Day 9/Last Day

 We needed to be out of our hotel at 11:00 am, and our flight left at 8:30 pm. We decided to see some sights since we needed to stay dry this day. Our first stop was the Laie Temple.

It was wonderful to spend some time on the temple grounds. 

We asked the sister missionaries what the significance of this statue is, and I really loved it! This is a mother pouring water over her children. The water represents her love for them, and the water flows from each fountain to the next, signifying a mother's love continues on forever. If you stand at the statue and look down at each fountain, it looks as though the water connects to the ocean, which adds to the unending love a mother feels for her children.

Next, we went to the Byodo-In Temple, a Buddhist temple built in the Valley of the Temples Memorial Park. It's a smaller-scale replica of the 950-year-old temple in Japan. It was built in Hawaii in 1968 to commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the first Japanese immigrants to Hawaii.

It was absolutely beautiful!! It's nestled right at the base of a mountain range, which only makes it that much more stunning!

We were able to go inside and light incense below the statue of Buddha.

There is a statue of a phoenix on the top of the temple, and the belief is that the phoenix will take the ashes of the incense up to our loved ones who have passed away.

The kids enjoyed feeding the fish, ringing the gong, and checking out the bamboo.

Our next stop was the Kahala Hotel in Waikiki to see the dolphins. We met Melanie at a park and then walked along the beach into the Dolphin pools at the hotel. We found some beautiful flower arrangements along the beach, and stopped to soak in all the beauty for a bit. At one point Paul told Mel and me to smile since we were centered in the flowers anyway. :)

I loved having this time to visit and catch up with Melanie, and for Paul and the kids to get to know her better. I'm so glad we were roommates 18 years ago, and have stayed friends ever since!

The dolphins were very cute. We all thought it was so funny when a man's hat fell into the pool and one of the dolphins picked it up and took it over and returned it to a trainer.

We went to Raising Cane's for dinner and then headed over to the airport. We were so so sad to leave Oahu. It was seriously the best and we had such a fun time.