Kauai (more of Hawaii)

Kauai is a beautiful island known as the Garden Isle.  I found out this is because it is unbelievable green.  We had previously booked a rental condo to stay at on the north side of the island.  However, we finally got there 3ish and lets just say it wasn’t what we had planned. So after some stewing, we decided to find a different place (if you want more details, feel free to ask me).  After some searching and driving, we ended up on the southwest side of the island at an awesome resort hotel. (Just south of Hanamaulu)  I also didn’t know that it rains ALOT on Kauai.  So almost everyday it rained, but the cool thing was, we could drive for 15-20 minutes and find a sunny beach.  That was great.  

Here is the view from our room.  Awesome.  Did I mention we were on the 8th floor on a corner room.  It was so nice.  3 pools (one was a sand bottom pool), 2 hot tubs, walking access to the beach.  It was great.

Thursday, March 4th:

Because we were still suffering some from jet lag, we were up at 6 a.m. the first night in Kauai.  So we went for an early morning stroll on the beach.  The ocean was churning, it wouldn’t have been a good idea to swim, but the stroll was great.

Ahhh, I wanna go back!

One of those funny self pics.  Such a pretty beach.

I was trying to capture the churning waves, it really doesn’t do it justice. 

See, we didn’t totally forget that we have children.

About the time Cam got all the names written, the wave came and washed them away.  See, here it comes…

“Oh, I’m sooooo happy”

Just looking at these pictures…Anyone want to go to Hawaii, tomorrow?

We spent some time watching these funny sand crabs.  Their holes were all over the beach and they would hide.  But then if we would hold really still, they would peek out, then sneak out.  There would be a ton on the beach, then Cam would wave his arms and scare them all back into their holes.  The kids would have loved it. What am I saying, we loved it.

I didn’t really understand this sign at first.  Don’t feed the birds OR CHICKENS???  Then I understood.  Kauai has a HUGE population of wild chickens.  They are called the Official Unendangered species of Kauai.  Each morning, we would wake up to the roosters crowing.  It was like being near a bunch of chicken farms.

We stopped for lunch and there was a hen under our table, then she stood up and she had 4 or 5 chicks hidden under her wings.  Crazy.

Double rainbow

Beautiful.  Just cruising down the road.  There was a double rainbow.  You can just barely see the second rainbow in the picture above.  That’s my cute husband too.

So on Thursday, we investigated the island a little.  We went down to Port Allen and signed up for a Catamaran tour of the Napali Coast.  We saw where “Dirty Jobs” did the red dirt shirt show. We also stopped into a FABULOUS chocolate shop.  Kauai Chocolate Company.  Yummm.  I don’t even love chocolate, and I could have stayed in there for hours.  It was a small, mom and pop shop.  But the handmade chocolates were amazing.

 

We also stopped in several other small town to see.  Kauai isn’t nearly the tourist place that Oahu is, so it was really great to see how the Hawaiian’s really live and what not.

Later that day we went to Poipu, which is a resort town, and went snorkeling.  It was awesome.  Once I got used to the idea that I could breath underwater.  We saw some awesome fish.  One other lady there had some fish food, so the fish were swarming the area.  I would love to go snorkeling again.

Friday, March 5th

We had the morning to buzz around before our boat tour, so we went to a few more towns that we hadn’t seen yet.  Someone said that Salt Pond Beach was good for snorkeling, so we went to check it out.  It was a pretty cool morning, so we opted out of snorkeling but found some other interesting things.

On the beach, I saw this funny lump.  Black lump.  It wasn’t until we walked closer that we saw the sign. Hawaiian Monk seals. (Hawaiian monk seal, Monachus schauinslandi, is an endangered earless seal that is endemic to the Hawaiian Islands^[2].Known to the native Hawaiians as ʻIlio-holo-i-ka-uaua, or "dog that runs in rough water)  Thanks wikipedia.

They are very endangered and very sensitive to human involvement, so when they are found “resting” on the beach, the lifeguards put up cones at a large perimeter around them and a sign like the one below.  There were 2 on the beach that day.

 

For the afternoon/evening, we took a Catamaran tour of the Napali coast.  The Napali coast is the west side of Kauai island.  It is inaccessible by car.  You have to get there by boat or if you are really tough, you can hike into some of it.

