Kauai!!

Wanted to share our trip that we took to Kauai last week!  It was a great trip, very relaxing, got to see lots of sights, eat good food, sleep in (with the 3 hour difference, we were tired by 8pm which meant we were usually awake by 6, but at least we could say it was 9 our time)!  Grandma and Grandpa came and spoiled the kids for a week.  I think the kids may have had more fun than us!  We had a studio condo right on the beach, so on most days, we fixed ourselves a bagel/cream cheese and fresh pineapple, packed a lunch and headed out to see the sights.  Then, back by the afternoon to hang out on our beach!  It was great!

We headed out bright an early (still dark) Thursday (my birthday) and were in Hawaii by noon.   I was surprised with birthday flowers from our friends, which were pretty all week.

Had to take a picture of the chickens...they are EVERYWHERE in Kauai!  By the ocean, in town, up in the mountains!  Mark says it's from a hurricane in the 90's that broke down the chicken coops and now the chickens roam free!  They kept to themselves though, so weren't too much of a nuisance!

 On Friday, we headed north.

 Stopped at the Kilauea lighthouse.  It's over 100 years old.

 On the hill opposite the lighthouse, you can see hundreds of tiny white dots...home of several birds (i can only remember the blue footed booby)

 These little birds were my favorite.  So pretty...looks like a cardinal.  We saw them everyday

 We took a hike over lots of lava rock to the "queens bath".  The ocean was pretty rough that day, so it wasn't much of a "bath".  I loved being able to see the amount of water that comes in with each wave though.  As you can see in this picture and the next (same shot, just different times that the wave was in)

 We got sprayed quite a bit!

 Standing water in the lava rock made it look gold.

 Ocean creatures

 We stopped and had a picnic and watched the waves

 Here is the "bath".  There were people jumping in, but you had to time it right, otherwise you would get clobbered by a wave and slammed into the rock!  Luckily we didn't see that happen!

 A pretty waterfall on the hike

We stopped by another beach and attempted snorkeling.  Here I am looking pretty cool in my snorkeling gear!

 This wasn't a great place to snorkel, as we didn't see many fish.  We did go to another beach later in the week and saw a lot of tropical fish, but didn't have the camera with us...oh-well!  If you look close, you can see the Hawaiian mascot fish, the humuhumunukunukuapua'a!!

 On Saturday, we headed south and traveled the road to see the Waimea Canyon (my favorite part of the trip).  The pictures don't do it justice.  The landscape was so pretty!  If you look closely in this picture, you can see a little farm down there.  We couldn't see how these people were able to travel...no roads, so maybe the river?

 Red dirt, contrasting with pretty greens!

 The Canyon

 This was a beautiful lookout.  We traveled farther up to another lookout, but it was in the clouds and rainy (the sign said that it was the rainiest spot on Kauai), so after eating lunch in the car and waiting for the clouds to pass (they never did), we headed back down the mountain.

 Next stop:  We drove as far west as the roads in Kauai goes.  The last 4 miles was a VERY bumpy dirt road.  We thought of turning back several times, but once we got to the beach, it was worth it!  There weren't many people there and there was lots of beach to walk on...and now we can say we went as far as we could by land!

Can you see the baby crab?

 The end of the road!  On our way back, we stopped by the best shave ice shop (Jo Jo's).  Better than ice cream...they add ice cream in the bottom and top it with coconut flavored condensed milk!  I think one needs to be opened here!

 Sunday, we headed south again to the south tip of Kauai (Poipu).  It was more of a touristy town, with lots of cruise ship buses and shops.  Here is a blow hole we saw.

 More beautiful ocean

 We snorkeled at this beach and saw a beached seal!

 Attempting to be creative with our photography and make it look like I was holding the seal....it didn't really work!

 Monday, we headed on a guided kayak tour down the Wailua river, then hiked to the Wailua waterfall.  It was a great adventure!

 Getting out of the boats and ready to cross the river by foot and into the muddy jungle!

 According to the guide, these stacked rocks are remnants of a drainage ditch that was built by the Polynesians over 1500 years ago.  We also saw some Polynesian hut foundations.

 Hiking through some deep mud!  Sometimes the best place to walk was the deeper mud, versus slipping and sliding on the wet ground.

 We thought this looked like where the trolls in Frozen would live!

 The light trunk trees are Mango trees

 Made it to the falls!

 Behind the waterfall!

 Tuesday, we headed as far north as you can go by road.  We saw this wet cave, and another dry cave that we hiked into.

 This is where the road ends and the hiking trail starts.  We could have hiked 12 miles to another beach....but we decided we would just take a picture by the sign instead!!

 Inside the dry cave

 We stopped at another beach for a picnic (I think I read this was the main beach that South Pacific was filmed)

 Then Wednesday, our last day....we took it easy!  We walked along the beach from our condo as far as we could go and then found a hole in the wall restaurant and had the best fish tacos we have ever had (I've never had fish tacos, but they were good!)

Then, we went to a luau that night to finish off the vacation.  There were lots of peacocks on the property.

 Uncovering of the pig

 After dinner entertainment!

 Aloha from Kauai!!!