January 4, 2018 - Pineapple Plantation, Wind tunnel & Magic Show

We covered a lot of ground on this day. We started our day up north with a trip to the Pineapple Plantation. Ricky and I had been here on our previous trip five years earlier and I remember thinking back then how fun it would be to bring the boys here once they were a little older. It was fun to actually have them there with us. As suspected, Logan loved the train ride, Lincoln loved the maze and we all loved the giant Dole Whip.

After several hours at the Plantation we drove to the east side of the island to what we called the wind tunnel. It's really called the Nu'Uanu Pali Lookout. It's not just any lookout though, it's the windiest place on the island. It's so windy that when you throw a coin forward into the air, it is picked up by the wind and lifted and thrown far over your head quickly in the other direction. The boys got an absolute kick out of it. We let them throw a bunch of coins up and then we'd duck as to not get hit by the flying coins.  During the late afternoon we stopped by a white sands beach on the east side of the island. It turned out that the water was too cold to really enjoy it and it was a fairly windy day so sitting on the beach wasn't fun with sand blowing in our eyes. We got in about an hour before we called it quits and headed back to the hotel to clean up.

That evening we walked downtown Waikiki, which is a similar feel and vibe of the Las Vegas Strip. Lots of high end stores, restaurants, entertainment and resorts. We were going for a dinner and magic show. The dinner ended up being pretty terrible but the magic show was fantastic. It was a great mix of laughs, showmanship and tricks that left us wondering to this day how they were done. We had great seats down in front and the boys were absolutely entranced with the magic show and that ended up being a very memorable show for them. We even got their pictures with some of the performers.

Who doesn't want to be in a giant Dole Whip?

Logan still has a deep love for trains so we rode the Pineapple Express.

The train ride took us all around the plantation where we saw fields and fields of pineapples growing. 

Daddy was taking pictures of all of us so I decided to take a picture of him. 

Our family before we boarded the train. 

Logan really wanted to ride on the very last car of the train in the last row, so that's where we all went. 

Fields of pineapples. 

The train commentator that sat behind us in the back of the train gave Logan this cocoa pod. It would have been illegal for us to carry it back home so we gave it to Tutu...and she may or may not have shipped it home. 

Because everyone wants to be a pineapple. 

Logan thought it was so incredibly hilarious to be a girl in the picture. 

I didn't get the massive three scoop one but couldn't resist the giant Dole Whip with caramel that Ricky, Logan and I ended up sharing. 

Taking a snack break to eat some ice cream and chips. That is how we roll on vacation. 

Tutu's sharing a giant Dole Whip. It's kind of one of those things you have to do when you go to the Dole Plantation. 

We made it in and out of that maze pretty quickly. There are six markings that the boys had to collect on their cards to prove that we had been all through the maze and we got them all. 

The wind tunnel

In addition to the fun entertainment that the wind brings, it also gave us spectacular views of the island.

The boys were pretty sure the wind could scoop them up and blow them away. 

Logan played in the water up to his thighs and then settled for playing in the sand. Lincoln and Ricky ended up going and playing football on the grass behind us. 

Magic of Polynesia show.