Kauai: Day 5

Our 5th day in Kauai as a little more laid back then the first few days. This day Eric and I headed to Hanalei Beach and Eric took surfing lessons while I enjoyed relaxing on the beach. It was a very cloudy day and I got sprinkled on a little, but I really enjoyed the down time.

View of mountain from Hanalei Beach - see the small white line on the mountain? Thats a waterfall!

Eric (far right) learning to surf

And he is up!

Hanalei Bay

 After surfing hard we decided to check out a taco truck that is parked by the pier in Hanalei bay. Apparently, Pat's Taqueria, is well known around the food scene and we had to check it out. We were pleased by some of the best tacos I have ever had! They were SOOOO good. If you ever find yourself in Hanalei, you gotta check this out!

After lunch we went back to our place and relaxed for the afternoon before going to a Luau at Smith's Garden. The Luau was fun. Nothing I would do again. The food was OK - nothing too special, and their performance was also OK. It was fun to see some of the dances but for the most part I would say it was a bit too long and slow moving.

Kauai: Day 4

On our 4th day in Kauai we traveled to the south side of the island to go to Waimea Canyon. The drive to the canyon from the North shore is over 2 hours long. Its only 70 miles from our house but the roads are slow going due to traffic and slow speed limits. It was worth the drive though! Once you get to the top there are plenty of look out points to view the canyons. It is an amazing sight to see. It was also SUPER windy up at the top which made it kind of chilly. I was glad to have brought a long sleeved shirt. While at the canyon we purchased some sugar cane to sample. Its a really weird thing to eat. You actually don't eat it, but suck on it until all the sugary juice is gone and then you spit out what it left. It was surprisingly refreshing!

At the end of the canyon road we did a 2 mile hike along a ridge line. This hike had some of the best look out points I have ever seen. It was spectacular!

This was our trail. The ground was all hard clay, I would never want to hike this in the rain!

After our hike we decided to check out Kauai Coffee Company. They have a HUGE coffee plantation and you get to sample ALL of their coffee. YUMMMMM. The coffee was really good but ridiculously expensive so we decided to not buy any for ourselves but as gifts for others.


Coffee beans

After getting energized on some coffee we headed to PoiPu beach to do some snorkeling. Eric and I were the only two to venture into the water here but we did see some great fish!

On the beach was this big guy below. Its a Monk Seal and it is an endangered species. What you cant see in this picture is that some crazy person has roped off the seal because they don't want you to get too close. Now, this seal is sleeping and chooses to go to a very popular beach every day to sleep. The people that try and protect the seal yell at people when they get too close, even if you are completely ignorant of the fact that it is there. One lady my parents talked to protects this seal every day from 8am to 5pm. I know the seals are endangered, but really, do you have anything better to do??

After snorkeling we went back to our home for dinner and a relaxing evening.

Kauai: Day 3

Day 3 in Kauai was Fathers Day and what could be better for my dad than to be in Kauai for Fathers Day! We had a fun day exploring the North side of the Island. We started out the day driving to the Kilauea Lighthouse. This was a great place to see some nice scenery of the island. Also, we were lucky that there were a TON of birds nesting during this time of year.

This bird nested directly in the gound in a hole it digs

After the light house we stopped by a fruit stand to get some yummy fresh fruit. The red fruit below is called Mountain Apple. It looks like a small read pear but tastes like rose. A very interesting and refreshing flavor! We also bought mango, passion fruit, lanzones, and coconut.

After the fruit stand we stopped for a while and Annini Beach. This was a great beach and I wish we could have gone back to it. We stopped here for lunch and our first snorkeling for the week. The snorkeling was OK - not the best - but a great way to start our snorkel experience. The beach was excellent! As you can see below, it was a bit cloudy but still warm and relaxing!

After exploring some more we went back to our house to do some more relaxing and then get ready for dinner. We decided to go to a restaurant right down the road from our house called Mediterranean Gourmet. It was rated the best restaurant in Kauai in 2011. The food was awesome! And the restaurant is right on the ocean so we enjoyed the sound of crashing waves as we ate. Here are pictures of us all dressed up and my mom and I had beautiful plumeria leis.

I am pretty sure this might have been my dad's favorite fathers day ever.

Kauai: Day 1 & 2

We arrived around 5:30 pm on June 15th in Kauai, hopped into our rental car and started driving to our home for the week in Kapa. Along the way we stopped for groceries and dinner. Our first meal in Kauai was in Hanalei at a place called Kalypso. The food was so good and we enjoyed our first (and not last) Mai Thai. It was such a long day and we were very tired that when we got to our rental home, we crashed.

On our first full day in Kauai we cooked a good breakfast at home and then went on a quick walk on the beach. Our house was a quick 10 min walk to a long stretch of beach including Tunnels beach. We finally felt like we were on vacation and we were excited to be on the beach and looking at the beautiful mountains of Kauai.

We also took this first day to go to one of the local farmers markets to stock up on a lot of fresh fruit. The fruit here was amazingly delicious! We then headed out to a local Botanical Garden to explore. Limahuli Garden and Preserve was beautiful! This was a place where the ancient Hawaiian lived, nestled into the mountains. It was a beautiful place and we really enjoyed the walk around the garden.

This was a GREAT first day in Kauai!

Cabin Times

These are all pics from a couple weekends ago at the cabin. I havent had time to write a lot so I am just going to share a couple notes on each pic. Enjoy!

Me happy because we were paddling in a canoe on Rainy Lake... it had been over a year since I last canoed.

Eric water skiing

Lupine

Our "new" canoe. Thanks to Chuck and Ada we have a lightly used 40+ year old canoe!

Nothing is better than a Rainy Lake sunset.

Eric's Cousin Baline wakebording

Eric in the canoe. With his "not another picture" smile :)

Stay tuned for a few posts about our trip to Kauai!