Sunday, October 13

National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today we focused more on birding as neither of us was especially interested in “touristy” stuff.  We headed out to the Punch Bowl Cemetery--the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.  It provides an awesome view of Honolulu and Diamond Head.  The “punchbowl” was formed some 75,000 to 100,000 years ago by secondary volcanic activity.  Its Hawaiian name is Puowaina, which translates “Hill of Sacrifice”.  It is quite a dramatic setting and there are 23 Medal of Honorees buried here.  Photo- journalist Ernie Pyle is also buried here.  There are nearly 40,000 graves in this cemetery.  There were supposed to be some specialty birds here, but again, not at this time of the year.  Most of what we saw were red-vented bulbuls which we had seen earlier at our breakfast at the Wilbur and Orville Wright Cafe on Hickam AFB overlooking the ocean. 

From there we drove to the O`ahu Cemetery where rose-ringed parakeets nest.  We’d looked for this bird on K`auai unsuccessfully, but here we found them.  Now, we know some “purist” birders would not put this bird on their life list, but we did!!

Next David drove us to the Hale Koa Hotel on Waikiki Beach, next to the Hilton Waikiki and dined on delicious sandwiches for lunch.
This is a Military Welfare and Recreation Resort, set on some very expensive property right on the beach.  It would have been a very expensive place for us to stay and the traffic would have stressed David out!  Neither of us are “beach” people, so we did not miss staying here.  But a great lunch was provided and we had our photo taken “on the beach” albeit just a foot or so off the sidewalk!

 
Exhaustion set in and we decided to drive to the USS Arizona Memorial which fortunately is not totally dependent on the National Park Service for viewing.  We didn’t take the actual memorial tour which likely was not available but we were able to view it from the site of the USS Missouri.  The Memorial is built over the remains of some of the 1,177 crewmen who were killed on December 7, 1941.  It is an awe-inspiring memorial.

The battleship USS Missouri at Pearl Harbor.  It was Admiral Halsey's flagship during World War II

Foreground memorial to USS West Virginia, also sunk at Pearl Harbor along with the USS Arizona which is the third or furthest-viewed memorial.  To its immediate left is the memorial to the USS Tennessee, also severely damaged at Pearl Harbor, but not sunk. 

We checked on the flight we hope to be on tomorrow morning and learned there are 73 seats available.  We will report for roll call at 4:30 AM.  Regardless of how we depart here, this will be our last night in Paradise!!!  Our next communication will be from California.