. . . to the airport. Two last photos from our last breakfast with Diamond Head in the background.

No car today. Sunny morning. Nice breakfast again at the hotel restaurant. Then we settled in to our reserved lounge chairs and umbrella on the beach. The beach is actually public and anyone can and does go there, but our little area is just for Royal Hawaiian guests. We both went in swimming. (Can’t remember the last time we did that.) Nice surf. Shifting sands underneath and tough to walk. I actually had to be helped up out of the water. (No video of that. Sorry. Sigh, getting old sucks.) We sat under our umbrella for a few hours including during a brief passing shower. Then we had a drink at the Mai Tai bar before venturing off hotel property looking for lunch. Recognize that shadow? Recognize those legs?

For lunch we chose the Maui Brewing Company. It’s upstairs in a shopping mall but it’s open air. We both had delicious fish tacos with a side of guacamole & chips and local amber ale. I suspect that there will be no dinner tonight as we were both stuffed. So do you think “do not feed the birds for health reasons” is for the health of the customers or health of the birds? The two pigeons look very comfortable at their table.

There is nothing else to report. As expected, no dinner tonight. We are finishing a bottle of wine on our balcony before retiring for the night. Tomorrow morning it’s off to the airport for our 2:20 pm flight to Phoenix on Hawaiian Airlines that arrives at PHX at 11:05 pm.

It’s been a great trip in almost every respect. Calm seas. Good weather. Great food. Meeting new people. But it will be good to get home and start to lose weight and rest up.

Thanks for reading and for all the comments. See you next trip!

In answer to comments, no, no Spam for breakfast (or any other meals). I actually love Spam whereas Elaine despises it. I used to eat fried Spam all the time as a kid. And I loved raw Spam right out of the can, sliced up with mayonnaise and onions. Yum. No Poco Moco either. Sounds good though.

Monday broke bright and sunny and stayed that way all day. We enjoyed a lovely breakfast at the Royal Hawaiian right at beachside. Scrambled eggs with sausage and potatoes for Elaine. Everything omelet with bacon and potatoes for me.

Then we were off on a drive to Oahu’s lesser seen North Coast. We made several stops.

At Beautiful Kualoa Regional Park we stopped and enjoyed the views and the quiet. The beach is as beautiful as Waikiki without the crowds. Birds and chickens everywhere.

We stopped briefly at Turtle Bay but quickly backtracked to Romy’s Shrimp Food Truck for lunch. GIAGANTIC steamed prawns for lunch. They looked more like lobsters. Peel them yourself. Four each with rice and dipping sauces. Delicious!

Then we doubled back again to Turtle Bay and Kawela Bay for some pictures. Turtle Bay Resort, once an independent resort, is now a Ritz Carlton. We didn’t see any turtles although they actually do nest and live here..

Then we started back towards Waikiki, about an hour and a half away. We stopped briefly at Dole Plantation, an outrageous tourist trap. You can take train rides through the pineapple fields at a ridiculous price. We didn’t. There is a huge gift shop. Blah. There was nothing worth photographing. We did enjoy excellent pineapple ice cream waffle cones (that were more expensive than our gold leaf ice cream in Tokyo).

Back at the hotel we walked next store and had pina coladas at the Sheraton Waikiki. Here are some random shots taken on the grounds of the adjoining Sheraton Waikiki and Royal Hawaiian both before, during, and after our pina coladas.

Good day! One more full day before we leave on Wednesday. Oh, when we driving back from the North Coast we saw a horrendous traffic jam on H-2 (a Hawaiian Interstate that of course doesn’t go interstate) caused by a bad accident. Fortunately we were going in the other direction and it didn’t affect us. Traffic was backed up, conservatively, eight miles. Not much on the agenda for tomorrow. Rest and relaxation and packing up.

One more post to go. Bye for now.

Woke up Sunday morning in Tokyo and had a nice breakfast. Then we checked out at 11:00 am. Now we had to kill time until 5:00 pm when our driver to the airport arrived. We walked around a bit. Right outside the hotel is the Ark Hills office complex, Suntory Music Hall and a host of restaurants. In the Ark Hills Plaza, there was a Music Fest of Japanese children performing, mostly for their parents, but today also for us. And we had lunch at the City Bakery, a Japanese chain based on the City Bakery in NYC. Good lunch. We walked a bit and cooled heels in the hotel lobby for awhile.

