The verdant tropical Island of Kaua’i
Friday 10 May
We’re off to the island of Kaua’i today – so back to Honolulu airport we went, dropped off the Mustang and checked in for our Hawaiian Airlines flight to Lihue. We took off, flew for about fifteen minutes and then started our descent, it was that quick! Set in lush grounds, Lihue airport was easy to negotiate and we were in our Ford Mustang number 2 – a silver one and later model this time – shortly after landing and en route to our hotel. We were too early to be able to check in to our room, so after a quick lunch at the pool café we headed back to the car to make the most of the afternoon.
Kaua’i is known as the Garden Isle thanks to the tropical rain forest covering much of its surface and it was a very picturesque drive to our first stop, the town of Hanapēpē. It was like stepping back in time – historic buildings line the streets, most of them first built more than a century ago when the first Asian immigrant entrepreneurs developed the area. Hanapēpē means “crushed bay” due to the appearance of the cliffs from the sea. Many of the charming plantation-style buildings have been seen on the big screen in films such as “The Thorn Birds” where the Serikawa hotel which was built in 1921 was used to represent the Dungloe Hotel in Queensland, and other buildings have appeared in “Flight of the Intruder” and the Disney animated film “Lilo & Stitch”. It was fun to walk through the little town and admire all the buildings, a good number of them being art galleries and charming craft, gift and book shops, and most of them displaying framed photos and descriptions of the stores they used to be when they were built all those years ago. Luckily for us, from 3pm – 9pm on Friday nights, the town runs an Art Trail, so it was an even more enjoyable experience.
We’re only here for a few days so as we were already on the west side of the island, we took the opportunity to drive to Waimea Canyon, which is also known as the Grand Canyon of the Pacific. It is a large canyon approximately fourteen miles long and up to 3,600 feet deep. It was a very curvy drive up there but on a really excellent road. We weren’t sure what to expect as it was getting late and the sun was peeping in and out behind the clouds. As we parked the car by the road it suddenly got quite misty and we thought we weren’t going to have much of a view at all, but as we walked up to the lookout we were absolutely blown away. There in front of us was this most beautiful panoramic vista of crested buttes, rugged crags, deep valley gorges and waterfalls in the most incredible colours. The canyon has a unique geological history as it was formed not only by the steady process of erosion, but also by the catastrophic collapse of the volcano that created Kaua’i. Like the other Hawaiian islands, Kaua’i is the top of an enormous volcano rising from the ocean floor. With lava flows dated to about 5 million years ago, Kaua’i is the oldest of the large Hawaiian islands. Roughly 4 million years ago, while Kaua’i was still erupting almost continuously, a portion of the island collapsed and this collapse formed a depression which then filled with lava flows. In the time since, rainwater from the slopes of Mount Wai’ale’ale has eroded Waimea Canyon along one edge of the collapse. On the east side of the canyon, the cliff walls are built from thick lava flows that pooled in the depression and over time the exposed basalt has weathered from its original black to bright red. The red colour originates from the basalt rock being very rich in iron minerals. These iron minerals over the millions of years of weathering have oxidised, or rusted, resulting in the red coloured dirt found everywhere in the islands. There you go, a quick geology lesson for you! As you can see from the photos, the colours were spectacular and the mist and sunshine floating around made the colours change by the minute. It really was breathtaking.
Saturday 11 May
Woke up to a rainy day which was definitely not on the agenda, but we were determined to make the most of it and headed out with our planned itinerary to explore the north shore of Kaua’i. However, a doorless helicopter ride and zip-lining were now out of the question. First up was the Daniel K. Inouye Kilauea Point Lighthouse located on the National Wildlife Refuge. The original 31 acres on which the lighthouse stands were transferred from the US Coast Guard when the refuge was originally established in 1985. In1988 it was expanded east to include Crater Hill and Mokolea Point and now covers 199 acres. The Kilauea Lighthouse was dedicated on 1 May 1913 and improved in 1930 when a 200-watt radio beacon was installed and the oil vapour lamp was replaced with an electric one. In 1939 the original clock was replaced with an electric drive eliminating the need to rewind the cable every 3 ½ hours! The lighthouse and radio beacon were turned off for the duration of World War II and the lighthouse was decommissioned in 1976 and replaced with an automated electronic beacon, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. (and that’s a wee sailing connection to the blog for the day!).
