Post #472914 by CincyTikiCraig on Wed, Jul 29, 2009 11:08 PM

Not to be missed is a visit to Lewers Lounge at the Halekulani Hotel on Wakiki Beach. Lewers is one of the top cocktail bars in the nation, and it's chief consultant is none other than the great Dale DeGroff, one of the fathers of the modern Cocktail Renaissance. Lewers is a class act, with live jazz, exquisite service and top notch cocktails. while not Tiki per se, you can rest assured that the well trained mixologists at Lewers can make any classic Tiki cocktail with expertise. The place is not inexpensive, it was a special night out for my Wife & I during our Hawaii trip. If you really want to top it off, have dinner at La Mer, the hotel's top restaurant, and maybe the finest restaurant in Hawaii. Again, it's a splurge, but a truly memorable one.

Another recommendation, you should visit the Punchbowl, The National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific; it's the resting place of the heroes that gave their lives during the War in the Pacific, Korea and Vietnam. It's the Pacific Theater's equivalent of the American Cemetery at Normandy, France and it's a very moving memorial to visit indeed. Also do pay a visit to the USS Arizona Memorial; it's the resting place for over 900 sailors and Marines that gave their lives during the attack on Pearl Harbor. The Arizona's dead are said to still at their battle stations on their sunken ship, and the Arizona continues to leak oil into the harbor as though she were bleeding. Her Survivors claim that the oil will continue to leak until the last Pearl Harbor survivor dies.

Directly astern of the Arizona lies the USS Missouri, where Japan signed the surrender that ended World War Two. within minutes you can visit the starting and ending places of the Pacific War.

[ Edited by: CincyTikiCraig 2009-07-29 23:36 ]