On the lookout ..............

............ off the Pali Highway, Oahu, Hawai'i.

A beautiful day today - it rained heavily in the night but, aside from a couple of sprinkles, the weather has been gorgeous .... hot sun but a breeze to take the edge off the heat.

Definitely better on large

We have the good and the bad (again) - last night Mum's suitcase arrived via LAX (Los Angeles) - that was more than good - hooray!!

Today I (very) stupidly locked the car keys in the boot (trunk) of the car while we were at Ho'omaluhia Botanical Gardens ..... I went back to the car to put some insect repellant on, put my camera and the keys on the floor of the boot, picked up the camera but didn't pick up the keys!!!!!!! Only took me two seconds to realise but that was two seconds too long to do anything about it. Of course, the roof was up (security as we were leaving the car) and Ford Mustangs do not have an independant catch on the boot .....

Rang Dollar Car rental roadside assistance - using the phone at the gardens office.
Them: Can we have your RA number please?
Me: Paperwork is locked in the car.
Them: Oh, well can we have the agreement details
Me: ALL the paperwork is locked in the car.
Them: Right, name and date of pick-up please.
Me: (gave them those)
Them: We will call you on your cell phone when we arrange for someone to come out
Me: errrrrm, my phone is locked in the car!
Them: Oh okay, we'll send you a text then ......
Me: errrrm my phone is locked in the car!
Them: We'll send a text to the phone you are using
Me: It's a landline and belongs to the botanical gardens
Them: Oh! We'll call you back on the number when we have assistance on its way.
Me: Please make it as quickly as possible as the gates will be locked in an hour.
Them: It won't be that long - thank you for calling Dollar, is there anything else we can help you with??
Me: (spluttering) please just send someone to get the car opened up as quickly as possible.

I waited almost an hour and nothing - went out to the car and one of the security guys came up and asked if he could help ..... we wandered around the car pulling at doors and the the roof ..... no joy.
I mentioned that the only way to open the trunk without the keys was to press the button in the centre console ..... he went off and got some stiff, strong wire with the intention of us trying to waggle it through the tiny gap between soft roof and car and maybe attempt to press the button with it (long shot) ..... I decided to try the "slim jim" approach and carefully put the wire down between the door and the window and waggled it about - up popped the lock button and, hey presto, I'm in the car!!!!!!
Yay!! (if I ever decide to give up the life of an international spy and jetsetter maybe I could boost cars!!!!!! Lol).

The issue then was that the little "hook" I had bent onto the end of the wire was stuck on something inside the door ...... oooops!!
He went off and got some wire cutters (we were actually going to snip it off and just leave it inside the door) but a few more "waggles" and it came free ....... SUCCESS!

I felt stupid for locking myself out but a little bit pleased with myself that I managed to break into the car with no damage caused ...... now I'm a little worried at how easy it all was!!!!!!!

I don't think we are going to forget this trip for a long time - for various reasons!!!

Tomorrow afternoon we fly to San Francisco for the next part of our holiday - I hope things run a little more smoothly.

The next chapter begins then ..............

~ Anni ~

Today we saw mongoose - Mum has blipped one - very cute!!!