One of the cool things about visiting Hawaii in the winter is that the humpback whales are near the islands.  We were able to see several on the boat ride out to the coast and on the way back.

 

The whales were usually at a distance. We saw several (5-6) green sea turtles floating/swimming in the water.  They were too far away to get a decent picture of. On our way back from the Napali Coast, we had a whole school of spinner dolphins playing in our wake and under the rudders of our boat.  They were less than 20 feet away and swam with us for quite a while. 

Ok, these two are stock photos, but the spinner dolphins were swimming like that with our boat, except there was probably 20+ of them. 

Then we saw a few more hump back whales swimming and there were bottle nose dolphins swimming with them. 

There are a few cliffs and little beaches along the Napali.  Our captain told us of the native tribes that used to live on the remote beaches and cliffs.    It is really amazing to think of a whole tribe of people living on a space that is not much bigger than a few football fields.  Growing their own food and fishing if the were on a beach.  With a whole bunch of cliffs and mountains all around.

Is he starting to look a little green??  It was a dinner, sunset cruise and lets just say that by the time dinner came around, Cam wasn’t really interested.

Saturday, March 6th

Oh, sad… Our last day on the islands.  We didn’t really have an agenda, so we set out to see a few things we hadn’t seen yet.

We drove to Waiamea Canyon, the grand canyon of the pacific.  Cam did his best to make me carsick on the way up there, but I held my ground.  ( I think it was payback for me taking him on the boat tour)

It was pretty windy, that’s why I look weird.  Trying to keep the hair out of my face.

Really beautiful.

I had to take a picture of a coconut tree.  It was growing in someone’s backyard.  We hit a few small towns and farmer’s markets that day too. In Kapaa and Anahola.

 

We were looking for a place for lunch while in Waimea, before heading up the canyon.  This place smelled good, so we gave it a try.   I got ribs and they were delish.  Their sauce was awesome.  It just goes to show you, don’t be afraid to get some good eats in the place called “Da Booze Shop”.  (I’m not sure what Cam was doing in that pic, maybe some lunch was stuck in his teeth :)

 

Then after coming down from the canyon, we had to get some shave ice  (not shaved ice---shave ice).  Jo-Jo’'s is the best shave ice on Kauai.  It is creamy shaved ice served on macadamia nut icecream.  Ohhh, my mouth is watering.

 

We did alot of driving on Kauai, but saw a ton of the island.  It really is beautiful.

These trees where growing on the road to our hotel.  They made a cool archway.  There were a lot of this type of tree on oahu too.  I don’t know what it is but the branches put off roots that eventually grow in to the ground.  The trees all have huge bases because of all the roots that are growing down.

And away we went.  Took a red eye flight home.

We had such a great time in Hawaii.  We are still trying to figure out how to afford a house on Hawaii so we can go visit frequently.  It was a great vacation.  Especially thanks to Mimi and Marnie for watching our zoo while we were gone.  We never had to worry that they were being taken care of.  They had a great time while we were gone!

More of Hawaii

Ok, here is the second installment.

I forgot to include that on Monday evening, we went for a drive.  The weather was pretty windy but we wanted to go see Hanauma Bay.  We figured it was bad weather to snorkel but we wanted to look.  It was really beautiful.  Next time I’m back hanging out in Hawaii, I’ll go snorkeling there.

(try not to be too jealous of my extreme supermodel talents)

Tuesday (3/2/2010)

This was the day we planned to hit the north side of the island.  So we took a meandering way up there.

First priority was to see Leonard’s bakery (on the east end of Waikiki).  I had read several places that said you have to go to Leonard’s, so we did.  I also read that you had to have a malasada, so we did.  Malasadas are a Portuguese doughnut, kinda.  Really soft.  Pretty darn good.

(stock picture, not ours.  We didn’t eat THAT many)

Anyway, Leonard’s was a small bakery that looked like it hadn’t been updated since it was built in 1950 something.  I thought it was a hole in the wall kinda place that only the locals knew about.  I was wrong.  We placed our order and while we waited for our hot malasadas, a man came in and said a tour bus was coming so we would want to get our orders.  Sure enough, a few minutes later, a tour bus came in with about 40-50 of our closest Japanese friends.  We decided to take our fine breakfast treat and leave. (oh, hey, they have a website http://leonardshawaii.com/)

Then we made our way up the coast of Oahu.

