One Thing at a Time

August 6, 2010

Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

View of Waikiki from the 33rd Floor 

There is a philosophy in the cruiser community that the day is successful if you can accomplish ONE thing.  It’s a strategy for us to meet our goal of slowing life down a little so that it can be enjoyed.  Out among like minds, it is much easier to to be successful at taking it easy, but when we come into a port it is always a challenge to strike a balance between getting things done that need to get done and keeping a reasonable pace of life so we can enjoy whatever said port has to offer.  I am working very hard at this balance, but it is difficult.

When we arrived on Monday, the priority was simple: get checked in.  So, we checked into the country and secured our moorage.  Luckily, Lydia was going to try to catch a flight back to the mainland late that evening and so taking her out to dinner was another easy choice.

Tuesday, I had to finish getting us checked and work on getting a condo and car.  I took the bike out to the container dock where Customs is located and checked that one off my list.  Since I had the bike, I multi-tasked a little with a quick recon to the little grocery store that is in the mall right across from the marina and a quick stop at the Seattle Embassy (aka Starbucks).  Sometimes, Google makes things easier – but when the tasks become easier, I always try to squeeze more of them in than I probably should.  Anyway, I spent a few hours searching on-line for places and directions to them where we could take care of some of things that have to get done before the boat leaves for the mainland next week.  I was also completely overwhelmed by trying to find a condo and car.  After the years spent working at a brokerage, I should know better:  there are people for that.  Brad had the great idea to call our trusted travel agent and within an hour, she had our reservations made for the next day for less than anything I could find!  Mulan arrived in the evening and we had to do some catching up with them.

Wednesday, the boys and I took the local bus out to the airport to pick up our car.  Through no fault of our own (we were a little lost at the time), we found Costco.  A quick phone call to see if the condo was ready and we decided to do a Costco recon and advance directly to checking in.   We got checked in and got our Costco purchases into the fridge.  Now that there was a car available, Brad was anxious to get some of his errands rolling.  Home Depot and West Marine were back out towards Costco, so while the kids veged in front of “Shark Week”.  We made another run out towards the airport and knocked a few more things off the list, including another trip to Costco now that I was sure that we indeed had a full sized fridge in our room.   We ate dinner together back at the condo and then returned Brad to the boat where we picked up lots of laundry.  There is a washer/dryer on the floor here, so that’s an on-going project.

It was now Thursday and we had not done anything to ENJOY Oahu.  Drastic measures needed to be taken, so we called a team meeting.  We got out that thing with the squares on it . . . . . oh yeah, I think it is called a calendar and we did a little strategic planning.  I know this is going to require time management and even some multi-tasking.   But if we hadn’t done it, we were in danger of only “getting things done” here on Oahu and not seeing anything the island has to offer.  We ran a few more errands and then, spent some time by the pool before heading out to a nice pasta dinner at the Spaghetti Factory.  Two more tasks were completed: post the “Capaz Chronicle” and get the pictures from the crossing onto the blog.

Today we will try to bring back some balance by doing a little sightseeing. 

Surfers waiting for the break this morning off Waikiki