Day 9 - Ride up the West (Leeward) side of Oahu and then across the North side

By Ellen Outten

                               

                                Clicking on any picture will enlarge it for a better view



Just trying to push the volcano back into the ground and cool it off so it doesn't erupt again

This is called The Chinaman's Hat.   We stopped to take a picture because it was so interesting a shape.

Today was another leisurely day (for me) as I haven't done any driving yet on this island.   As much as I love driving and don't care about traffic.  Heck, all the years I drove in New Jersey and Maryland and DC, yet traffic here is massive.   Lots of volume.   Very slow going on some roads; start, stop, go, stop, start.   I'm glad Wayne is doing the driving.

So today we saw the 'poor side of town'.   It appears all of the homeless have settled on the western side of the island, above Pearl City.    Homeless tents set up along all the coastline from Waianae to Makaha and north.   


Not to denegrate the homeless or their need to survive, the scenery is spectacular.   I've been trying to figure out the special words to use with Hawaii - Oahu, specifically and the best word I've come up with so far is LUSH.   I am in the tropics; a first.   I don't know that i expected all the greenery and the mountains filled with LUSH trees.   It's every where you look.  If you don't see the ocean, you see greenery.   Simply spectacular when you consider I've been living in Arizona for almost eight years.






Harnessing the wind on the North Shore.   A definite need for power, I'm sure and the perfect place given the winds and the gusts.

Tomorrow, our last full day here, we plan to visit Schofield Barracks, an Army base and part of the history of WWII.  And, in honor of Joe Oswald, I hope to take a picture of the barracks he slept in when he was assigned here. 

There's also a museum on the base, Tropic Lightning Museum that we want to check out.  Then it's back to our condo to clean up, pack up and get ready for an early rise on Wednesday for the trip to the airport and back to our normal way of lives.










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