[Cruise Journal: December 14]
For the science team, tonight is our last on shore before over a month at sea. Of all the places we could have spent these last hours of land-bound indulgence, we have decided that Honolulu is really not too bad a choice at all.
After convening at the baggage claim at Honolulu International Airport and becoming acquainted during the short taxi ride to our hotel, the four undergraduate (or recently graduated — congratulations, Alex!) and three graduate student members of our expedition’s science group spent the evening soaking in the ambience of Honolulu in December. Northern hemisphere winter is a good time to be in Hawaii, and we were far from the only mainlanders to be found.
In fact, we were in the midst of such a well-honed tourism destination that the first-time Hawaiian visitors among our party were taken aback by the extent of the city’s modern urban appearance, and we all wondered at the appeal of travelling so many miles to the tropics in order to find a Tiffany’s next to a Chanel. Later our taxi driver would recount the old days when the waterfront was clear of skyscrapers, and in lazy endless nights people would gather in restaurants along the beach to talk and watch the water.
Today’s Honolulu is of course not without its own considerable charms. Following a fine dinner, swapping excellent seafood and stories around a turntable in an establishment seconds away from our hotel, we set out to browse the beachfront district. (There are many upscale clothes and accessories to choose from. There is also a Ferrari store.) Our mainland-acclimated senses were treated to the kind of December evening we can usually only wistfully imagine, and we eventually returned to a hotel whose open-air lobby is comfortable at any time of day. Between getting our feet wet in the Pacific and heeding the absolutely correct advice of our Hawaiian shave ice expert John, we are pretty well set for a month-long voyage.
Tomorrow, we provision and board.