Okay, so, here's my super long journal about my trip!

If you don't want to read this, jump to Summary at the bottom, I won't mind. :D

So, we ended up driving to the city (where we were flying out of) and staying the night at my mother's house. Fun fact, she works for the airlines, so it was easy breezy getting to the airport and not having to worry about what to do with the car. Also, Alaska airlines is legit. Highly recommend them. They were so nice, the terminals were not confusing, they do courtesy bag checks for carry-ons if they plane is a tad full, so we offered to do that. We had a 1+ hr layover in Seattle (btw, I don't know how you can stand that overcast Seattleans, I couldn't do it), and walked around this super small box of a terminal and caught pokemon, restocked at 2 stops, and messed with a gym. LoL.
THEN came the flight to Honolulu.
I'm just going to say this, I HIGHLY suggest to make use of any kind of entertainment they offer. $10 to use a tablet for 6 hrs is great. I didn't take advantage of this on the flight there, but I sure as hell did on the way back, cause I got to watch movies and play games and whatnot, which I didn't have on hand. The planes also had charging stations at each seat, which is SUPER awesome, and offered Wi-Fi...over land...so....that....several hour flight over water...was depressing...

ANYWAYS.

They offered a complimentary Mai Tai when we got close to landing, which I was all about. We also had to fill out an Ag form...you know...to make sure we weren't bringing anything weird like lettuce. Also, time change was bizarre. We left around 7am and landed at 2pm island time. So like...weird feeling there.

After we landed and picked up our checked bags, we took a shuttle to our car rental (a convertible cause you know, why not), and drove like an hour to our AirB&B up on the north side of the island, aka SUPER country, which was pretty nice. It was a super rural area, but it was quiet and calmer and you could tell there was a huge sense of family and community here compared to super touristy areas like Waikiki. The place we stayed at was kind of like a converted basement with it's own entry, and it was blocked off from the rest of the house, but DAMN were those walls thin. I think they had a few kids up there, cause there was running, and dropping things, and stomping...but good thing it was when we were awake...cause omg. So A/C, but we knew that going in. There were a lot of fans, and we propped a standing tower fan up on a chair and it was fine. It's like a constant 85 outside, a bit humid, but with fans it was okay. Also, there were some geckos that got into the place, which was fine. They warned us before hand, they eat the bugs. One just hung out in the shower...so it was cool. I named him Leonard.

We hung out with the future bride and groom for a bit, her family is from the islands and she was showing us around a lot. Also, it was 7/11 so we got a free small slushee from 7-11 which I've never actually gotten to do before. LoL. We walked through Waikiki, she pointed out the 100s of ABC stores which are like a touristy, glorified Walgreens (lol), and we ate at a gathering of Japanese food trucks. ALSO, best part about these islands, the food. Like, asian food is amazing and every part of me loves the fact that there is fast food vietnamese, korean, ramen, curry stops. Omg. Amazing. Also, Spiderman was roaming the streets.

The next day marked the reasons why we didn't do a lot...
We were supposed to go to the beach with people in Waikiki, a lot of people took up residence in that area so that's why we ended up there a lot. A 50 hr drive for us...but eh...whatever. So, we walk around waiting for a response...hours go by...and then they decide it's too hot. So, we wandered more, looked for Pokemon, ate at the food court (cause the options, lol, also fighting for a seat is crazy), and went home. Which we found out was good...because we were apparently burnt. That walk from the parked car to the actual downtown area (that was covered with tall buildings) was enough to burn us. Soooo his head and neck and arms, my nose and chest...which was the one place I didn't want to get burned cause I have little spots on me I try to watch... WE DID put on sunscreen, and I brought more in case we went to the beach, but it wasn't physically on my person. It was in the car....oops. We went home, slept, ate burgers around 8pm.

