Bishop Museum

While reading the Honolulu Star-Advertiser's TGIF edition, we discovered that both the Bishop Museum and the USS Missouri will be free to kama'aina within a week of each other.  We decided to visit both O'ahu tourist attractions.  We'll cover our visit to USS Missouri in another post.

The Bishop Museum (named after Princess Bernice P. Bishop - the last heir to the Kamehameha dynasty) is the largest museum of Hawaiian history and also houses a planetarium and a science center.  We caught two shows at the planetarium where we learned how Polynesians navigated to Hawaii using only celestial naviagation and how to identify constellations in the sky above Hawaii.  We toured the Hawaiian Hall, learning about Hawaiian history and agricultural practices.  We also visited the Kāhili room that pays tribune to Hawaiian monarchs and displays some of their personal affects (including Kāhili - feather staffs).

Sperm Whale in the Hawaiian Hall

At the science center we saw lava being made right in front of our eyes.

"Homemade" Lava

We also walked into a "volcano", learned about wind energy and different kind of waves, and saw sand samples from different Hawaiian beaches.

R is sliding out of the "volcano"

A is under "bug" attack

The museum tries to cover a variety of subjects relating to Hawaiian history, royalty, gods, and science as well as a rotating exhibit.  It's a lot of museum to cover in a few hours but is a good diversion from the main tourist sites if you're looking to get out of the sun or rain for a day.