Hawaii Aulani Thanksgiving

So before this trip, I was talking to Meera who mentioned she was going to some Disney place in Hawaii. Then I realized we may actually be going to the same place at the same time and lo and behold we were! It was beyond exciting and I started coordinating plans with her brother.  We weren't getting there until Monday due to the crazy flight prices while they would be going on on Saturday.

Monday

Upon arrival, we waited and waited and waited for the Alamo shuttle. It was ridiculous. I tried calling them but no luck. Not sure if it was just due to the busy holiday schedule or what. But we also hadn't fed the kids any lunch and we were all tired and hungry. On the drive to Aulani, we looked for a Bubble Tea store to get the kids some snacks. I also stopped by a Times supermarket to gather some basic groceries.

Then finally we made it to Aulani by mid-late afternoon and of course there was another long checkin line but in the waiting area there were disney cartoons playing so the kids didn't seem to mind so much. The car rental seemed painful to have with $39 a night parking but Meera's brother ended up renting a car later that week and it was a slow and expensive process so I don't know what is better to do. We did need our car since we were going to go stay in Waikiki later that week.

We had the character dinner buffet which the kids really enjoyed. I had no idea how much it cost until afterwards but I would have had Christopher eat even more steak if I had known. As it is, he did pretty well.

The room was pretty well situated for us - I got a pool view 1 bedroom which had a full kitchen. The kids had a sofa bed and separate twin bed which Hannah claimed. It helps a lot at bedtime to not have them share a bed on these trips.

Tuesday

Luckily, the timezone change was in our favor and I had heard that waking up early to stand in line for the kids club was needed. I got there around 7am and had this line. But I just wanted to make sure to get the kids in for dinner since we had our own dinner plans at Ama Ama. After I got processed in the line, I headed back up to the room and got the kids ready for pool time!

We spent most of the morning on the lazy river. The water playground looked really fun but oddly enough the kids weren't that into it. It probably didn't help that it was pretty windy.

Our timing with Meera's brother's family didn't quite work out. When we were heading back up to the room to shower, Meera texted saying they were heading down for pooltime. Oops. I managed to get christopher to take a quick nap and then I woke him up to take him to the kids club at 3pm for their reserved slime activity and they were going to remain there until 8pm. I was super excited about this...

Once the kids were gone, we met up with Meera and the 3 of us walked across the street to get bubble tea. Dinner was on the resort that night at Ama Ama which was fun with Meera's brother and his wife as well.

Wednesday

So I got to the line even earlier today (6:30) now that I knew how the line situation was. But I brought a kindle and was more prepared mentally.

Today was beach time in the lagoon. We checked out beach toys (such a nice perk!) and headed to the very empty chairs.

There wasn't much to see in the lagoon but I swam around the lagoon looking around. We had stayed at Lagoon 2 before at the Ko Olina resort and it was pretty empty there but I would say this lagoon wasn't too crowded either.

After the beach, the kids wanted to hop in the pool again and this time I took Hannah on the waterslides though there was a wait which was painful since we were wet and it was windy. But the slides were pretty fun.

Back to the room after for another nap for Christopher and then back to kids club they went. We had reservations at Roy's tonight - we took the shuttle there but walked back afterwards.

Thursday

It was Thanksgiving and we were leaving Aulani already! We were headed to Megumi's place for lunch. We got there slightly on the early side and it was really good to see them. We stopped by a supermarket again on our way to the Ilikai condo in Waikiki. Parking was free which was a relief. The complex itself was a bit dated but when we opened the doors to our condo, it was super bright and had the most amazing corner view.

I took the kids to the kiddie pool at the complex which was super shallow and small but they surprisingly had a wonderful time. I guess kids don't need much.

We went to Katsumidori (which was recommended by Megumi) for dinner and just hoped to get in by showing up when it opened. We were successful but the keiki meal was weird for the kids. They only liked the bread, fried chicken, and dessert. After dinner, we walked to the movie theater to watch Coco which turned out to be so much farther than expected. And then we had to walk back. Coco was pretty emotional for Christopher who cried a little (in his words "I don't know why water was coming out of my eyes").

Friday

I had booked a dolphin excursion at the aquarium for the afternoon but made the horrifying discovery that Hannah had lice! I made a late afternoon appt at the local lice clinic. On the way to the aquarium, I wanted to do the lighthouse hike that I had done in the past but the parking lot was completely full. Darn. So instead we just headed to the aquarium earlier which worked out fine because we got to see the sea lion and dolphin shows though it did start raining during the dolphin show and we didn't have full roof protection.

Then we went to our dolphin excursion and it basically was just one big photo op where they sell you the photos afterwards. Charles snuck in a go pro but they got really mad at him for trying to use it.

They had us do 3 photo ready poses with the dolphin. Dance with the dolphin, kiss the dolphin on the nose and then have the dolphin kiss you on the cheek. Christopher had the cutest moment because he got confused and kissed the dolphin on the cheek but we missed getting that on camera.

After the dolphin excursion, we headed to the lice clinic and waited a long time but they were too busy to slot us in so I just bought the solution and lice comb for Charles to use later. We did another super early dinner at Imanas Tei to avoid crowds. On this trip, having a big breakfast, light lunch (or just snacks) and then eating super early at 5 or 5:30 has worked out well to avoid any waits at these popular places.

That night we saw the fireworks show from our balcony which is the best seating you can get. This is the whole reason I booked this unit.

Saturday

Not bothering to hold the rail.

Today we wanted to do the Diamond Head hike but parking was impossible at the top and then there was the Farmer's market at the bottom. We did eventually find parking and just took a random cab up to the top since there was no way we could get the kids to hike to the top. Surprisingly as we were hiking up, I heard Christopher say "that looks like Lucas from my class". And then I heard the other boy say "that's Christopher!" A funny coincidence!

The kids did really well on this hike up surprisingly but they were pretty tired by the end. We took another cab down back to the parking lot. This guy was not as friendly as our ride up the mountain.

On the way back we dropped by Waiola's for shaved ice since we couldn't possibly have a trip to Oahu without that. Then I left the kids with Charles who fed them mac n cheese for lunch and planned to take them to the lagoon later. I met up with Megumi and Meera for lunch at the mall.

For dinner tonight, we went to another trendy place (Sweet Home Cafe) for Taiwanese hot pot! This may have been the first time we tried hot pot with the kids surprisingly so we hadn't quite figured out what they liked yet and they were still a little picky.

View from the top

Sunday

Our flight was in the afternoon so we went to the Japanese food court for lunch before heading out. The food court was such a cool place to be for lunch. Plus kids got 1 free token for the toy machines which made them super excited.

On the flight back, the kids didn't sleep at all which meant there was some fighting and crankiness over the tablet but we made it.

Always love Hawaii and we did a lot this time. The weather was colder than expected with random rain showers.