one really fun party. It reminded me of Panama City Beach when the bands played on the edge of the beach and everyone could walk up and enjoy in their swimming suits. The crowd was enthusiastic but well-behaved and everyone had a great time until the last note was played. I definitely want to check it out again next Sunday afternoon. This was the first time I had set foot on Waikiki Beach and the sand is darker than the Destin area and rather course. The sand was shipped from Molakai and New Zealand and deposited onto the beach. The water is beautiful but much of it is strewn with rocks so you have to be careful. The beach in front of Duke's is probably the best in the area because it has been carefully groomed all the way out into the surf but it cannot compare with the natural beauty of 30A/Destin. Nevertheless, the portion of the beach is filled with surfers and canoers.

The Ilikai

Last night I went to the Ilikai Hotel with my buddys, John Ho and Eric Morrison - John does a lot of work for Continental Pacific, owns 3 restaurants in Santa Barbara, CA, was at one time a Navy SEAL and is the reigning Chinese golf champion of Oahu; an interesting and hard-working fellow who owns a very nice home not far from Jere's mansion - The Ilikai is the hotel where they shot the intro to Hawaii Five 0 and it still has the '60's retro look to it - By the way, Hawaii Five-0 replays come on every night here and it is still a claim-to-fame for native Hawaiians - We went to the Italian restaurant at the top, Sarento's, which was great in all respects - I am attaching my I-Phone photos (still don't have my digital here) that show the view to the west 20 minutes or so before sunset - They had a great piano player and it was a good view for the Friday night fireworks show from Waikiki beach which is quite an anticipated event for most everyone in Honolulu,

The People of Honolulu

Hawaii is in the middle of the Pacific not too far from LA and about twice that distance from Japan and China. Some refer to Honolulu as LA West and based on the ethnicity of its population it seems an appropriate moniker. The majority of the citizenry in the city is of Asian descent. The next most populous group would be native Hawiians. Caucasians from the mainland make up the third group with no real trends beyond that besides what breed of mongrel the intermarriage of Asians, Hawaiians and Causcasions creates (and I use the term "mongrel" strictly in the denotative sense and without the negative connotation that is usually attached).

I have not been around Asians much but they seem a very proud and private people. Many of the asians here also have either lived in California or have a business there or relatives there or were at least schooled there and travel back and forth between Honolulu and California fairly regularly. Of the causcasians, many have ties to California, but regardless of where they come from we are all referred to as "mainlanders" by the asians and outside the city as "haoles" by the native Hawaiians (which is often a racial slur but not always). Interestingly, the continental U.S. is referred to as "the mainland" not as "the states" but since Hawaii is a state I guess it makes sense.

Saturday at the Park

Double left click to enlarge pictures

I decided to go to the park this afternoon for a little sun and surf. On the way, I joined in with some native Hawaiians for a little touch football (top left) and took these pictures. The park, Ala Moana Park, is a city-owned facility that is very well maintained and serves many divergent functions. It is "home" to a significant homeless population (bottom left) though a bill has been proposed in this legislative session to appropriate $150 million or a new homeless center, it is a place to camp out for families looking for a weekend in the open-air, it is a great place for locals to picnic and it provides consistently good swimming, sunning and snorkeling. These pictures are typical of how the park looks and is used on any given day. It is just across the street from the Nauru Tower (top right).

Friday Night in Waikiki

Jere invited Eric and me to dinner with he and Patty; we ate in Waikiki Beach at Nobu; the crowd was great and the food excellent except for this very strange dessert- believe it or not, it is composed of Shave Ice, Sweet Syrups to put into the shave ice, green tea ice cream (which tastes just as bland as green tea - no sugar at all) and mexican brown beans (the kind you eat with tacos and rice) - yuck! I took a big bite before I realized what the beans were - The most notable event of the night was getting from my condo to Nobu - It is approximately 8 blocks from one to another - I left the condo at 6:00 and due to the bumper-to-bumper traffic, arrived 40 minutes laters - Honolulu traffic seems to rival that of Atlanta and LA -

Balcony View Toward Diamond Head

I took this with my cellphone camera from my balcony - The view in person is much more panaramic !