Wed. we had a BBQ at the park to go to, so we drove around a bit, got coffee that morning at a local shop, got sushi at a place in pearl city that served it on little cars on conveyor belts so that was fun. The BBQ was on Magic Island...which...I don't believe...is an island....more like a peninsula... Food was great, I met an APO brother, and then the bf went off to do the bachelor party thing since he was the best man. So, me and the wife of one of the guys going roamed around the downtown area and just window shopped, went to a gastropub, and then went to watch Secret Life of Pets which was absolutely hilarious and great and I recommend it 100%. The bf ended up at several bars, and a gay karaoke bar which they only discovered was such an hour into it when they started getting hit on, but they're good spots and they don't mind that kind of thing so they stayed and had fun. We didn't get home until 4am, it was gross to drive that long.

The next day we got coffee at a truck and at Giovanni's Shrimp truck which was SOOOOOOOOO Tasty. Expensive as all hell, but SOOOOOOOOO tasty. And because we had no idea what to do at all, we drove around a lot more, ended up at the outlook in Makai, aaaaand then back to Waikiki cause the food places we wanted to go to that were around there were so small with no where to park...so we just food courted it again.

Friday was the wedding at the Kualoa Ranch. It was SUUUPER nice and the food was AMAAAAZING. Bread pudding with terra root and macadamia nut sauce? Omg, I wanted to eat it forever. One thing that sucked was the lack of A/C in the prep rooms for the party, so my bf had to take off his shirt along with most of the guys cause they just sweat right through them. It was gross....and sticky...but it was later in the day so it cooled off pretty fast afterwards.

Sat. we went to Ala Moana and wandered around at the expensive stores we couldn't really buy anything from until we had to go to the brides gpas house for had another family get together. One of the Beamer Brothers sisters was there, who then in turn invited her brother and whatnot to come...so...apparently that was a big deal. I'm not up on my Hawai'ian pop culture, but I've been told they're a big deal. It was cute, we had fun, ate good food (THE MANGOES OMG), was taught the Hookie Lau...which I didn't realize was a real dance...

Sunday, back to Ala Moana with people after we packed and got frozen yogurt and coffee for brunch. Later we met people again down in Ala Moana for dinner and then the bar in the middle of the mall. We then went home to prepare for a flight at 8am, sooo...woke up at 4:15am...cause of the drive...and the rental return.

We were going to do Pearl Harbor, BUT...some things. We tried to earlier in the week, but you couldn't bring any bags that could conceal, and my phone was dying cause I forgot to charge it and I had it plugged into a portable battery. I also was wearing a dress with no pockets...so that was a bust anyways. ALSO, other reason why we didn't...the bf got a severe heat rash/burn and he's still recovering from it. The poor guy got it on his forehead, so it's draining into his eyebrow/cheek/zygomatic area and he's all puffy and sad and I might have called him Quasi lovingly once or twice. His mom is a doctor, so we just had her look at it when we got back in. It didn't look infected, which we could tell cause it was healing well, but it was just draining. 2 weeks...lol. Poor thing.

Another thing that was sad was that we never got to go to the beach cause of the burns. There was a beach down the street from the house, but it was ALL rocks and shit...so....

We decided we should try to do it again, maybe Maui.

ANYWAYS. I can't believe you read all of this, you're incredible and I love you all! XOXO

Summary
I went to Hawai'i for a wedding with the bf. Flights were fine, but long as hell. We got an AirB&B in the country that was 50 min from Waikiki (mega tourist, fancy shopping district and also several beaches), which we frequently visited. We also drove around the island a lot to areas like Pearl City and the Makai look out on the north side.
We ate lots of foods: a known burger place, several food trucks that served Japanese (we got Yakisoba), shrimp (Garlic Scampi YES), coffee, frozen yogurt, etc. Also the food court in the tourist area, which had fast food vietnamese and ramen...yes. Also, a sushi place with conveyor belts. And of course family BBQs and the wedding itself. Bread pudding with terra root and macadamia nut sauce AAAAAAAAAAmazing.
Wedding was lovely, and hot at first, but the ceremony was quick and it cooled off fast.
Met Beamer Brothers and one of their sisters who sang to the married couple and taught us the Hookie Lau.
Didn't get to the beach or Pearl Harbor because of time and early acquired burns. Bf's face is swollen from said burns and blockage.
Caught Pokemon.

Came home.