Visiting the Menahue-Our 1st trip to Aulani

[AJaquins]

On this day my DH was celebrating his birthday. We also were going to the Aloha stadium swap meet. So we got up early again and headed out to Honolulu and the Aloha stadium. The traffic was almost non-existent this morning and it was so quick to get to the stadium. It is right down the road from Pearl Harbor so you could potentially do these on the same day. We got there about 6 or 6:30am and people were still setting up. It cost $1 for parking and we ended up in the handicap parking area which is so much closer to the booths. (DFIL had brought his permit with him) So we went and started looking anyway. DFIL was looking for some Hawaiian shirts and wanted to make sure that he would get some. There are many booths that repeat themselves and many that are owned by the same families. We ended up walking around the stadium 2 times and people were still setting up even later. We ended up finding several Hawaiian shirts, beach towels, quilt squares, window decals, wind chimes, and some other items. We had a low picture day this day but we did get a few.







We were there for about 4 hours and headed to Denny's for lunch. Then we went back to the room and found this.


So yummy too.

Then we went to spend the afternoon by the pool...well the chairs were full so we went and sat around the fire pit. DH listened to his IPOD, DMIL and I well we read our Kindles and relaxed..





After spending some time there we walked around the pool area, they were filming the whole week we were there for commercials and advertising and so things were a little different. They were shooting the pool party and they were doing retakes over and over. So after a while we got exposed to enough sun and went inside to do laundry. But before we went in we snagged a few pictures with





DMIL and I went and did laundry while the guys watched the Seahawks. We enjoyed the laundry room it was cool, had good seating and a tv with a remote. After laundry was done we headed back up to the room and the Seahawks were ahead enough that we left during the 4th quarter and headed to Denny's for birthday dinner. DH didn't want to go anywhere else. We went to McDonald's afterwards also and got another set of pies. Then we headed back to the resort and DMIL headed down to the couches on the 3rd floor right off the lobby on the balcony that overlooks the pool area. I headed down a little after her and joined her and we both just relaxed in the cool air listening to the band in the oleo room downstairs. Then before we fell asleep we headed back to the room for the night.

 

[allison k]

Those Sunset pictures are gorgeous!!! How cool you got to do the class for free! And thanks for the info on the swap meet, we're thinking of combining a trip there with Pearl Harbor. Thanks for a great trip report!

 

[AJaquins]

Those Sunset pictures are gorgeous!!! How cool you got to do the class for free! And thanks for the info on the swap meet, we're thinking of combining a trip there with Pearl Harbor. Thanks for a great trip report!

Thank you very much. It was a very good class too. We were amazed they were offering it for free. Had we known Pearl Harbor and the stadium were so close we would've probably combined the 2 also since they are so close together. I still have 2 days to finish yikes its been a while.

 

[J&K'sPrincessMommy]

Great report!

 

[AJaquins]

Well I have 2 days left to finish, I got distracted by an anniversary vacation to Las Vegas and helping plan our 1st Disney World vacation in October and other things. So back to it.

Well on Day six we had a very busy day. We went to the Mahalo member mingle and enjoyed the company of the other DVC owners and got some good advice from some CM from Florida who we were sharing a table with. We got some more lei's and some yummy juice and just enjoyed the trivia and the presentation. Then we headed off to the other side of the island to Kailua. During his talks with the bell hops and valets at night DFIL got a good tip of a good place to eat. So I went and got the car out of the parking garage and pulled around and off we headed to Kailua. It was a beautiful drive and I wished we could of spent some more time there taking pictures. We had the restaurant programmed into the GPS and it was fairly easy to find. We were eating at.....



We got there around 11am and it was already backed up and had a waiting list of about 30 minutes...or so we thought. 30 minutes wasn't too big of a deal as it was a nice day and we were lucky enough to have a bench to sit on. So we waited and waited. We kept hearing them call the same names over and over. There was a tourist group there and they were heading in to "use the bathroom" and occupying the empty tables. So after we had asked a couple of times why we hadn't been called yet DFIL just barged in and took a seat at an empty table. Our waiter didn't seem to be fazed by this and just greeted us and took our order. We all ordered...



Banana pancakes with Macadamia nut sauce. They were so delicious. Its too bad the wait was so long and such a pain. After we were done we took some pictures around the restaurant.