Here I am with Chinaman’s Hat or Mokoli’i Island.  That’s all I have to say about that.

We stopped at the park/beach to look around.  Kind of a windy morning (check out the trees).  It got much better once we made our way up the island.

We drove up north (on the Kamehameha Highway) to  Waimea Bay where there were good northshore waves.  All the beaches on the northshore are pretty crazy in the winter.  Big waves, strong undertow.  We saw some locals do a little surfing then moved on.  Stopped in the surf town of Haleiwa and walked around a bit. We stopped at a roadside stand that sold fresh cut pineapple, mango, guava, and coconut.  But the best part were fried bananas (they were a banana wrapped in a thin egg roll wrapper and deep fried right there and they were soooooo good).

Then headed back toward Laie.  It was lunch time, so we needed some lunch but weren’t sure where to go.  Our goal was to eat at places that were not available on the mainland.  We found a small cafe that was rated well on Google maps (thanks google).  The Hukilau Cafe.  It was small (4-5 tables) but there were locals eating there, so that is always a good sign.  The server was awesome, talked to us like we were friends.  We noticed a sign on the wall with a plaque that said that Hukilau Cafe was chosen as the place to get the best burger in Hawaii.  So Cam ordered the “Moco Loco” which was the dish they won the award for.

Moco loco was 2 scoops of rice, two hamburger patties and 2 fried eggs, all bathed in brown gravy.  And of course, served with macaroni salad (every lunch is served with rice and macaroni salad in Hawaii).

 

Then we went to see the Laie Hawaii LDS Temple.

Unfortunately it is undergoing renovations right now, so we couldn’t go in, but it was awesome to see anyhow.

As we came on to the temple grounds a Polynesian sister missionary came up to us to welcome us and asked where we were we were from.   Then as soon as we said Boise, ID, she turned around and yelled across the grounds to where her companion was standing “Sister Cutler, your Idaho cousins are here (in Hawaii, everyone is a cousin).  So Sister Cutler came over and we chatted for a few minutes.  Cam says “Are you related to Trent Cutler?” and she says “that’s my brother”.  It is a small world.

From there we headed to the Polynesian Cultural Center.  A huge place with little village that are devoted to each of the major Polynesian islands.  At each of the villages you can learn about the culture, try out some of the local crafts, etc.  It was a cool experience.  We saw a Samoan guy hop up a coconut tree to get a coconut.  Then saw how coconut milk is made and strained using the husk of the coconut.  Tried our hand at Poi balls in New Zealand and did some chanting in the Fijian village.

(in the Fiji village)

We also went to a huge Luau there and had lots of traditional food.  Taro poi ( poi is mashed up starch that is kinda runny-think elmers glue), poke (raw fish marinated), lomilomi salmon (salmon broken into small pieces, which are then mixed with tomatoes, onions), pipi kaula (seasoned beef jerky, similar to salt beef), taro rolls ( they were purple), kalua pua’a (roast pork—the pig cooked on a spit in a pit in the ground covered with banana leaves), teriyaki chicken, chicken long rice (tasted like chicken noodle soup), Dark purple Hawaiian sweet potatoes. Cam tried everything.  I couldn’t bring myself to try the raw fish.  I tried everything else.

(the luau)

At the luau there was good entertainment.

Then we saw the show that they put on in the evening.  It was really awesome.  Cam videoed a bunch of it to show the kids.  A favorite is the fire stick dancers.  Amazing.

Probably the coolest thing about the PCC is that A LOT of college kids work there.  The are paid and get scholarship to attend the university.  One of the older gentlemen in the Fiji village told us how the PCC not only educates the  rest of the world about their culture but the kids too.  He said many of the kids that come to work there are from the city and don’t know the songs, and traditions of there family/people.  Therefore, while they work there, they are able to learn those things so that the island culture is not lost on the next generation.

 

 

(Banana trees were everywhere on the 2 islands but do you know how much bananas cost in the store in Hawaii—1.59/lb!!)

Wednesday (3/3/2010)

We had our flight to Kauai on wed so we only had a few hours before we had to be at the airport.  We headed to the Swapmeet.  We were told that this is the place to go for souvenirs.  It is at the Aloha stadium parking lot and circles the whole stadium.  It was huge.  We walked around about 1/3 of it then had to leave.  We did find a few things there though.

Next installment:  Kauai-The garden isle