A couple weeks ago, my hubby Michael and I went on a trip to Oahu, Hawaii. YES, it was a dreamy as it sounds!!! I still cannot believe we got to go. I had been once in middle school, but hardly remembered it… and Michael had never been at all! We were able to do so much in the 4 days we were both there, from snorkeling to hiking to eating (REAL) shave ice… oh it was just amazing!!
If you’re like us and you don’t really love doing all of the “touristy” things, you’re going to love what we did!! Obviously going down to Waikiki in downtown Honolulu is fun to do once, but we were good with seeing it and leaving (haha!) Plus, other beaches are prettier anyway, in our opinion!
I could go on and on about all of the amazing things we did, but I want to first tell you the top 8 things you should do if you travel on vacation to Oahu, Hawaii:
- Go snorkeling. Our favorite place was Shark’s Cove, it’s not crowded and there were a lot of pretty fish to see! There is a little shop to rent snorkeling gear right across the street. Highly recommend buying your own from the store, though, if you go more than once! We also went to Hanauma Bay which is gorgeous, but very crowded.
- Go on hikes. We only had time to do one hike so we headed for Diamond Head. We loved it! It’s a little crowded but it wasn’t too bad. Plus, most hikes are known for being very muddy… and this one wasn’t since you’re walking on rock the whole time. The view from the top is absolutely amazing. We did it in about an hour, but it can take up to two depending on how fast you hike! Plus, they were selling pineapple smoothies in real pineapples at the head of the trail… YUM.
- Get shave ice. This is one of my FAVORITE things we did… authentic shave ice from Hawaii… it doesn’t get any better than that!! Matsumoto on the north shore is pretty popular, but was closed by the time we got there, so we went to Malia’s on the same street!
- Drive along the east side and stop at the beaches. It’s absolutely GORGEOUS there, this is where the beautiful tall mountains are! The beaches here are not crowded at all and provide some gorgeous scenery. Soooo beautiful!!
- Go on a tour at Kualoa Ranch. This is also on the east side of the island, and where a ton of popular movies have been filmed, including Hunger Games, Jurrasic Park, and so many more!! They offer movie tours, farm tours, horseback riding, ATV rides, and a ton of other options!! SO gorgeous there, the mountains are unreal and like nothing you’ll see anywhere else!!
- Get photos taken by a professional photographer. Especially if you’re going with your other half, HANDS DOWN one of the best things we did there. Now we have beautiful photos from a treasured vacation!! Scroll down about half way through this post to see how they turned out! ;)
- Stop at Leonard’s Bakery. It’s a little food truck and WOWWWW is it amazing. They offer malasadas, authentic Portuguese donuts. You haven’t lived until you’ve tried these. AMAZING.
- Visit Pearl Harbor memorial. My hubby did this without me and loved it, but we didn’t do it together because the USS Arizona part was closed. He was in Hawaii longer than me and went after I left! But I remember doing it from middle school and it is totally worth seeing.
This blog post is filled with all of the beautiful images I took while we were there so ENJOY!! First up, a quick video I put together with little snippets from our trip there. I used a knock-off GoPro to capture most of this:
On our first night, we went to the north shore. This is one of the beautiful beaches we stopped at before getting shave ice:
More beaches along the east side… SO GORGEOUS!
While I was there, I did a photo shoot of a couple there! They were celebrating their anniversary so it was perfect timing!! There definitely aren’t views like this in Ohio… still OBSESSED with all of the images from this shoot (if you want to see what I photographed, click here!) We went to Pounder’s beach for their session!
Hanauma Bay… gorgeous or what?! And this was just with my iPhone!
We did the farm tasting tour at Kualoa ranch! We signed up last minute but it was TOTALLY worth it. Next time we want to do the horseback riding!
The rest of the images in this post are taken by Sunny Golden. We are IN LOVE with these sneak peeks she sent over… LOVE LOVE LOVE!!! Getting photos taken of the two of us while we were there was the best decision ever!!
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