Finally our driver arrived and we were off to Haneda Airport. Tokyo also has the larger (and further out) Narita Airport. We were at the airport at 5:45 for our 9:45 flight. Check-in, customs, and immigration were a breeze. We spent the rest of the time in the Delta One Club, a very nice facility. We took off roughly on time at 9:55 and began the flight to Honolulu. Shortly after takeoff, we crossed the international dateline and it was Sunday morning all over again.

Aloha!

We landed on schedule in Honolulu at 11:00 am Sunday morning. Yes, still Sunday. We arrived before we left. We picked up our rental car (Kia Sportage SUV) and now had to kill time until we could check in at the Royal Hawaiian at 4:00 pm. We searched out a laundromat and did a load of wash. We had lunch at McDonald’s. (Yes, Micky D’s.) We visited a Whole Foods to pick up some wine. And finally we were able to check in.

We have a great room at the historic Royal Hawaiian overlooking Waikiki Beach and Diamond Head. The first picture is from our balcony and that’s most of Diamond Head on the left. See Elaine with her hotel provided lei? We had pina coladas at the hotel’s Mai Tai Bar (with a nice sunset) followed by a glass of wine on the balcony in the room. Alas, Hawaii has cockroaches and they enjoy the balcony too. So, exhausted we headed inside to bed.

See you tomorrow which, thank God, will be Monday!

First we had a delightful complementary buffet breakfast at ANA Intercontinental. Great view from our table. After breakfast we took a short walk outside in the vicinity of the hotel. It wasn’t raining yet. Unique window cleaning method!

Forecast called for clouds. What we got was a steady light rain. We had a walking tour scheduled with Kyoko Kitagawa of Chris Rowthorn Tours. Rain be damned, we went ahead as scheduled. Kyoko met us at our hotel. We set off for a subway ride on Tokyo’s Metro which has 14 different lines. Riding the Metro was fun. Our first stop was at Ueno Park where we had a nice walkabout. See the famous moon pine?

The highlight in Ueno Park is the Ueno Toshogu, which is the Tokugawas Shogunate‘s Golden Mausoleum, a Shinto shrine. The Sacred Tree is over 600 years old.

After another Metro ride, we stopped for lunch at a very small family run restaurant. Maybe eight tables. We all had some sort of ramen or noodles accompanied by draft Asahi beer. Yummy. Here’s mine:

Next we visited the Asakura Museum in the Yanaka District, an area of Tokyo undamaged during WWII. Fumio Asakura was famous for his sculptures of cats. From the museum there was a view of the Sky Tree tower through the rain and fog. You could barely see it. The museum is where he used to live. No shoes allowed in the museum. And there were only certain round blue mats from which you were allowed to take photographs. There was an excellent (long) video that showed the tedious process of how the cat sculptures were created. The one created in the video is the actual one in the next to last photo in the gallery below.

Then we had a walkabout in the traditional Yanaka District with its small food markets and shops. By now it was raining pretty steadily. Time to call it a day.

Then it was back on the Metro to return to the hotel to say goodbye to Kyoko (who was delightful). Uncharacteristically, we decided to stay in tonight and skip dinner. We did share a bottle of wine and a loaf of bread.

Tomorrow will be a long day. Checkout at 11:00 am. Then we have to kill time until our ride to Haneda Airport and our 9:55 pm Delta One flight to Honolulu. Then we have the red eye night flight – business class with lay flat seat, thank God (or maybe Buddha) – that arrives in Honolulu around 10 am the same day that we leave (the dreaded International Date Line again). So the next post will not be until we are comfortably checked in at the Royal Hawaiian.

Click on the galleries below to bring up scrollable windows with full size pictures – the gallery previews may show just thumbnails of the pictures. By the way, the pictures look much better on a tablet or a computer than they do on your phone. Just saying.

A busy, busy day. Last breakfast on the ship. By 9:30 we were off the Orion and on an all day bus tour of Tokyo. Our bags went directly to the hotel. Orion will continue on its 92-day Grand Pacific Cruise to more of Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Viet Nam, Australia, and New Zealand. 92 days on ship would be WAY too much.

