Day 28 Oahu - Pearl Harbor and a long journey home

August 19, 2022

We leave the Imperial Hawaiian this morning around 10 am with packed suitcases and head towards Pearl Harbor. I reserved the tickets for the Arizona Memorial at the end of June. We arrive at Pearl Harbor around 10:45 am and then spend a whopping 25 minutes looking for parking. Since we want to park in one of the 3 large parking lots right by the Memorial (we have the car full of suitcases and would therefore prefer not to leave it unattended on the road upstream to the overflow parking lots), we have to wait until someone leaves. And that takes a while...

We go to the entrance with only our wallet and phone. We are checked and then allowed in. Bags and backpacks are prohibited - lockers are available.

It is very hot today, so we are glad to be able to line up in the shade for the Arizona Memorial. Please note, in line with a ticket. There is another line next to it for people without a ticket. We only have to wait 5 minutes, then it's our timeslot and a ranger explains to the other line that only 3-4 people per timeslot can join. Estimated wait time is 3-4 hours!

OMG! And people are waiting!!!

Make sure to reserve in advance!!! It may be that one or the other tourist has had the luck spontaneously, but as with all activities we have done here in the last 4 weeks, NOTHING, absolutely nothing would have been possible WITHOUT a reservation. At least not during the summer holidays, the high season!

We are explained the behavior code in a cinema, unfortunately the information film is cancelled and we go directly to the boat that takes us to the Memorial.

Once we arrive, it is somehow depressing to know that hundreds of people died directly below us and we are standing quasi above a "cemetery".

We see the Arizona lying in the water below us, the gun turrets sticking out. It is high tide, so it is almost completely submerged under the water.

After 30 minutes we drive back to Pearl Harbor and get something to drink and chips and pretzels at the kiosk. Sandwiches are sold out.

After we have looked at the submarine from a distance and walked around the outdoor area, we go to the shuttle bus that takes us to the Missouri. I also bought the tickets for the Missouri National Monument and the Pearl Harbor Aviation Memorial in advance.

I am looking forward to the Missouri. Since I am a Hawaii Five 0 fan, I naturally remember the episode that was shot on the ship. Exciting!

At first we are skeptical about the recommended visit duration of 2-2.5 hours, but if you actually look at everything, you need at least 2 hours.

We explore the entire ship and after almost 3 hours we continue with the shuttle to the Aviation Memorial. However, we could have skipped that and instead looked at the submarine. We know the Museum of Flight in Seattle and the aircraft museums in Sinsheim and Speyer. We don't really see anything new here. accordingly, we are here for a short time and leave the museum after 1.5 hours - and we really took our time.

PS: Both the Missouri and the Aviation Museum are completely air-conditioned inside! This is fortunate given today's temperatures!

We take the shuttle back to Pearl Harbor.

It is so hot today, we are sweaty and exhausted from running around.

We leave Pearl Harbor at 5 pm - our car with luggage is still in place - and drive to the nearby Moanalua Shopping Center, where we treat ourselves to a late lunch or early dinner at Panda Express.

Then we head to the airport.

We drop off our rental car at 6:30 pm - it's much faster than the pickup - and go to the terminal.

At check-in, we are informed that there are no seats together anymore. We completely forgot the online check-in... Oops.

The man at the counter tells us that the plane is full and he can't do anything from here, we should try at the gate. We are scattered throughout the plane:

Row 14, 23, 28 and 34 🙈

The lady at the gate is very helpful and manages to place 3 of us in a row of 3. So I sit with the kids up front and the husband stays alone in row 34 🙈

Our plane takes off as scheduled at 10:05 pm, so we still have time. The airport is deserted. After we have checked in our suitcases, we wait at the gate and take off on time at 10:10 pm towards Vancouver.

We still see Oahu from the air - it is already deep night and we fall asleep for a short time until we reach Vancouver early in the morning.