Kauai Trip- days 2 & 3

June 26, 2009

We woke up really early Friday to go to Waimea Canyon.. the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific". It was about an hour drive to the bottom of the Canyon, on the west side of the island. There are two roads that go up to the State Park, and we took the more scenic route, stopping to take pictures along the way. The road up was very narrow and winding long the mountain side which made the drive like twice as long as it would take if the road was straight. There are supposedly goats, deer and wild boars in the canyon. We didn't see any, but we heard the goats. The main lookout is at 3400 ft up.. we got there just in time because after we were at the lookout for a while the clouds/rain started to come in.

We drove all the way along the canyon (from Waimea Canyon State Park into Koke'e State Park) to the end which overlooks the Na Pali coast.. where they filmed some shots for Jurassic Park. The views were so amazing, words can't describe it and the pictures don't do it justice. Matt and I definitely want to go back sometime and go camping & hiking in Koke'e. We stopped at the Koke'e lodge for lunch. Matt had a BLT sandwich with Portuguese sausage on it, and I had Portuguese bean soup and corn bread.. pretty good! After eating, Matt and I went outside and threw the frisbee and fed the chickens while we waited for grandma and my mom.

We drove back down from the canyon and stopped in Hanapepe to pick up a lilikoi chiffon pie. We stopped at the Fort Elizabeth State Park which was just ehh.. The most exciting thing was showing Matt the sleeping grass.. you touch the leaves and they close together. Then we stopped at the Salt Pond Beach Park. They actually still farm sea salt here. Although I'm not sure what they do with the salt. The guidebook we have said it has impurities so it can't be sold. We drove back home and ate dinner at a thai restaurant. Matt had the super spicy red curry, and I had the pineapple curry. It was really good; I love thai food! After dinner we drove to Koloa on the south side of the island to go to a Bon Dance (buddhist celebration kind of thing), but the info I saw online was wrong and we were like 2 weeks late. We drove back to our place and went to sleep.

June 27, 2009

We woke up around 8 am this day.. the latest on the trip. We drove to Princeville Ranch on the north side to go horseback riding. Matt's horse was named Big Blue, and mine was Lilo. The trail we went on went through pastures where they raise grass-fed cattle. We stopped at a couple lookout spots and took some pictures. The views were amazing and the horses were beautiful. Mine was very stubborn and didn't want to get too close to the other horses. Anyway, the horse ride was awesome!

Then we drove into Hanalei (toward the west along the north side) for lunch. Matt and I got burgers from Bubba Burgers which uses the meat from Princeville Ranch. The burgers were really good, although I couldn't really tell the difference between normal grain-fed and grass-fed meat. After lunch, we kept driving west to the end of the highway. The Kalalau Trail starts here at Ke'e Beach. The whole trail is 11 miles long, and goes along the Na Pali coast. We decided to only go 2 miles along this trail to a secluded beach, then 2 more miles on a trail up the Hanakapi'ai Valley to a waterfall. We started our hike around 1:45 pm, so it was pretty hot out but there was a strong breeze. The hike wasn't too hard and only took us an hour and fifteen minutes to get to the beach. We took a dip in a stream that discharges into the ocean there. Then we continued hiking to the waterfall which took about the same amount of time. We passed huge patches of bamboo and the remnants of an old coffee mill chimney. Some parts of the trail were more strenuous.. there were a few slippery parts from water trickling down the side of the mountains, and we criss-crossed over the stream a few times. Once we got to the waterfall, the 4 mile hike was totally worth it. It was the most amazing thing I've seen! The waterfall was 100 ft tall (according to a website I found, although it looked taller) and the water in the pool was freezing! maybe in the 60's. We swam some, ate a little snack and took lots of pictures.

After hanging out there for half an hour, we started the 4 mile hike back. The first 2 miles to the beach wasn't bad.. we checked out the beach when we got there. I think there were like 2 other people there at the time. On the trail just above the beach, there's a wooden sign that records the number of deaths at the beach below. I think the count was up to 82... The currents are pretty bad and there's no lifegaurd. Anyway, the last 2 miles was mostly uphill.. and very steep on the downhill parts.. pretty tough on the knees and ankles. We got back around 6:15pm, and wait a few minutes for my mom to get back to pick us up.

Then we drove back into Kapa'a and found something for dinner. Matt and I got fish tacos from Pau Hana (hawaiian for done with work) Bar & Grill. They came with a mango salsa and were really good! For dessert we had coconut water (the liquid inside a coconut) and some lilikoi chiffon pie. We were exhausted from the day! We packed up our things because we flew back to Oahu early the next morning.

Overall, the trip to Kauai was awesome! I planned a lot of things for us to do and everything went pretty smoothly. It's amazing how different Kauai is from Oahu.. much more rural and remote. I loved this island because it has a little of everything. The west side is dry and more like a desert with the canyon. And the east/north side is very lush and green. One of the mountain peaks receives the most rainfall in the world. I definitely want to go back and do some snorkling and check out the south side.!