Kauai Anniversary Trip Day 3

*Regular Font: David
*Italicized Font: Shantel 

Our second full day on the island was actually an open book. We had generally decided beforehand that we would spend the day in Waimea Canyon and the beaches on the south end of the island and that was really all we knew. It made for the perfect day because we basically just did exactly what we wanted until we decided to do something else. 

We woke up very early in the morning, although it did not feel early because we tried to keep our bodies on close-to-Utah time, so waking up around 5 am did not feel crazy. It ended up working out amazing. We left our hotel pretty close to 6 am. This was really nice because we avoided the traffic that we saw other days coming south from the north. We also wanted to get up to Waimea lookout pretty early. 

Below is us in the parking lot on the way out for the day and the map of what our day looked like. It is hard to see- but the little light blue parts are anytime we were hiking. 

When we were planning where to stay, we decided to stay on the East side of the island. I am SO happy that we did that. It made it easy to get to each side of the island and we really really enjoyed the sunrises each morning. 

We had heard from my co-worker Paul Skeen that they really liked using the Shaka App guided tour, so we decided to try it out. Other than the occasional odd story, we ended up really liking the app. It added some good details of things we could see along the way and told some good stories. Our first stop in Waimea Canyon was the Iliau nature loop. It was a great place to start and we loved the little plant. It looks almost like a mini-palm tree, but is only about 3-10 feet tall. It is really interesting because it only blooms one time in its life and that is it.  

Next we hit the Waimea Canyon lookout and had a beautiful view of Waimea Canyon. Then we also stopped at the Waipo'o Waterfall overlook. 

A little further along the Shaka guide reccommended doing the Canyon Trail /Cliff View Trail. It was a really fun trail because it starts by going down the mountain, then reaches a flat area at the bottom. Our guide told us that it was a mile or so to the Cliff viewpoint and this is about the time we got lost. Fortunately another couple had a map and we figured out where we were going. 

It ended up so fun because after the trail flattened out then it went back up on the other side of the canyon to a view point from the opposite side of the canyon the road was on and we got to see the Canyon from a totally different view. 

We hit a few other viewpoints of the canyon along the way up the road then stopped at Kalalau lookout. 

After that we headed to the very end of the road and the Pu'u O Kila Lookout. Both the Kalalau lookout and the Pu'u lookout were incredible and gave amazing views of the Napali coast. There is no way to describe how breathtaking the view was. There were these amazing cliffs right up to the ocean just covered with green plant life and then the ocean that went on forever and basically blended into the sky so you could not tell where the ocean stopped and the sky began. I feel like we could have spent hours just mystified by the view of the Napali coast. 

We decided to try another trail, the Pihea Vista trail (about 2.4 miles round trip). This turned out to be the absolutely most pure fun thing we probably did the whole trip. 

The trail basically climbed along the top of the crest of the Napali Coast with cliff on both sides. One side a drop off to the Napali coast and then the other side a lookout to the Alakai Swamp and this huge jungle forest area. Either side had these amazing views. As we moved along the trail there was a really light misty rain that kept it nice and cool. It starts out pretty wide because they had tried to build a road through the area and then gave up because they could not. Then the trail narrows and you walk through a jungle area.

As we got further along the trail it started to get really cool with lots of roots and things to climb over and around and it also started to get really muddy. We were definitely prepared for some muddy hiking in Kauai, but this was actually not our big hiking day, so we were not totally mentally prepared for a ton of mud. The further we went the more muddy and tricky it go, but we were really wanting to make it to the viewpoint. 

After a while we were starting to question where the viewpoint was because we had been hiking more than the mile the trail head said it would be. There were a couple other hikers wondering the same thing. We just kept deciding to go a little further. Finally we reached a steep muddy area and worked our way up until we got up and had an unbelievable view. Then one of the couples found the sign at the end of the trail for the viewpoint. We were so excited that we made. This was the most true fun we had the whole trip. We just kept laughing as it got muddier and we were trying to not get our shoes muddy. Then along the way we shifted from not trying to get our shoes muddy to training to avoid ending up falling totally in the mud. 

The view did not disappoint. A few minutes after we got there, the fog rolled in and the view was just gone. On the way a back the fog covered everything and we felt so sad for everyone who did not see the view that we had just spent the last hour hiking along.  The whole hike was invigorating and breathtaking and fun. We just were laughing and joking so much along the way.

David and I read a book this year called "The Power of Fun" and have had a lot of good conversations about FUN and what is is, when we have had true fun, and how fun can help create a happy and well rounded life. This hike ended up being a bright spot of TRUE FUN, and maybe even the very most true fun that we had the whole trip. It's one of those things that words can't really explain WHY it was so fun but that that even just remembering the experience gives you the same feeling of lightness, laughter, and fun. True fun (according to Ms. Price of "The Power of Fun) requires three things: playfulness, connection, and flow. True fun can turn experiences into powerful moments of connection and treasured memory. This hike will forever be a treasured memory for me. The spontaneity, the mud, the laughing, the connection to David and the other people on the trail, everything about it combined to turn into a favorite adventure. 

This is my favorite picture of the whole trip. This is on the way back down the trail. All along there would be multiple spots where you could go up or down multiple different ways. On this one, I took one look at this steep muddy path and though - yeah I can't do that, so I went the other way and went down a different steep muddy path. Shantel looked at the path I went down and said no way and opted for this way instead. She basically used this fence and climbed down this fence to avoid sliding down the muddy path. It is hard to tell, but the trail was so so steep. 

At the end, our shoes were pretty muddy and the back of our legs ended up muddy - but for the most part we stayed mud free with our amazing climbing skills. 

With that - we headed out of Waimea Canyon. We stopped at Kekaha Beach park. We looked around decided to move on to a few other sites. Next stop was Porky's for lunch. By this point we were starving and ready for food. This was probably my favorite meal of the whole trip. However, we were starving so no picture. We got the pulled pork grilled cheese (with bacon) and the hot dog with pulled pork and they were so delicious (Shantel put Pineapple on both). 

After lunch we stopped at the Hanapepe Swinging Bridge. 

Next stop was Salt Pond Beach. This is one of the beaches that I had looked up before the trip and really wanted to stop at. It did not dissapoint. This was my favorite beach of the whole trip. It was not that busy, so there were people there, but not many and we had a huge section all to ourselves. We spent time sitting on the beach watching the waves come up and then spent a while just swimming in the ocean. I loved this beach because it had some real waves coming in, but it had some rocks that gave it some protection and made it really nice for swimming/safe. But you could still feel waves flowing in and out and that was really nice. We read books for a little bit and then walked down the beach for a few minutes and explored as well. 

After a while we decided to move to Poipu beach because we wanted to see the turtles come in that evening. Watching the sun set at Salt Pond beach would have been amazing, but things worked out at Poipu beach. Poipu beach was really pretty crowded, but that meant there was a snow cone place by the beach and so we had these delicious snow cones and sat in our beach chairs (came with the AirBnb) and read our books, ate snow cones and watched the sunset. It was incredible. 

This day was so magical. The perfect amount of fun/adventure balanced with beaches, books, snowcones, and relaxing. 

After we watched the sunset, we watched the turtles climb up onto the beach to rest for the night. 

Last thing we did was stop at DaCrack and get some tacos and take those back to our hotel and eat. With everything all day we just felt like we did exactly what we wanted to do and loved having a day that we could just make things up as we went.