Hawaii Eleven-O: Day 1

Day 1 of our Tripp Family Hawaiian vacation (dubbed Hawaii Eleven-0 by my mother given that its 2011, and if you count grandchild #4 that's one the way, there were 11 of us there) started at the Salt Lake International Airport, where the security line was a little long but moved quickly and before we knew it we were on our way to the islands! And because our direct flight from Salt Lake to Honolulu was part of an international flight, in-flight movies were free! I watched "Red", which I found to be surprisingly entertaining, if a little silly at times, and then watched "Inception" for the first time since I saw it in the theater. And of course I still loved it, and was left with some questions still. Anyway, definitely a fantastic movie. Free movies made the flight go by pretty quickly, and soon we were touching down in Honolulu.

George, Kimi, and the fam surprised us by coming to the airport to meet us at baggage claim and they'd brought leis for all of us. It was great to see them and the kids after some time away (9 months for Ben and Natalie).

"Ben and Austin are the best!"

We got our bags, our rental car, and headed over to a park in the shadow of Diamondhead for a picnic, some kite-flying, and just some hanging out and playing time.

Diamondhead looking nice and green in the early spring.

Then we took the scenic way around the island to George's home in Kaneohe, where they'd also gotten us each a box of chocolate covered macadamia nuts with a tag that said "Welcome to the Tripp Ohana (Hawaiian for "family") Hotel". We played for a bit and then settled in for the night (Hawaii is 4 hours behind Utah, so 8:00 pm in Hawaii was like midnight Salt Lake time).