After we paid we headed back to Aulani for some rest and relaxation. Before we got back to the resort DH asked me to drop him off at the overpass so he could get pictures of the resort. That is about the only place that you can get a almost unobstructed view of the resort besides flying. After I dropped him off I took my DMIL and DFIL beck to the resort and the then took the long way down and around and then back to the highway and back to the next exit and ended up looping around a few times till he got all his shots he wanted. Here is one of them.



We then went and may or may not have taken a nap or indulged in the lazy river again. I don't really remember. But I do know we headed to Denny's for an early dinner because we were going to try and capture the sunset again and go to the Starlit Hui also.

 

[AJaquins]

So after dinner we headed to the beach with our cameras to capture some more of the beautiful scenery. We ended up running into Derwin who was down on the beach to take Photopass pictures of guests. We took quite a few pictures and then Derwin took some of us.

Us...














Derwin-Photopass....






DH got a few more tips from Derwin and the sun was setting so we then headed to the Starlit Hui.

 

[AJaquins]

We stood in line for the Starlit Hui for about 30 minutes beforehand and played Disney trivia with the Castmembers that were there to entertain us. They started seating people on the grass mats and we ended up sitting in the front row of the Handicap section-its off to the right hand side of the stage in the back. It ended up being a great place to take pictures. So they were taping the Starlit Hui for commercials and advertisements, etc. so we were told that it would be strictly to program that night. So before the show DFIL and DH went and had their pictures taken with some of the dancers.





Then the show started. It was really beautiful and had dancing, singing, storytelling, and more dancing and then a few characters joined in at the end. Here are some pictures.















Then we went around the resort and took lots of pictures and visited with some CM.

 

[AJaquins]

Here are some more resort pictures for your enjoyment.




This bird is in the entry way/hallway when you 1st come in. Watch it and see what happens.

 

[AJaquins]

This was our last day at the resort and we decided it would be a day of relaxation. So we started out going to Denny's for breakfast. DMIL decided to try an item off the local menu.


Yup Spam and rice.

Then we went back to enjoy some more pool time.








We packed and went to Denny's and McDonald's one more time and went to bed fairly early as we had an early flight home.

 

[AJaquins]

So we had to be up at 3am to go to the airport. We got up and called DFIL's friend in bell services and he came up to help us take our luggage down about 4am. I headed off to go get the car and pulled it around to pick everyone up. We visited with the guys from bell services and valet for a few more minutes and with DFIL looking sad we pulled out and headed towards the airport and the car rental return. We successfully found the area to return the car at 4:30am and they weren't open yet. We weren't the only ones waiting so we waited and they opened the gates about 4:45 and car was returned successfully and they pulled the shuttle bus up and we headed to the airport. Our flight wasn't until 8am but we like to make sure we are early. Now this is something we haven't ever dealt with before.

Department of Agriculture screening. Yup your bags have to be checked before you can go check in. Nice. They don't open until 6am and they don't open early. So we waited for an hour and they slowly opened up, we got our bags screened and went to check in. We got thru security and waited at our gate. We ended up leaving late-one of our flight crew overslept-then we were on our way. No 1st class upgrades this time as the flight was full. We landed in Seattle in good time and then we waited for our next flight for 6 hours and ended up at home about midnight. Long day. Went to go pick up our fur baby nice and early the next morning and back to work the day after that.

Then this arrived....


Oh so yummy..

So we had a great time and enjoyed the resort so much. We thought it would be a once in a lifetime trip. But...yippee...we get to go again and this time for my birthday! We can't make room reservations until July but we are going for 12 days in February. We decided that 7 days was just not enough last time. Yay! I can't wait. Thank you to all of you who read along and if you have any questions about the resort just ask, I will try to answer what I do know.

 

[heaven2dc]

First of all I'm glad you get to go back and stay longer! I'm jealous lol I've never been to Hawaii and have always wanted to stay at Aulani. What a beautiful resort! Loved your pics esp of the sunsets If I hit the lottery, I'm taking a trip to Aulani and hiring you guys as my photographer

 

[AJaquins]

First of all I'm glad you get to go back and stay longer! I'm jealous lol I've never been to Hawaii and have always wanted to stay at Aulani. What a beautiful resort! Loved your pics esp of the sunsets If I hit the lottery, I'm taking a trip to Aulani and hiring you guys as my photographer

Thank you very much. It definitely is a great place to visit. Can't wait to go back. Just waiting for the 7 month mark now.