Images of Oahu Hawai'i, taken in January 2016.

On my “down time” while on Oahu I took several tours to get a better feel for the islands beyond the national parks. One of those tours circled the island with an emphasis on the coastline and particularly the North Shore. The sites were spectacular but I also gained a better understanding of the islands and their history and culture. For instance, there are only 12 letters in the Hawaiian alphabet (a, e, i, o, u, k, l, m, n, o, p, w) which explains the long names with strings of multiple vowels everywhere!

Besides seeing the beautiful coastline and water, incredibly blue no matter where you go, and having fresh pineapple at the Dole Plantation, the highlight of the tour was catching a glimpse of a Green Sea Turtle on a beach in Waimea Bay. At first I thought it was dead but apparently they love to crawl up on the beach and bask/sleep in the sun just like so many of the tourist you see in Hawai’i! And, also like a true tourist, this guy was oblivious to everything around him…we took our pictures and moved on without even the slightest twitch from our subject.