The One with Hawaii Five-O

Paradise. According to the dictionary, this means:

"...a place of extreme beauty, delight, or happiness.

a state of supreme happiness; bliss."

and

"...a town in Northern California."

2600 miles (4184.294 km) and a big gulp of water away from the town Paradise, you reach what a lot of people and travel brochures dub the ultimate "Paradise". I'm, of course, talking about Hawaii. Just like every other person out there, I also wanted to experience "supreme happiness and bliss" and took advantage of my current address and it's close proximity to Hawaii and booked my flight to Eden.

The Hawaiian Islands are actually an archipelago that has hundreds of volcanic islands but the 4 biggest (and the most known) are the island of Hawai'i (Big Island), O'ahu, Maui, and Kuau'i. Also known as "the big one", "the one with Hawaii Five-O", "the fancy one" and "the green one". I, obviously, opted for "the one with Hawaii Five-O". Alex O' Laughlin, if you're reading this, I didn't see you in Honolulu, but no worries man, I'll catch you next time! And we chose "the fancy one", Maui, because...well, it's Maui. Apart from fantasies about causally running into Alex O' Laughlin at a Starbucks, O'ahu, also made the cut for its illustrious Waikiki beach, the iconic Pearl Harbor, the cool and breezy North Shore, and the famous Kualoa Ranch.

Waikiki Beach

The Ali'iolani Hale, which means "House of Heavenly Kings" is the Hawaiian Supreme Court

This is a gold leaf statue of King Kamehameha, the founding monarch of the kingdom of Hawaii

Fun things to do with a pineapple

O'ahu is known as "The Gathering Place", which is suitable because that's where we encountered the majority of tourists and also about two-thirds of the Hawaiian population. O’ahu for us was the sightseeing leg of the journey. With the attractions that I’ve mentioned earlier, it would be a week of action and exploration without end. Except, after 4 days we covered everything that was to offer and we were left staring at TripAdvisor and the map dumbfounded on what to do with our time. Nowhere did we read just how small the island is or how quickly you can zip from one attraction to the next and cross off 3 activities in one afternoon. I guess coming from the city, we’ve been so conditioned to rushing from one point to the next, and in contrast with the slow ease of Hawaii, we basically polished off a third of her sights in a day. We had to learn the “Aloha” way of life and soon; otherwise, we’d end up with 80% of our holiday scrambling for something to do.

“Just relax on the beach!”, some of you are probably shouting at me. But getting sticky in the sun with sand up your bum isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Don’t get me wrong, I love beach days, but I tend to go to foreign areas for the culture, nature, and something, I’ve never seen or experienced before. The nature on O’ahu was divine, but with metropolitan Honolulu breathing down my neck, I didn’t feel like I was on an exotic island nearing a state of supreme bliss.

Speaking of divine nature. Even though O’ahu wasn’t my favorite Hawaiian island, it will be the most memorable simply because of one thing: Koʻolau.

The Koʻolau range is a towering, lush, beauty of a mountain range and is ever-present when in the Honolulu area. It’s actually a dormant fragmented remainder of O’ahu’s windward shield volcano. A shield volcano is a type of volcano that was created almost completely of flowing lava. Koʻolau, meaning "windward" in Hawaiian, is the western half of the original volcano that was demolished in prehistoric times when the entire eastern part broke off and disappeared into the Pacific Ocean.

This gigantic range was gorgeous. I mean, it was so captivating, that it was downright dangerous driving near it because it was distracting you from paying attention to traffic. She is a stunning lady striking a sultry pose right there in the middle of the city, with not a care in the world. I felt like an idiot with my jaw on the ground, gulping and stupidly saying “wow”, every time I saw her. And I saw her a lot. She is a 3,100 feet (945 meters) dame, after all.

O’ahu’s nature is also what caused a lot of Hollywood execs to take notice of her and bring their blockbuster titles and movie stars to feature her in their films. Perhaps the most concentrated spot that attracted directors in search of their muse is Kualoa Ranch. You might never have heard of this place and chances are you can't even pronounce it, but I'm sure you've seen it before. Think, three people running, doctor Alan Grant grabs the two children’s arms and drags them behind an eerily shaped tree branch as a flock of Gallimimus rushes past them. Got it? This was the scene in the first Jurassic Park film that was shot on Kualoa Ranch.

When they’re not catering to Hollywood, Kualoa Ranch offers several tours of the property as well as being a private nature reserve and working cattle ranch. I found the history of the ranch quite charming. The entire area was a scared space to ancient Hawaiians but as capitalism always finds a way to rear its head, King Kamehameha III sold this holy place to an American doctor around 1850. Fortunately, this doctor, Gerrit Judd, was a pretty decent guy. He didn’t just translate medical journals into the Hawaiian language, but he loved Hawaii and her people so much that he renounced his citizenship and became a trusted advisor and cabinet minister for King Kamehameha. Additionally, he founded a school for the children of the missionaries, founded Hawaii's first medical school, and was the author of one of the first medical texts written in Hawaiian. He was quite invested in the community. The ranch today still belongs to his family. Over 70 Hollywood films have been shot there, but some of the most noticeable ones are:

Jurassic Park
Jurassic World
Pearl Harbour
Kong – Skull Island
Pearl Harbour
50 First Dates
Jumanji
Jumanji – Welcome to the Jungle
Hunger Games
Mighty Joe Young
Wind Talkers
Tears of the sun
Godzilla
You, me and Dupree
Karate Kid II
Snakes on a plane
Battleship
Journey to the Centre of the earth
George of the Jungle

They offer a “Movie Sites Tour” on the ranch where they take you to see the Jurassic Park stump I told you about, Godzilla’s footprints, scattered bones from a scene in Kong – Skull Island, several spots where certain scenes from the movies above were shot as well as a seven-story WWII army bunker built into the side of a mountain. And if this wasn’t exciting enough, the scenery was worth a million bucks!