Moving to Hawaii

In September 2020, the theme park I worked at gave me notice that my job was ending on November 6th. Given that I'm up in age (60 to be exact 🥴), I was shaken. I wasn't quite old enough to retire and I wasn't sure exactly how to market myself due to my age. I spent a few hours that Thursday afternoon mourning the life I had carefully planned out and then I spent the rest of that weekend going over options with my adult daughter.  By Monday, we had made the decision to move as a family (my daughter, her toddler and me) to Hawaii. 

The next two months were filled with finishing up work and preparing for the move. My daughter's job was in the process of ending so she was in charge of logistics. She started our packing, researched shipping options, looked for apartments and bookmarked many, many Hawaii you tube videos that we watched at night. She was a rock star and, by the time my job ended in November, we were mentally ready to move.

What we weren't prepared for was how difficult it is to pare down belongings. We were moving on a budget so we were limited to two checked bags, one carryon and one personal under-the-seat bag each.  We spent a lot of time selecting the clothes and items we would bring with us. Since my job had a budget shipping service, I arranged for a PO box so we could ship 13 boxes before my job ended. The place here was kind enough to store our boxes for almost a month.

After watching a bunch of you tube videos, we decided it would be financially better to ship both our cars. We staggered our pick-up dates so that we wouldn't be without a car at either location for long. The shipping process takes about 21-25 days and ours was hindered a little by the Thanksgiving holiday.

Three days before our flight, a dear friend's husband took us for our pre-trip covid test at CVS that was required by the State of Hawaii. She and her husband also helped me finish packing and cleaning our old apartment. I couldn't have done it without them.

They dropped me off at the hotel on Sunday night and I knew I'd have to pull an all nighter to get everything repacked before our 6am shuttle on Monday. Unfortunately, we ended up leaving three big shopping bags full of stuff at the hotel. I stopped by the desk on the way out and the concierge said they would donate the items so I didn't feel too bad. 

By the time we got on the airport shuttle, I was just relieved to be on our way. I was ready to meet our new landlord, see our new apartment in Oahu and see what life would bring us. Our Aloha adventure was beginning.