Up and at’em early, we take our last walk through Kalama park and down Halama Street, then back to the condo, finalizing our packing and waiting until the absolute last minute to leave. With a 6pm flight, we have enough time to waste without leaving here a minute before 11am. Our first stop is Long’s Drugs to use our $2 CVS rewards coupon. We grab some potato chips and those good $1 cookies, then have a very nice surprise as I get a $2.50 CVS Birthday reward as well. The total price ends up being $0. Nice. Then it is off to get gas at the Safeway, where we figure out how to use our rewards to save 30cents a gallon. Nice perk! Especially as gas prices are pushing the $5 mark here.

Next, it is off to Baldwin beach for a picnic of shrimp cocktail, chips and cookies in the beach shelter. We’d hoped to hang out here in the shade and the breeze for a while after finishing our meal, to avoid getting to the airport so, so early. But alas, it was not to be. Sadly, joining us in the shelter was a delusional houseless guy who had a running monologue about Navy Seals 4 miles from his present position, including a woman Navy Seal who was talked about, then some he moved on to some other topics I won’t repeat, finally ranting on about the Filipinos owning the ABC Stores. We felt really bad, there wasn’t much we could do, but it was not a comfortable situation, so once we finished our shrimp, we skeedaddled back to our car and just sat there for a while, eating our chips in the heat. Pooh.

It was not even 1pm yet and we still needed to kill time, so we hit Target, wandering around the aisles, perusing all the clearance shelves. Ed found a great pair of shorts cheap and I found a wallet that actually fit my phone. Will wonders never cease! And we got 5% off as my Birthday gift. This birthday has been very profitable indeed.

Finally out of time wasting options, we elected to make our way to the airport, turning in the car, getting our bags approved through the agriculture check and checking our bags with way too much time still to spare. Oh well. We’ll hit the club. Or not. First time we hit a waiting list because of the capacity controls. Pooh. Plus, we had almost 4 hours to kill, and our passes are only good for 2 hours before our flights as was pointed out by the sweet club hostess. Ok, it’s onto the bar we go.

An hour at Sammy’s, nursing our one drink, then back to the club, where we walk in to our second disappointment of the day – there’s nothing in this club! Not a restroom, not food, not alcohol, not even a TV! Well, there was a TV, but it wasn’t on. There was water. Juice. A soda machine. Oh, and Biscoff cookies. Ok, so I love Biscoff cookies, but um, not for over 2 hours! Sigh.

Back to Sammy’s we go, where the cute waitress greets us with, oh, hello again! Glad to see you back!. Haha. Well, at least we can order another overpriced drink and then we did splurge on a burger to split – which actually was very good and reasonably priced for an airport and for Hawaii. Something to do for an hour or two.

Finally we can head to the gate, where stop at the restrooms to change into our winter gear (we both had on summer gear – shorts for Ed, sundress for me – so we wouldn’t overheat and sweat out our traveling clothes), then it is onto the actual gate where we hang out with a bird (yes, a bird – everything is open air here!) before boarding our Red-Eye to Chicago.

The flight is nowhere near as full as the one coming over – and we were lucky enough to rebook, (paying for our fare and using our $100 credit instead of points) and grab 2 Premium Plus bulkhead seats for the extra room – and hopefully to help us sleep the little we can on this quick but overnight flight. The seats are great – the service good (not as good as our sweet Jennifer on the way over though) – and the view on take off is spectacular. Bittersweet. But spectacular. I have to admit, though, I did have tears in my eyes watching the island slowly disappear into the clouds.

After that, the flight was totally uneventful. A great dinner of Chicken Katsu, which I had been wanting to try, but never managed to during our stay. Then sleep – sort of – for a couple of hours on and off. I finished my book in the “off” periods. Good breakfast of scrambled eggs for Ed and fruit plate for me – chock full of excellent fruit. Then we were in Chicago – and hour early. What a difference from our journey here!

With plenty of time, we spend 20+ minutes in line at McDonalds for coffee, finishing it up at the gate waiting for our flight to Raleigh. That flight was right on time, and seamless. We were in the terminal, picking up our luggage almost 30 minutes early, so early in fact when we picked up the rental car, they added charges for the additional hours! Huh? Oh no, that’s not happening! We’ll figure that out when we return it in Asheville.

The drive was uneventful as well. A stop for caffeine in the form of Pepsi Zero Sugar (used to be Max apparently….it’s obviously been a long time since we stopped at convenience stores for road snacks!) and peanut butter cheese crackers, then onto a very disappointing visit to Costco where they literally had nothing on our list to buy. I managed to find goat cheese and then we lucked into these micro-biotic work gloves on sale which used up all our Costco savings coupon – and you know what? We feel we need to move on from Costco. The distance of the nearest warehouse (1 hour) as well as their propensity for charging $3 shipping fees for things that do not need to be priority shipped And, in our feeling, over emphasis on “upscale” products (like $6000 outdoor living rooms) that we would never consider. So after decades of enthusiastic support, we won’t be renewing at the end of our membership this year. Sad, but true.

2 1/2 hours later, we are home, safe and sound. Dumping our bags, we quickly turn on the water, ratchet up the heat, then return the rental car to the same sweet rental car agent who is always on duty at Budget at the mall. She handles our bill, taking off the additional charges, and voila! Home, settled in, unpacked and ordering dinner from East Village Grille by 6:15pm. Couldn’t ask for a better trip. Now if we can just keep our eyes open until at least 10, we’ll be golden!