Exploring the King's Village in Waikiki

Joe, Allison, and I stayed at the Princess Kaiulani Sheraton in Waikiki.  I managed to not think about taking pictures of things like the hotel itself, our room or the pool, so I'll just say they were really nice.  Personally, I didn't spend any time at the pool other than passing a half hour with a beverage in my hand, but it had plenty of lounging room and lots of kids splashing around.  I mean if there's a beach two blocks away there's basically no chance I'll be at the pool.  As for the room, it was your standard hotel room, save the pretty view we had from the fourteenth floor.  It was lovely to wake up and read with a glass of tea in the morning and look out at our little peak of water.

oceans to the left

 and mountains to the right

The only drawback was our proximity to a particularly loud bar, or as we called it "pineapple-land" that played music until right around our bedtime.  Certainly not a deal breaker, but it could be a little bit of a hassle.

Our hotel was also right across the street from a little shopping center called the King's Village.  This cute little center is home to a handful of tourist shops with clothes, quilts, knickknacks, and shoes as well as a few restaurants.

there's not much cuter than baby-sized Hawaiian shirts and dresses. 

I seriously loved these quilts.  As happens with anything remotely crafty, I admired them greatly but refused to buy them with the idea that I could make my own.  But I did eventually buy myself a pattern to make it, so hopefully I'll follow through with this one.

 my favorite quilt

But by far the best part of the village was its farmer's market.  Several days a week vendors fill in the walkways with food stands for grilled meat, more varieties of peanut butter than you knew existed, and of course, tons of fresh fruit.  

More than half of the world's pineapples come from Hawaii, so they're obviously incredible.  But there's also mangoes, bananas, dragon fruit, and many more all grown fresh on the islands with the best weather ever.

One very hungry afternoon Joe and I went over and scrounged up a few snacks- mostly from the above food stand.

 lobster balls

fried rice 

teriyaki chicken, orange chicken, and barbecue chicken kabobs

barbecue chicken wing 

orange chicken

dragon fruit 

 check out that weird texture

the malasada- a Hawaiian donut 

 As should be apparent, we demolished our lunch.

If you're staying in Waikiki, it's well worth the stop.  Plus, we picked up fruit that we munched on over the next few days.  It's delicious and (important for us) reasonably priced for a nice late lunch. 

Stay tuned for a little more Hawaiian nature in my next post!