Spent part of my day with Zarli and Wilma checking out the First Hawaiian Autoshow. Though geared more towards families and mostly a product oriented sit-and-feel type of show it was none the less enjoyable. There were some noticeable absentees however like the Chevy ZR1 Corvette, and perhaps the biggest let down... No Nissan GT-R! Other slight disappointments included not being able to actually SIT in the new Mitsubishi Lancer EVO, or the Porsche 911 Turbo. Another let down was the Subaru WRX STi, which was positioned behind a rather droll and somewhat off putting announcer lady.
Onto the good... the Audi R8 is gorgeous. From the visible engine, the tiny little R8 headlamp projection screen thingie... to the huge honking brakes, the car is built for speed and looks it even at a stand still. Equally surprising was that IS-F wasn't locked down, on the contrary it was open AND had a working battery. Most of the cars that you could sit in were stripped so that no one could turn on the accessories :| Though not as fun as seeing a ZR1 Vette there was a Z06 with the hood up. The 427 V8 of the Z06 is still a great piece of engineer to behold and the brake assembly on both front and rear wheels are enormous on this car.
If I had to give a nod to the most "hey I didn't expect that to be cool" car I'd have to give that to the Mini Cooper Clubman. An elongated cousin of the standard Mini Cooper, the clubman surprised us with the sheer size of the center spedometer and the nice inclusion of suicide doors on the passenger side. A great little people mover/stuff transporter the Clubman looks to be a fairly fun ride. I will admit however, I have a coworker with the Clubman S and he confirms the stock engine used in the normal Clubman is woefully underpowered.
Following the car photographic goodness, we meandered our way to Shokudo for some dinner. Service was a little slow as initially we got there right at the lunch run. I sampled one of their vodka soda's as did Zarli. Unfortunately we both came away with the same view, super sweet, too much so. While the citrus and sweetness did help cut the bite of the vodka it did so almost to a fault. Other noticeable highs were the char siu pork withTokyo negi which had a great garnish of seasoned onion which gave the pork sort of a tako poke flavor. The desert was also a big hit :P after all honey toast is just a comfortable easy to eat dish.
So that was my sunday.... hopefully work won't have me so snowed under that I have no flexibility to proof my photos. Crossing my fingers that I will have stuff to show soon.
The gallery can be found here (there are also several mirror sites for it)
http://vraxx.smugmug.com/gallery/4491111_5Z3aq
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