Kauai, Part II

After our long day driving around most of the island, we took it easy the next day, slept in a bit and then hiked to a few waterfalls on the east coast.  First was Ho'opi falls which we found after a nice 15-minute hike through a beautiful forest.

The kids were having a great time climbing up and down the hills and weren't even concerned with the little matter of actually finding the waterfall...they were all about the adventure.

Personally, I was pretty excited once we found the falls because they were lovely.

Opaeka'a falls was much easier to find - park at the lookout and stare.  This one was much bigger and gorgeous.

Alex got a little distracted chasing chickens...

By far, the most impressive was Wailua falls.  Most places say it's about 80 feet tall but the guidebook I read said they measured it at well over 150 feet.  It was twice as tall as the nearby trees.  Amazing!

All that adventure meant we needed to go relax at the beach again.  We walked about a minute down the street to baby beach - the hidden gem with just a handful or parking spots and not a single sign, so it was pretty much just the other tourists from our street and a few locals.  The rocks break up the waves so it was safe for the kids to play freely.

It's just a small stretch of sand and sun and it was perfect for us!

There is even a tiny pool perfect for relaxing or finding hermit crabs (which, no, we could not bring home, no matter how many times he asked).

 

 The next day we headed to the west coast and Waimea canyon.  Just a short drive west and the scenery started changing noticeably.

The first lookout was amazing!  The rainiest place in Kauai (and actually the rainiest spot on earth) is on the other side of the canyon.  Mt. Wai'ale'ale gets about 432" of rain a year and blocks the majority of rain from the canyon, so on such a lush island, this place is pretty arid, getting only 19" of rain annually.  

It was also cool because of the elevation and since I left our jackets sitting by the door, we made do with beach towels :)

The next lookout gave us a closer look at the fantastic waterfall.

 

The end of the road was incredible!  We were on top of the Na Pali cliffs that we had seen from the boat just a few days earlier.

On our way back through Waimea, we stopped at the BEST shaved ice place ever.  It's hard to beat a scoop of macadamia nut ice cream inside a mai tai shaved ice topped with cream.  Yum!!

We also stopped at the unusual glass beach.  This area was treated like a dump years ago but all the glass has broken up and been smoothed by the waves, so now it's an interesting beach.  The pretty cliffs behind were full of rusty old car engines and tires.

On our last few days, we revisited some of our favorite spots and soaked up our last afternoon at baby beach with a pretty rainbow.

I made a cute little feathered friend there, too, that would eat crumbs off my legs.

Our last dinner was at the Beach House, just a short walk in the other direction.  The sunset and the food made it a perfect place to wrap up such a wonderful and memorable trip.

We walked out on their lawn to get a few pictures after we ordered.

I love these crazy boys!  They were so good during the trip and loved going to all the different beaches.  It was such a fun family time together and so great for them to have a buddy to play with (and annoy) everywhere.

 

Aloha, Kauai, and thanks for the memories...hope we meet again one day!

Kauai, Part I

The upside to having a husband who travels for work is that occasionally we get to trade in some of those frequent flier miles for a fun trip!  I found roundtrip tickets to Kauai for a steal and we jumped at the chance to explore an island we'd never visited.

We had to wake up at 4am to catch our first flight, then catch our connection in LAX, and it was 6 hours to Lihue.  After hours of ocean, this was a welcomed sight!

 We got our car, stopped by Costco and the grocery store to stock up for the week, then went straight to our rental in Poipu.  Loved this little cottage!  It was perfect - two bedrooms, full kitchen, washer and dryer....all the things we needed to live comfortably.

 

My favorite place was the big porch and the swing.  I enjoyed my coffee out there every morning watching the waves and listening to the birds while the sun rose.  It showered nearly every morning, too, so we were greeted with lots of rainbows.

 

We overlooked PK's beach, too rocky for swimming but an excellent place for Matt to watch the surf breaks and decide when and where to go.