The National Wildlife Refuge protects and enhances native bird populations such as the Hawaiian goose and seabirds such as the wedge-tailed shearwater – of which we saw many mating and nesting – the Laysan Albatross and the Red-footed Booby. The shearwaters pretty much covered the side of Crater Hill – all you could see was little white blobs!
Just so you know, Daniel K. Inouye also has Lihue Airport named after him – in 1959 when Hawaii became a state, he served as one of its first congressmen. He was elected as a senator for Hawaii in 1962 and served for 40 years and was the first Japanese American in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.
We had lunch at the Kong Lung Centre in Kilauea which was very timely as the heavens opened and by the time we got back to the car it was deep in rainwater – Geoff had to take his shoes off and paddle into it to open the door which one onlooker seemed to find hysterically funny! Fortunately, by the time we drove further along the coast to Hanalei Bay the weather had started to clear and the skies turned blue and sunny and the beaches looked magnificent with their rolling foamy waves.
Next up was a visit to Limahuli Garden and Reserve, a tropical reserve meaning “turning hands” in Hawaiian. What a treat - the gardens were full of native plants built on agricultural terraces out of lava rock and the colours were so pretty – it was wonderful walking around the paths full of the most beautiful, colourful flora and fauna and little waterfalls.
En route back to our hotel we decided to make the most of the late afternoon sunshine and stop by ōpaeka’aalls. These falls are 151 feet tall and 40 feet wide and cascade down to a hidden pool. The name means rolling shrimp and the falls were quite a sight I can tell you!
Sunday 12 May
Our last day in the Hawaiian Islands – we’re leaving for Vancouver tonight – but fear not, we have a good plan for our last day. Firstly, it’s Mother’s Day today so Geoff treated me to a very delicious lunch in a lovely resort called Timbers – we had a fabulous table on the outside patio with a wonderful view of the lighthouse and Pacific ocean – perfect. We had two more places to knock off before we leave tonight. First up was Kōloa Town – established in 1835 it was Hawai’i’s first productive sugar plantation and has retained a lot of its historical charm with many of the plantation’s original buildings. We had a lovely little browse around the shops – my favourite was the macadamia nut shop which had an endless array of nuts covered in all sorts of flavourings and spreads and the lady in there was very generous with all the sampling, so that was afternoon tea sorted!
Last stop on our Kaua’i holiday was Po’ipū Beach and the Spouting Horn - puhi – it’s a spectacular lava tube that releases huge sprays of water during large swells – it was quite spectacular watching the waves come in and the water shoot up!
We were cruising along in the car on our way back to our hotel where we had left all our baggage to pick up before we went to the airport when I got a text from Hawaiian Airlines informing us that our flight was 90 minutes delayed! Panic – we have a connecting flight to Vancouver tonight which we are going to miss!!!! Geoff put his foot down and we hightailed it back to the hotel, literally threw the luggage into the car, my bag over the top and into the back seat and foot down again, to the airport, which thankfully wasn’t too far from our hotel. Geoff dropped me at the terminal to try and get us booked on the earlier flight whilst he sped around to Alamo car rental to dump the car and jump on the shuttle back. Luckily, I was able to snag us two seats and we got our bags checked in and into security and straight out to the gate just in time – a crisis averted. Let’s hope it’s the only one on this trip!
We’ve had a wonderful 6 days here and seen and done so much on both islands – it’s been full on and so much fun. We have pretty much driven on all roads on both islands! Which leads me to a final comment about the car! Can’t resist including a few photos of us two oldies reliving our youth in the Mustang with the roof off – doing a bit of posing against a beautiful Hawaiian tropical background. I’ve also included a photo of the car at night – this amazing image of a mustang is projected onto the ground when you unlock the door! Very fancy!
Finally, hope you’ve enjoyed these two Hawai’ian blogs, but I tell you something, I won’t miss the typing of them – all these funny symbols and apostrophes on the names have been a nightmare to type!