Day 24 of 111. Oahu, Hawaii

The next few stops sort of blended together for me. Justin, our guide, was very knowledgeable about the nature we were seeing as well as the history and culture of the island. Some of the highlights for this section was driving by the Kualoa Ranch which has been the background for many motion pictures including Jurassic Park, Godzilla, 50 First Dates, and many others. We passed a beach where Tatoo used to say “Ze Plane, Ze Plane”. We saw big red leaves which come from the tropical almond tree and lots of chickens because they are one of the pre-contact (pre-Capt. Cook) species which are protected by Hawaiian law.

We also stopped at Sunset Beach where a surfing competition just finished and another beach where we saw a green sea turtle. We are not allowed to touch or disturb the turtles for the turtle’s sake, but also because you can get nasty diseases from them (chlamidia, herpes, and salmonella). This turtle had a herpes growth on its neck. More interesting from a distance. We also passed an interesting-looking McDonalds restaurant because the region required all businesses to fit into the old town look.

We stopped for lunch at Fumi’s Shrimp Farm and Drive In. I actually had Chicken Katsu (because I really like chicken katsu) but what caught my eye was the graffiti or messages left by pst visitors on the leaves of the large tree over the picnic tables. For dessert, I got to try Rainbow Hawaiian shaved ice. The white ball of ice was pulled out of a freezer and onto it was squirted blue (vanilla), yellow (pineapple), and red (strawberry) syrups. I was impressed at the great color mixing going on as the syrups dispersed through the ice. Lovely and tasty.