Off to Hawaii

Today's post will be a departure from all others. As we were on a bus from the ferry that brought us to Vancouver from Victoria, we had a call from Jessie letting us know that Dawn's Mom, Mary, had passed away. So I'd like to start off with a tribute to Mary. When I first met her in 1972, I was immediately impressed with what a classy, beautiful woman she was - a military officer's wife. Over the years Mary became a friend as well as my mother-in-law. There were never any derogatory jokes about mother-in-laws from me. We were fortunate to have her living near us in her remaining years and she was always an important part of our family. When we set off on this vacation, we knew that there was a distinct possibility that we would not see Mary again, but the Mary we knew and loved had slipped away from us in the past year, so we are resolved to carry on with our plans. We 're saddened of course, but more happy that she suffers no longer. We'll love you forever Mary and have a great time with the angels! Today was a travel day. Because we had an early evening flight to Honolulu, our day began somewhat leisurely, with a final breakfast with Gerry and Diane before they delivered us to the ferry terminal at Swartz Bay for a 90 minute journey to Vancouver. We prearranged coach transfer from the ferry to the airport and after Gerry and Diane dropped us off, we purchased our ferry tickets, boarded and checked our bags straight to the bus. The ferry journey was thankfully calm, although we travelled back into the rain. This is a pretty voyage and would be more so with some sun. After an 11:00 ferry departure, by 2:00 we had cleared American customs at the airport and immediately went to toast Mary with a Bloody Mary. Our flight was on time in a large filled plane and once again calm is the word. We landed on time, caught the Alamo shuttle bus to their offsite rental location and by 10:00 we were in our Mustang Convertible and off to the Queen Kapiolani Hotel. This hotel is located at the Diamond Head end of Waikiki and was a short block from the beach, so we changed quickly into lighter clothes and headed out for a drink and snack. At this time it was 81 degrees F. We ended up on Waikiki at the Tiki Bar where we had a Waikiki classic, the Kalakoa Sunset featuring Skyy vodka and Chambord and we shared a taro tortilla plate with Hawaiian pulled pork. Then we pinched ourselves to remind us where we were. As I'm finishing this it is now past midnight Honolulu time which is 3:00 Victoria time. Time to cash in the chips, because tomorrow it's top down and off we go.