Kauai
7 January 2007
Valerie and I took a brief Christmas vacation (without the kids) to Kauai, the
Garden Isle. If you ever go to Kauai, or anywhere in Hawaii, we recommend
the guide books from wizardpub.com.
There are plenty of books about Hawaii but these are the best.
Between the book and geocaching, we could have stayed busy for a
couple weeks. Unfortunately we only had three days.
Many visitors, after a long flight from the mainland, arrive in Kauai
ready to check in to their resort and lay on the beach for the rest of
the day. Our flight was much shorter and we decided the beaches
could wait. We arrived early in the morning, rented a Jeep and
headed off in search of our first geocache. We geocached for the
majority of the day while touring the island and exploring Waimea
canyon.
Besides the sweeping vistas and amazing waterfalls, we were also struck
by how much dirt Kauai has. I guess we've grown accustomed to the
lava rock of the Big Island. Being an older island, the jungles
of Kauai have had more time to make dirt. Sticky, muddy, red dirt
that gets everywhere and is horribly slippery after a rain. We
were hiking to a "secret" waterfall in the jungle when we decided we
had to turn back because the trail was too steep and muddy.
Age has also given Kauai plenty of time to develop beautiful sandy
beaches. On the west side of the island the sand stretches 300
feet across with 100 foot sand dunes. You could hike along the
sand for 20 miles and hardly see any other people. We drove our
Jeep right onto the beach. There are no protective reefs and the
surf was 8-10 feet the day we were there so the strong rip currents
kept us out of the water. That's ok, we have plenty of time for
beaches back home. Snorkeling is generally better on the Big
Island anyways.
Instead of swimming at the beach, we rented a kayak and paddled up the
Wailua river. Valerie's not fond of boats but by the end of the
trip she decided that kayaks aren't so bad. Somebody should place
some geocaches that are only accessible from the river. The rope
swing would be a great place for a geocache. We were there in the
morning so we had the place to ourselves. It was great.
On our last day we had a little time before our flight left so we
stopped to watch a cruise ship leave port. We were at the edge of
the pier with several local fishermen when some guy came running up
yelling "Stop the ship! Stop the f**king ship! You have two
more!" Apparently he and his girlfriend hadn't been watching the
time closely enough. He was so worked up it looked like he was
going to jump in the water and swim for it. Needless to say, the
captain did not throw the ship into reverse for this guy. We saw
him and his girlfriend again an hour later at the airport.
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