My First Mother-Daughter Trip

HOTELS:

RESTAURANTS:

24 years ago, my daughter, London was born. We just had our first Mother-Daughter vacation together. We departed the dry dusty conditions of autumn in Southern California and hit the shores of Waikiki Beach for 3 nights and 4 days; a brief interlude before she took the redeye straight back to class at Pepperdine School of Law. I’m used to trips with my husband, and family trips with my daughter and my son, but this was new. We were two women on the town…free to shop, stroll, sing, and be silly. We lived up to all of the above and more!

Day one, we sat poolside and snapped some pics. We used www.Yelp to pick a highly rated steak house within walking distance for our dinner. The waiter seemed unusually nice and attentive. Was this because we were in Paradise or was this because I had a darling daughter with me?

Historical wing of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel

Day two we started with a morning walk. Of course it included a sing-a-long to some of our favorite songs. When we passed some “monkey bars” we got to relive old memories about tricks we both used to be able to perform. Returning to our hotel, we scored a beachfront umbrella with 2 lounge chairs. That led to photos galore, swimming, and reading. For lunch we walked down the beach to the Moana Surfrider http://moana-surfrider.com and sat under the famous Banyan Tree. While sipping our iced tea and coffee, we were asked to be filmed and intervewed for a PBS special about the Banyan tree. Of course we obliged.

By Day three we started to get a little silly. We purchased “kid size” Hello Kitty t-shirts and did a balcony photo shoot with our camera set on a timer while precariously placed in a chair. Peace signs and Shaka Bro (“hang loose”) hands abounded. At the beach we had a giggle fest while trying to use my new “selfie stick” which is a contraption one can hook an iPhone to and extend in the air to remotely take your own photo. Sharing one lounge chair and trying to remotely take our selfie while holding the “stick” was sending us into hysterics. Once we posted the selfie shot on Instagram, we got “liked” by a Strip Club in Las Vegas and they asked us if we were “tempted” to come in and strip as a Mother/Daughter team! Now THAT hasn’t happened on one of my vacations before!

Selfie-Stick Hysterics — Selfie-Stick Learning Curve

By our last day we did the complementary photo shoot at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel http://royal-hawaiian.com and we got to feel like models for 15 minutes. Then in contrast, we tried to duplicate a photo I had of myself at the same hotel taken in 1971. You can judge how we did. We walked through the local mall, had a fabulous sushi dinner at Doraku Sushi, shopped for pineapple souvenirs for London’s boyfriend, and then she left on the redeye. I can’t wait for my next Mother/Daughter trip, and I certainly won’t wait 24 years!