King Kamehameha I Day--June 11th

Yes, June 11th is a official Hawaii state holiday and we just happened to be there on June 11th. King Kamehameha I, was the first ruler of the Hawaiian Islands, he united all the Islands together. There was a parade that was going to be passing right by our hotel so we decided to check it out. We staked our place and took some pictures of the kids.

Well, after being there for about 30 minutes and the parade still wasn't to our street and didn't look as if it was anywhere nearby the kids started getting ansy. Also, two older ladies who were pretty rude came and practically pushed our kids off the rocks they were sitting on and took up residence there for the parade. Annoyed was I you ask?? Yes I was but I just moved them to the lawn and didn't worry about it. Another five minutes go by and the ladies that just stole our sitting rocks asked if we could move because our stroller was blocking their view? Seriously? So I politely told her we couldn't. Gosh I'm nice. You can see a picture of the culprit below.... :) Well, after about another 10 minutes Landon and Dayton voted that we skip the parade and head to the Dole Pineapple Plantation. We didn't need much convincing and we were off.

So here we are at the Dole Pineapple Plantation and "The World's Largest Maze"--atleast that is what Landon and Dayton kept reminding us the whole way there.

So the maze sounded like a good idea and it started out fun with our little Dole visors on and our map to find the eight secret stations hidden in the maze. Ugggg. Seriously, after about 10 minutes mom was so sick of running into dead ends and walking, walking, walking etc. Landon and Dayton liked it but this thing was humongous and we were so lost and hot and hot and sweaty and lost. We found our way back to the entrance/exit and told Landon and Dayton we would come back after we saw the other stuff all the while knowing there was no way I was going in there again.

I have never seen a pineapple bush before so I was curious to see one. They are so weird looking and did you know it takes a pineapple 22 months to grow!! Crazy, that is so long. Here is a picture in case like me you don't know what a pineapple bush looks like. They just stick up on this really thick, stiff, leaf thing. Huh. I'm sure I looked like a dumb tourist but it was so weird looking.

Our little pineapples!!

My boys!

After the Dole Plantation we drove around the island to the Oahu temple. It is currently under renovation and is closed but the visitors center was opened so we stopped by. The visitor's center is one of the nicest I have seen aside from the SLC temple visitor centers.

The Polynesian Culture Center is close to the temple and with your PCC ticket you get a "free tour" of the LDS temple visitor center, I thought that was funny because last I checked you get a "free tour" of the visitor center without the ticket too. Sneaky mormons. Okay not really but the sister missionaries said a lot of people do come by from the PCC so it is a good thing. It was a fun day.