The Nauru Tower Pool

This is a picture of the swimming pool at the Nauru Tower. There are also 2 hot tubs; 1 maintained at 101 degrees and 1 maintained a 104 degrees.

Hawaii 101

Aloha, from Honolulu - Yes, I know that is a bit corny but if you have never had the opportunity to say it then I think it should be said -

THE PLANE TRIP: I arrived by airline on Monday afternoon after a lay-over in LA - I arrived on Hawiian Airlines and the flight and meal were an improvement from the Delta flight from ATL; nicer workers and a decent chicken teriaki lunch -

MY ARRIVAL: Eric, who works with Continental Pacific (CP) was to have met me at baggage claim around 2:15 but thought I was arriving Delta and ended up at the wrong airport - finally, around 3:30 we connected and he very graciously took me on a short tour of Honolulu before dropping me off at the condo that will be home while I am here - Eric could not be a nicer fellow and I think I will enjoy working with him -

THE WEATHER: Eric described the weather that day as "the worst it gets over here" - It was partly cloudy, 73 degrees, wind around 10-15 mph and a very pleasant change from the 30 degree morning I spent in ATL - that night it dipped into the upper 50's and TV reporters were complaining about how cold it was - Since then it has warmed back up nicely and today it is sunny and a very pleasant 80 degrees -

MY CONDO: My condo is on the 29th floor of the Nauru Tower. Jere and his family lived here when they first moved to Oahu but now live in the "mansion" 30 minutes out of town on the southeast coast where they recently filmed the final episodes of "The Shoot" for the cover of the Victoria Secrets Spring swimwear catalog. The condo is 2 bedroom with marble floors throughout and a balcony that offers great views of the ocean and Waikiki Beach slightly to my right and skyscrapers and mountains to my left. The building is one of the nicest in Honolulu and very well-secured. It is right across the street from Ala Moana Beach that offers a blue-green "swimming pool-like" bay with first-class snorkeling. I have been going every afternoon for 30 minutes or so to get a little salt water in my sinuses and start a gradual tanning of my pale face. The condo is also just across the street from Ala Moana mall which houses Nieman Marcus and Tiffany's and many other shops too expensive for my budget. It also offers many great restaurants, some with open-air views of the Pacific. Eric was kind enough to treat me to a dinner at Longhi's on Monday night that was hearty.

WORK: I have the title of Corporate Counsel for Continental Pacific but am doing very little real legal work. I am acting more in the capacity of project manager for the Kahuku Village project and immediately started attending meetings with Jere and Eric regarding their ongoing real estate projects here on Oahu. They have invested many tens of millions of dollars primarily on the North Shore near the village of Kahuku and are working with engineering and design firms daily to try and get the property ready to market. I attended the opening of the Hawaii legislature with Jere on Wednesday and met the representative that I will be working with to introduce land use reform legislation for Oahu during this session. I also scheduled and attended my first "meeting on my own" with a senior land planner yesterday. It was educational.

THE NORTH SHORE: The North Shore, besides being where the Continental Pacific land is located, is one of the top surfing spots of the world. During the winter, when the surf is at its peak, world surfing tournaments are run non-stop on and around Sunset Beach which is just 10 minutes from Kahuku Village. Jack Johnson lives in Sunset Beach and his children attend Sunset Beach Elementary school which is right on the main highway. On Tuesday, I went to the north shore and the surf was so high that all of the tournaments were canceled. The surf was between 25 and 35 feet high and was startling. Today the surf is forecast at 8 to 12 feet and the tournaments will be going full-speed ahead.

BODY SURFING: I want to try some body-surfing this weekend at Sandy Beach where the surf is forecast at 2 to 4 feet. It is supposedly the best body-surfing beach on the island and one of the better anywhere. Guess we'll see.

GROCERIES: I went grocery shopping on Wednesday night and finally have something fresh to eat at the condo. I never had such a good-tasting bologna sandwich as when I got home that night! I shopped the Safeway grocery store that is 6 or so blocks away. I asked for a "buggy" and they laughed and said I must be from back east; they simply call them carts. Anyway, groceries are priced a good bit more expensively than in AL and GA but the selection is pretty good; especially the fresh vegetables.

My fingers are tired - more later - ALOHA! (The same word means hello and goodbye)

Tim