By Edward Wang
Aloha and welcome to Kona, Hawaii. Today, we are on The Big Island of the Hawaiian Islands. The last time I went to Hawaii was when I was about three years old, so I don’t remember much besides that we went to Maui. It was much different here in Hawai’i or the Big Island.
Warning: If you suffer from any type of injury from reading articles, DO NOT READ ON. I REPEAT DO NOT READ ON.
Background Information
Hawai’i is the largest of the Hawaiian islands, as well as the largest island in the United States. It is still getting bigger because of its volcanoes! Its many volcanoes include the tallest: Mauna Kea and some smaller ones like Mauna Loa. It is a state of the U.S.A. Hawai’i is famous for its millions of activities globally: some include snorkeling, whale watching and even observatories. Some places that catch your eyes are the Volcanoes National Park located near Mauna Kea, and Pearl Harbour ─ a place you might want to visit.
Back From The Start
How much do you like waking up at 4:00 in the morning? I definitely don’t, but I had to anyway. If you have ever tried, you would know I was about to fall onto my bed and not get up but, BEEEEP. It makes my head spin; why would the taxi driver honk the horn at such a time?
Plane Flight
It was the most tiring day (or night) of my life! The connection flight from Denver to Kona, Hawaii meant twelve hours of flight—not even counting the hours at the airport! Once we finally boarded the United Airlines flight, we fell asleep right away. It would have been midnight here in Canada, but 4:00 pm in Kona! The flight itself was well entertained: there was a “mini TV” that was a little bigger than the ones on Air Canada on which you can play games like Hangman or Battleship.
Hotel Number One: Hilton
Remember my trip to Mexico? Hacienda Tresios – the hotel I stayed in Mexico- had gifts like chocolate on the bed waiting for us. Hilton didn’t have that, but its activities are super, and super isn’t the word for it—it’s stupendous! There was a whole bookshelf full of cards introducing different events in fabulous topics, from hiking to cruises and also helicopter rides. Plus, the employees there are much more welcoming and friendly. My stay was awesome. If I were to give Hilton rating, it would be 9.5 out of 10.
One reason for me to give it a high rating was that our room was the biggest room I’ve ever seen! It was like a whole house. It even had a balcony! Our room was on Lagoon Tower. We were lucky that the pool and the place where the Luau was held was close by. Plus, the shops were just outside of Lagoon Tower. The highest floor was 6 and we stayed on 4. It was still super high up.
Being one giant hotel, where visitors are housed in towers, how would people get around? Well, the answer is that they built a tram. The tram was like a subway, but travelled slowly. I was on it once, but my mom decided that we should not have to take the tram to get around. We should try going around by ourselves. Which I thought was a disappointment.
Luau
Have you ever heard of Luaus? Well, we went to one that was one of the activities at the hotel. Basically, the Luau was a feast with a stage, where some people preformed Ancient Hawaiian entertainments, showcased their history and how their ancestors celebrated in early times. There was a kid’s buffet with a table full of French fries and Mac and Cheese, and even Chicken fingers and nuggets. I am not the person you would call a junk food addict, but my brother definitely is. When the main course came, I can’t say I can name any of the foods. They all looked like different kinds of squishy mixes. However, it was was delicious. Maybe you can try to attend one too.
Helicopters
It was my final day at Hilton and I was sad to leave. Hilton was the most amazing hotel I have ever been to. Anyway, we went to the shuttle bus place. When we got there, the driver was already there waiting for us. Once we got on, we went straight to a different hotel to pick up some people. That’s when we started our trip to the heliports (where the Helicopters were parked). We drove to Blue Hawaiian Helicopters. I guess there’s the word blue in the name because the Helicopters are blue.
Our pilot was Noah. Before we began, he explained about the headsets that we had to wear. He also said that if we wanted to say something, we can communicate by holding a button on a small microphone and speaking into it. So that’s when we flew off. We flew a long way. It was not so scary being so high up as you may think. After all, I had been looking out the window of a plane for 12 hours. Plus, I’m not so scared of heights. Our first point of interest was Mauna Kea, which, when measured from its base on the Pacific Ocean floor, is the tallest Mountain or Volcano in the world. Mauna Kea didn’t look like a volcano at all, and that’s the same for all the other volcanoes we saw, because all the volcanoes on Hawaii’s islands are shield volcanoes, which means they look more like a warrior’s shield laid on its side than a mountain.
We flew over many places, and though we did not stay long at the sights, the pilot specifically checked out Mauna Loa─another tall and active Volcano. It’s just a few hundred metres lower than Mauna Kea. But once again, it’s a shield Volcano. We could literally see the snow and ice on Mauna Loa. It was so cool looking at it from so high up. The whole scene was like a picture: the cars on the highway, and the volcanoes polluting the air with ash.
We flew across the island and got back to the heliport. Overall, I loved the chance to see so many different points of interest. One other interesting thing was that my brother Edmund was sleeping and snoring the whole way. Once we landed, my Dad apparently lost his camera lens, which was funny because he always talks about how I lose stuff. So, my adventure on the Helicopters was very amusing.
Hotel Number Two: The Fairmont Orchid
After four days, we moved to another hotel. It was called The Fairmont Orchid or Fairmont for short. Fairmont was just like any other random hotel in Canada, except that there weren’t lots of roofs, mostly because it doesn’t snow down there and rain is very rare. It’s either summer, when it’s around 45° C or, winter when it’s around 38°C. The hotel was still pretty big. There was a whole beach behind it and a giant pool in the middle. It was much smaller than Hilton but it was as much fun!
Snorkeling
My snorkeling trip in Cuba was an absolute fail because it was our first time. But, we tried again this time in Hawaii. Once I got onto the boat, I felt the warmth of the sun overcome me. With the ocean waves drowning my sorrows, it was great. I already knew it was going to be a great adventure.
The water was probably colder than I expected, which is why I went back up onto the soothing boat as soon as I could. Despite not getting to see any fish or turtles, I found out that many other people who were brave and weren’t scared of the cold water did go close to shore and see the cute and sophisticated green sea turtle, or Honu, swim under them. I spent most of the trip on the deck of the boat watching the sunset. I loved my experience.
Sunset
As the afternoon sun went downhill, our boat moved towards the horizon line. The waves pushed the boat. We were supposed to see the sunset, but because it was March, the humpback whales come here in Hawaii for their breeding season, which was pretty cool to see.
The whales were really big, maybe bigger than the boat. Once in a while, they would come and squirt their water right out of the blow hole. A few hours after watching the sea monster, the sun was clear, coming right down from heaven with nothing blocking it. When it was fully out of sight, it suddenly turned much darker; as dark as the clouds before a big thunderstorm.
So anyway, my Hawaii trip was great. I went sightseeing and even just flying on airplanes 26 hours was a huge accomplishment. Maybe you, too, can take a short vacation there sometime. Peace out!
