I did take some time out for enjoyment, of course. I had a nice flight, though long, and filled with EPIC struggles with the stewardesses over the fact that I can't eat gluten. It's like they thought if they insisted hard enough I could eat wheat. If only, ladies. It was a little "who's on first" there for a while when I was saying "wheat allergy" and they were hearing "meat allergy". You'd think this would have been cleared up after I said I can't eat stuffing, pasta, flour, bread or croutons. Or at least by the time I ate chicken ... I had similar issues on the island and really only managed to get one real meal a day. Luckily I had brought snacks.

My room was right on the ocean so I had a great view and could run downstairs to the beach or serenity pool when I had some time. I never really got on the Hawaiian time schedule, which is 6 hours earlier than EDT. I wasn't able to sleep very well on the plane rides either, so I should sleep well tonight and hopefully not be too tired tomorrow. At any rate this meant an early bedtime for me since I was somewhere between Pacific and Eastern time.

I took time for a tour of some of the island including Pearl Harbor, the Dole Plantation, Sunset Beach and the Pali Road up in the rain forest. Pearl Harbor was very moving. Oil was visible and smellable on the water. Large parts of the USS Arizona were visible above or just under the water. Other ships in Battleship Row that were sunk were also marked. I learned that survivors of the Arizona who died later had asked to be interred with the ship. Oddly there were a lot of Japanese on the tour. I'm not sure how the attack is viewed in current Japanese culture, I'd be interested in a perspective. I don't think anyone there spoke English though.

Dole is currently the only pineapple company on the island although they only grow the pineapples there, they're canned in Asia. Other produce includes coffee, macadamia nuts and taro root. Cousin Walter the tour guide was very amusing and informative.

I think those are the highlights. My hotel was right near VERY upscale shops so I window shopped at Cartier and Ferragamo. It was very muggy so I was thankful for the conference shuttle. It was only about a mile or so walk but I worked up quite the sweat the first afternoon. The next time I travel to Polynesia I'll bring more than n+1 days of clothes.