Exploits and adventures of a soldier ashore and afloatAdams, William Llewellyn
History
Exploits and adventures of a soldier ashore and afloat
Adams, William Llewellyn
Adams, William Llewellyn; Americans -- Foreign countries; United States. Army -- Military life
In the evening about sundown the party, having increased, journeyed to
Waikiki Beach, the popular bathing resort. Here, at the Moana Hotel,
we joined in a genuine native “luau,” heard “Sunny Chunna” sing her
famous compositions, and later joined in the merry whirl to the music
of the Hawaiian Band. Near this famous winter resort we journeyed into
a gayety hall, where a string of Hawaiian beauties, festooned in
garlands of flowers, performed the “Hulu Hulu” dance, rivalling in
vivaciousness the whirlwind contortions of our valiant Ruth St. Denis.
After a midnight lunch at the Hotel Moana, the party returned to the
city. A motor-boat conveyed me to the transport, which, fortunately,
was boarded without difficulty.
Next morning on board the transport I was the recipient of a basket of
delicious pineapples, and, as a memento of the enjoyable day, a
scarf-pin bearing the coat-of-arms of the Hawaiian Islands.
Honolulu, on the Island of Oahu, is the most beautiful section of the
earth I have visited; the climate varies little, and it can be more
properly termed a temperate clime than tropical, although tropical
vegetation is indigenous. Kilauea, on the eastern slope of Mauna Loa
mountain, is the loftiest and most active volcano in the world, its
crater being nine miles in circumference. Mauna Loa has an altitude of
nearly fourteen thousand feet and is covered with perpetual snow.
A few hours before the departure of the transport for “Frisco,” “Jack”
London, the writer, arrived in the harbor on the _Snark_, a
twenty-four foot schooner, in which he was making a tour of the globe.
As the ship cast loose from the pier, it was with a feeling of regret
that I had to leave this delightful country and such amiable people.
Wafting an Aloho to my friends and their country, we departed for the
American coast, passing _en route_, the second day out, an American
fleet of war-vessels. As the transport approached the city of the
“Golden Gate” in the darkness of the night, myriads of lights
glittered along the distant shore.
Steaming through the channel, we entered the bay in the break of the
early morning. Off the starboard side stood the grand old landmark the
Cliff House, overlooking the bay and city of San Francisco; on the
port side, Fort McDowell and the old Island prison, San Quentin. After
docking at the pier, relatives and friends of the soldiers were
permitted on board, shore leave was granted, and the boys roamed at
will through the city that had recently risen from a mass of ruins,
caused by the telluric flames that followed the dreadful earthquake of
1906.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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