Today, our ship docked in Honolulu. The cruising part of our Hawaiian vacation is over, and we were in the process of disembarking when the ship went on lockdown because an alarm went off. It was soon discovered that a piece of luggage had fallen over and triggered the alarm. Since there was no clear and/or present danger, the disembarkation process was resumed. [Author’s note: Maybe alarms should be located above the height of a suitcase.] We got off the ship and took a cab to our resort. The man who checked us into our room said we’d just missed the half hour of panic. “Why, what happened?” we asked.
Well, if it’s not a drill, what is it? Let’s see what the U.S. Pacific Command has to say.
And then came the explanation. 
Really? I can’t even overwrite a computer file or photo without telling my computer at least twice that I really, really want to overwrite the file, but an incoming missile alert can be sent with a single click? Well, the good news is that Ted and I didn’t know anything about this, so we stayed very calm. Sometimes, it’s less stressful to be ignorant.
Moving on with our day, we took our luggage up to our room.
On the way to our room, I heard squawking and saw two parrots in trees on the resort grounds. We’re not in Missouri any more!
We got a free upgrade to a small suite, which was lovely. The shower stall alone was nearly as big as the entire bathroom on the cruise ship, and the bathroom suite was only a little smaller than our ship stateroom. We could definitely spread out in here.
The two balconies in our suite had water views.
The resort is huge. It has eight high-rise towers of rooms, lots of shops and restaurants, several pools, open seating areas, etc. and all of it is right on Waikiki Beach in view of Diamond Head. We needed a map to get around, and spent some enjoyable time discovering the amenities available to us.
Here are two of the eight towers of rooms at the resort. There are people on the beach and you could swim or rent paddleboats in this little pool of ocean water.
As we explored the resort, we saw an appropriate door stop at a shoe store.
This is a shopping/restaurant area of the resort along one of the entrances. One of the things I noticed everywhere we went was that there is a lot of shade. Add an ocean breeze, and it’s wonderfully comfortable outside–even in January.
We were assigned to the Rainbow Tower.
It’s a big resort, but it was easy to find our room–just look for the rainbow. There’s another rainbow mosaic on the opposite (ocean) side of the tower.
The Rainbow Tower is iconic. It was built in 1969 and its focal point is 2.5 miles away on the ocean side. It was purposely set at the beach along the flight corridor of HNL airport to welcome visitors to Honolulu. The two rainbow mosaics on the building each have 16,000 glazed tiles that were hand-painted. They form the world’s largest ceramic-tile mosaics at 286 feet high and 26 feet wide.
Here’s a close-up of the tiles.
The Rainbow Tower is stunning at night.
We spent the entire day relaxing, walking around the resort, sitting on the beach, and just enjoying the warm January weather. It was a nice change from being on a timetable for our daily cruise excursions. We loved the excursions, but it was easy to spend a day relaxing without a schedule. As we were meandering, Ted and I saw a T-shirt that described our day: “Could you be more Pacific?”
The sunsets behind the palm trees over the Pacific seem magical.