Long Ride Home

The trip to Hawaii took 10 1/2 hours. We all got a chance to sleep on the cargo floor some. We arrived in Hickam at 3:00 am. the first task involved getting to Billeting to store our bags and reserve a room for the night if possible. At that time of the day we had to do another "bag drag". We are getting quite good at that! LOL. We were able to get a couple of rooms for the night, but of course couldn't check in until after 2: pm. We were able to store our bags though so we could catch "The Bus" down to Waikiki to the Hale Koa for breakfast. I remembered those wonderful buffets from 30 years ago and hoped they would be the same. My husband and son weren't as enthusiastic as I was so I hoped it was. It took aver an hour to get down there. We found the way to the buffet which was on the Lanai overlooking the beautiful landscaping. We ordered coffee and started in at the tables of food awaiting us. It was just as I remembered it The Kona coffee was worth the bus trip if nothing else. But, the fresh fruit and juices were my favorite. We enjoyed every bite!! We then walked the beach and enjoyed the grounds. Truly one of the prettiest places in the highly commercial Waikiki.
I had a few last minute gifts I wanted to get before we came back, so I went to the nice BX there at Hickam. Then we got our room and went to bed to get some sleep because we had to get to the terminal at 1:00 in the morning for roll call to Travis.
We were already manifested through. There were at least 4 flights to Travis the next day. We got into Travis about noon. Since there weren't flights to Scott, we had to get a commercial flight in to St. Louis the next day. We called Stan's Chaperon Service to take us to a hotel near the airport. We got a good nights sleep and the hotel had a shuttle service to the airport. Were worth the stay. The flight to St. Louis was about 3 1/2 hours long. We arrived there at 6:30 pm and got to the train to catch it to Scott AFB where Dani would pick us up. We were plenty tired and slept pretty good. Saturday we rested before we travel to our house on Sunday. It's been an exciting trip and one we will remember for the rest of our lives.