To start, here are some random shots from during the day, mostly from the bus tour, including one of the National Stadium and one of the Tokyo Sky Tree.

First stop on the tour was the Meiji Jingu Shrine. Shrines are Shinto. Temples are Buddhist. Buddhist comes later today. We had a long walk around and took lots of pictures (including the last two looking inside the main building which was clearly labelled “no cameras”, but I didn’t see the sign. I was not arrested.)

Then it was off to lunch at Happo-En Garden. What a beautiful site! Lots of functions are held here including a wedding today. And they have a beautiful Japanese Garden. Lunch was excellent – a beautiful Bento Box selection. They provide a fork for Americans who can’t use chopsticks. I’ve been practicing chopsticks and managed the whole meal without using the fork. Only one person at our table for eight used the fork.

Then it was a return visit to the gates of the Imperial Palace. We did that yesterday, so we stayed near the bus and sucked down another gold leaf ice cream cone.

Next stop was the Buddhist Sensō-ji Temple. Tokyo has 14 million people. I think 10 million of them were at the temple site. Lots of women dressed up in kimonos. You can rent a kimono for the day – about $30. Lots of kids. Lots of tour groups. Rickshaw rides. Frankly, it was a madhouse, but it was certainly worth a visit.

Next it was off to our hotel for tonight and tomorrow night, the ANA Intercontinental. It’s an older Tokyo luxury hotel undergoing a big refurbishment. We lucked out with one of their newly refurbished rooms on the 17th Floor. Very nice.

Tired and not wanting to go searching for a restaurant, we opted to try the hotel’s Unkai Japanese Restaurant. We had the set Sashimi and Tempura menu with Sake pairing. Yum. It was dark out, so we couldn’t see the beautiful garden, but the food and service was extraordinary. We added single glasses of New Zealand Cloudy Bay Pinot Noir, one of our favorites, to supplement the sake. Sake is a taste I (we) have not acquired.

Here’s a night shot from our hotel window.

And then B E D. Worn out.

Short and sweet today. Busy packing. Bags have to be out by 8 pm tonight for transport to the hotel in Tokyo tomorrow while we are on another tour. It was mostly cloudy but no rain while we were out and about.

At 12:15 today we had a two hour bus tour of Tokyo with only one stop at the Imperial Palace, home of the Emperor of Japan. Here’s a photo recap.

Pictures from the Bus

Walking to the Imperial Palace

That’s a statue of Statue of Kusunoki Masashige near the palace. Great trees.

At the Imperial Palace

The Emperor lives here at the Imperial Palace.. You cannot go into his 250+ acre domain. He doesn’t want visiting tourists wandering around. His loss. At a nearby kiosk we had ¥1,300 ($10) gold ice creams. – green tea flavor with real gold leaf. Apparently gold is good for you.

Back on the Bus Going Through the Ginza Area

I remember the Ginza area from when my mother and I visited Tokyo in 1973. No one here or anywhere in Tokyo seems to remember me from that trip.

And back to the ship. The first two pictures are from the Cruise Terminal, a huge facility. We were the only ship in port. Then quick drinks and dinner, get the bags out, and final nightcaps. The group pictures (including a selfie) were taken by Alden, the Explorer bartender. And finally some night shots from the bow (taken by Elaine).

The rain predicted never materialized and we spent our last day at sea sailing the Sea of Japan, the Tsugaru Straight and the Pacific Ocean. It was a bright, sunny, warm day. We didn’t do much except start to get ready to disembark on Friday. Otaru is on the west side of Hokkaido Island while Tokyo is on the east side of Honshu Island. The Tsugaru Straight is the narrow passageway between Hokkaido and Honshu.

Today we had more swells than any day of the trip. It wasn’t really rough, but we could tell we were at sea. We have had amazingly good luck with good weather and calm seas for our whole voyage. The week before we were in Alaska, the seas were rough and some port calls for cruise ships were cancelled. This week the seas in Alaska are really rough and some cruise lines have cancelled ALL their port calls. Bummer for people on those cruises

No pictures today. Taking it easy and starting to get ready to repack everything. Tomorrow we will be in Tokyo for an excursion and then spend our last night on the ship. It will be sad goodbyes to passengers we have met and crew that we have come to know. Then it will be two nights in a Tokyo hotel. But more on all that later.