 

The kids cracked me up - they had self-imposed Hawaiian uniforms and wore these shirts (compliments of Grandma Kirkham from her trip last year) every time they had the chance.

 

 Alex was a huge fan of the plumeria blossoms in the yard and all over the street.

 

Our first full day, we drove to the end of the road in Poipu and started exploring some remote beaches.  The kids were a bit excited...can you tell?

 

 We found a protected pool at Gillin's beach and they immediately got busy building sandcastles.

We also noticed lots of these holes, which were obviously from sizable crabs.

The kids were digging holes in a steep sandbank when Alex jumped up and screamed bloody murder, over and over.  I'm not exaggerating because Matt was a couple hundred yards upwind and he heard it loud as day.  Surfers down the beach turned to stare.  I was looking for blood or broken bones, when I saw a big crab take off running from Alex's hole.  Turns out they gave each other a pretty good scare!  Once I realized no one was in mortal danger, it was hilarious.  For the rest of the day, Alex wouldn't go anywhere near a hole or even look at a half-inch crab.

 We explored some gorgeous lithified cliffs around the Maha'ulepu beaches and watched the fish in the clear water below.

We explored as far as Ha'ula beach, which was gorgeous and nearly deserted.

We found a perfect place for a picnic lunch on the beach.

Later, we headed to Poipu beach park, which had a fun sandbar down the middle and a little point with lots of interesting tidepools.  The snorkeling here was impressive with a huge variety of fish just inches from our fingertips. We took the kids out for their first beach snorkel experience and they really enjoyed it but still preferred digging in the sand and playing in the waves.

Our last stop for the day was Spouting Horn, which was a lot of fun to watch.

We spotted our first sea turtle enjoying his dinner on nearby cliffs.  His head is poking up in the middle of the picture.

I'd read that the island has lots of wild chickens but I didn't expect them to be everywhere.  On the highway, on the beach, all over golf courses - there are chickens everywhere you look!  Ben was determined to catch one but never got lucky, even with this little guy.

Our second day dawned bright and early because we had to drive all the way around to the north shore for a 7:45 check-in at the boat dock.  We followed heavy rains and brilliant rainbows all the way there.  Looks like there was a pot of gold in the taro fields of Hanalei.

The rain made beautiful waterfalls in the mountains.

We chose a rigid hull inflatable boat to view the rugged Na Pali coast because it was small enough to go into caves and get close to the shore.  I was a little nervous about getting seasick but so excited to see the coastline firsthand!

We were ferried back and forth by a little dinghy and once everyone was onboard, it was time for our adventure!  Things were already beautiful before we even left the bay.

The first cave we saw had a gorgeous waterfall running right through it.

 

 The scenery was breathtaking!

We ran into a pod of spinner dolphins and turned to follow them for a few minutes.

The open-ceiling cave was impressive.

We saw many sea turtles along the coast, big and small.

The next cave we encountered was deep and dark and gave us a nice shower on the way out!

We went far enough into the cave for me to know I never want to explore a dark cave full of water.

 

After we'd seen the entire coast and nearly reached Polihale beach, we set anchor and snorkeled at the edge of the cliffs.  The kids were great sports and jumped in to try it, but they both got cold quickly and were ready to get out and have lunch.  The ride over was nice and calm with the wind at our backs.  The return trip into the trade winds was wet and bumpy but a ton of fun.  The kids couldn't decide if it should be called splash mountain or splashtown.  Alex even got a new windblown hairdo!  And thankfully, no one got seasick and we all enjoyed the entire trip.

We checked out some other beaches on the north shore but found parking was a problem, so we had to walk pretty far to get to Tunnels beach.  As it turned out, our walk to us right past some huge sea turtles in knee-deep water so it was totally worth it.

 Gorgeous!!

 

This was no surprise on the way home!

We all adjusted to the time difference really well (probably because we were all so wiped out from the long travel day when we arrived) but when these kids crashed, they were out!