Kwajalein Island 4-1-1

One of our reader's requests for a blog topic was "more about the island itself"...  


Kwajalein (locals call it Kwaj)  is located about 8 degrees North of the Equator.  A common misconception is that we are a "South Pacific" Island, when in reality we're still part of the Northern Pacific!  :-)  Kwajalein Island is part of the Kwajalein Atoll which is part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI).  An Atoll is "a coral reef or a string of closely spaced small coral islands, enclosing or nearly enclosing a shallow lagoon."  Kwaj is the Southernmost and the largest of the islands in the Kwajalein Atoll.  Kwaj is about 3.5 miles long and .50 miles wide.  For the history of Kwaj and the Kwajalein Atoll, click here.  


The primary mode of transportation for locals who live on Kwaj is by bike.  For a cute write-up about Kwaj bikes, click here.  My bike is only 4 months old and can already be considered in Kwaj-condition.  My handlebars are rusty, my chain is rusty, 3 bolts are missing (that I know of), my basket is held on with zip ties, and I'm probably only a few weeks away from adding some duct-tape, somewhere.  :-)

Our primary location for "shopping" is AAFES (I believe Army, Air-Force Exchange Store).  There used to be three stores, but they recently (October) consolidated down to two.  Over the years the stores have had different local names but I call them the PX and the PXtra.  One of the stores is like a 7-11 in the states on light steroids.  You can purchase snack foods, soda, alcohol, household goods such as toilet paper, toothpaste, OTC medicines, coffee, etc.  We can also rent movies there.  The other store carries electronics, bedding, kitchen supplies, bike parts, garden supplies, pet supplies a few pieces of clothing, and other miscellaneous living-ware.  Neither store is very large, say about the size of a small 1-story house... Needless to say, if you need anything that the stores don't carry, you'll have to order it online and wait 2-3 weeks for delivery.  I would venture to say amazon.com, drugstore.com and wal-mart.com are kept quite profitable by Kwaj residents!

There is one grocery store on island; it's called Surfway.  They receive fresh fruits and vegetables once per week, on the Tuesday military flight from Hawaii.  However, sometimes the plane doesn't come and we go a few weeks without fresh food.  Really it's not that big of a deal.  The best time to shop is Tuesday at 3:30pm as the fresh foods have usually just been placed out for sale and you have the best selection.  Before we came to the island, the only information we could find online made it sound like grocery shopping would be very sparse, ie: one type of chip on the shelf, limited canned foods, etc.  However we have found this to be quite untrue!  While fresh foods can be limited, for the most part there is a large selection of chips, canned foods and dry boxed food.  Certain things just aren't ever stocked, for example canned pumpkin, but we learn to get by with what we have!  Sometimes you'll be shopping and you'll see something that hasn't been there before, so you buy 3 or 4 because you probably won't see it again for awhile!  The price of groceries is comprable to prices in Hawaii.  However, sometimes things go out-of-date before they are sold so you can get pretty good discounts.  When we first came on island, the frozen butter was past it's sell-by-date, so it was 75% off!  I stocked up!  I'm fairly certain frozen butter is just fine even if you use it well past it's sell-by date!

For recreation, there is no lack of things to keep us busy!  Diving obviously occupies a lot of our free time, but some of the other activities include: snorkeling, kayaking, rowing, fishing, sailing, volleyball, baseball, soccer, bowling, movies theaters, biking (!!), exercising (we have a nicely equipped gym)... and I'm sure I'm missing many others!  The movies are free; there are two theaters.  One is an outdoor theatre and the other is a partially indoor (it's an A-frame building, with exposed floors) theatre.  Peter and I haven't been to see a movie yet as we are usually too tired from diving all day, :-) but maybe we'll make it down there sometime. 

The work-week on island is Tuesday through Saturday.  Since we are on the other side of the international date-line from the states, they work T-Sa to stay on the same schedule as ConUS (Continental U.S.).  

If you want to leave the island, you have to plan ahead a bit since out-going flights (for non-military) are only 3 times per week.  Continental is the only airline that flies to Kwaj.  It's a 5 hour flight from Kwaj to Hawaii and another 5 hour flight from Hawaii to San Francisco, California.  I'll let you make your own calculations from there.  :-)  Prices to fly here are pretty high... but we promise if you come we'll make sure you have a wonderful time, and your accommodations will be taken care of!  That being said, we're limited to 90 days of visitors per calendar year, and half of those are already spoken for in 2012!  We have to obtain clearance for anyone who comes to visit, which takes about 2 weeks to process, but is a pretty simple form to fill out and then they perform a background check.  

Hopefully this covers some of the information you were interested in!  If I missed something you're wanting to know about, please let me know.  :-)  Now I will get busy answering some of the other blog-topic ideas!