The remainder of our trip was spent in the Honolulu/Waikiki area spending time with family and doing typical Hawaii tourist stuff. We got a great deal on a sweet room at the Embassy Suites and after so many days sleeping in a van or tent it truly felt luxurious. One of the first things we did was take LONG hot showers. Afterward, the tub was filled with sand.
It was funny pulling up to the hotel to have our VW campervan valet parked. The valets were oohing and ahhing over our van and asking us all kinds of questions. Ha! One guy asked us about our time in Hawaii. We told him we had been camping in our van all around Maui and Oahu. He replied, “oh, so you have been camping in this van the entire time? Man, that’s the true Hawaiian way…the nature…the water…cool man, cool…” He trailed off and became so excited talking about camping in Hawaii that he soon was at a loss of words. And when his words failed him he gave us shaka, waving his hands animatedly back and forth accompanied by a huge grin. We still think about that guy with a smile. Camping + Hawaii = Shaka.
