Timeshare at the Hawaiian Princess

Friends of my husband gave us their timeshare at the Hawaiian Princess.  I was really excited since I had never been to Hawaii before.  We were warned that it was in a “depressed part of the island” where many of the workers lived.  Nevertheless, it was the impetus for this great trip for us.

The Hawaiian Princess is in an area called Makaha which is in the  northwestern part of the island, about three quarters of the way up the western coast.   It is a gated high rise with 16 floors, the highest building for miles on a nice beach.  There is a swimming pool and hot tub outside as well as a small park to the left of the building.

We were given our key and fob (used to open gates and elevator) and parking pass.  We had a nice one bedroom corner unit.  As we arrived around 5:15 we noticed that the sun was streaming into our unit and it made the unit very hot.  We did have a gorgeous sunset from our wrap around balcony.  The kitchen was well appointed except for the dull knives and no staples except for take-out salt, pepper and sugar.  It did come with a small box of dishwasher detergent, a sample box (like you would buy in a laundromat) of detergent for washing our clothes in the washer/dryer that is in our unit.

We were warned not to go into the park next to us as it was a bit sketchy.  Other than one morning seeing a many who had slept there all night, it didn’t appear to be sketchy but we heeded the warning anyway.

Our first morning we drove to Schofeld Barracks in the center part of the state to get information from the Leisure and Travel office on base.  We booked tickets for the next day at the Polynesian Cultural Center but did not book the luau.   In our travel guide book “Oahu Revealed” it suggested we would do better having a luau on another island as they tended to be smaller. in numbers

After the “housekeeping duties” were complete, we headed up to the North Shore where I had to have a Shave Ice at Matsumoto’s General Store in Haleiwa.  Apparently this is extremely famous and I had actually seen something about it the week before on one of the travel channel.  We also got a shrimp dish at Giovanni’s Shrimp Truck – very good.

As we drove up the shore, we noticed all the red flags around the beaches.  The surf was breaking right at the shoreline and the water was rough.  No one except surfers and boogie boarders were in the water.  The sand was also a coarse.

After a long drive, we went back to our condo.  Next up, Polynesian Cultural Center.