Game #151 of 364 41% complete
Yes, I traveled thousands of miles from Connecticut to Hawaii, with a stop in Las Vegas to catch a basketball game. With my wife by my side, we spent a beautiful five days in Maui at the Grand Astoria Resort. At first, the amount of money we spent seemed a little crazy, but after a while the feeling of “who cares?” took over.
I had already had two trips canceled this season—six games in total—because of the weather, so I was more than ready to enjoy basketball again.
We stayed at the Excalibur Hotel in Las Vegas and spent the evening watching a group from Australia performing a Bee Gees tribute show. I even won $27 at the casino that night, but we turned in early since we had an early flight to Maui the next morning.
We booked the trip through a Costco package that included a rental car, waived resort fees, a $300 food credit (which didn’t go very far), and a $280 Costco gift card.
You might ask: “Isn’t the University of Hawaii at Manoa on the island of Oahu?” Yes, it is. I had visited Oahu before and wasn’t impressed with the traffic and crowds, so I chose to stay on beautiful Maui and work out the logistics of getting to the game on Oahu.
That meant flying from Maui to Oahu, but there was one problem: the last flight leaving Oahu was at 9:40 PM. With the game starting at 7 PM, it was impossible to stay until the end. So, for the first time in the history of Operation 351, I didn’t stay for the entire game. I left at halftime—just in time to catch my flight back to Maui.
Long Beach State came into the game with a record of 9–22, while Hawaii stood at 22–7. With the long flight from California, I didn’t expect the Beach (I love that nickname) to put up much of a challenge against the Rainbow Warriors of Hawaii.
Much to my surprise, Long Beach played Hawaii very tough in the first half as we exited the arena. I wasn’t surprised, however, when I later learned the final score after we returned to the hotel.
As I write this, Hawaii is preparing to face UC Irvine in the Big West Championship. There is only one native Hawaiian on the team. It must be a dream for many of these players to compete among the palm trees, especially when four of them come from places like Utah.
I loved it when the band played the theme from Hawaii Five-O. I had that tune stuck in my head for the next couple of days.
It was also Senior Night for Hawaii. I held my breath, hoping the ceremony would take place after the game given my tight schedule. Fortunately, it did—no disrespect intended to the Hawaii seniors, of course.
On the way to the game, we saw a rainbow in the rainy sky. It felt especially fitting since Hawaii’s nickname is the Rainbow Warriors.
Before the game began, and after the national anthem was sung, a woman performed a song in Hawaiian called “Hawai‘i Pono‘ī.” The song was once the national anthem of the Hawaiian Kingdom and later became the official state anthem of Hawaii.
Pictures from Maui.
Aloha to March Madness!
Mahalo to all my followers.
journey to 351 