---

When my friends John and Junko announced that their wedding would be on Hawaii, Chisako and I immediately said we would be there. Another exotic location for a wedding and this time I would not have to organize the whole thing. Perfect, but first things first. Before the wedding we would first have a bachelor-week for John on Waikiki beach. So we rented two apartments in Waikiki Park Heights, a condominium with views on the beach and the mountain.

View from the apartment

The wedding was in the Ihilani hotel on the west side of Oahu. It is maybe the most beautiful hotel that I have ever seen, even though it has a couple of strange rules (no walking on the beach at night and no wine or champagne during the day) and an inconvenient check-in time (3pm). The rooms came with a gorgeous bathroom, the size of a Manhattan apartment, floor to ceiling with marble. Look here for the wedding pictures.

The Ihilani

View from the room

The perfect beach

After the wedding we went to Hawaii's Big Island. Adrian came along for a helicopter tour over the live vulcano. Quite a sight and even at 1000 feet in the air you can feel the intense heat.

Big Island has a lot more relaxed attitude than Oahu. We stayed in Kona which is a small tourist town on the western dry side right at the ocean. By chance at the small hotel we were staying we attended another wedding. A couple, when vacationing there, suddenly had realized that it was a perfect place for in impromptu wedding. All the hotel guests were invited to join and soon we were all celebrating. Congratulations Michelle and Furcy! Also we went up the Mauna Kea to see the sunset. On top of this dorment vulcano there is a world reknowned observatory for astronomy. It is so high we both started to feel a bit dizzy due to lack of oxygen. It's a good thing we spend about an hour climatizing at the visiter center halfway during the ascent.

Sunset at 4205 meters

It's freezing

The weirdest roadsign ever

After visiting Big Island we went on to Maui and Kauai. Also Maui has incredible scenery and it is a lot more developed. We both liked Kauai the best. It is the most laid back of all and has the best beaches. In Kauai you can still find spend your day at a beautiful empty beach. I did not take any pictures of beaches this time. The last time I tried (in Fiji on the island where Castaway was filmed) a few drops of salt water killed my camera. But if you really want to get the picture look here.

Waimea Canyon