Kauai Bound - Friday

May 23 2008

Off to Waimea Canyon. This was such a pretty drive. We stopped at the Hanapepe Lookout along the highway. This was just a warmup of things to come. We drove up Highway 550 which is Waimea Canyon Drive. This is not the road that they direct you to take, it is the highway just before and it was recommended in the Ultimate Kauai book so we took that instead. We were going to stop at the Pu'u Ka Pele Lookout but we missed it. This is where Pele leapt from Kauai while being chased by her sister Na-maka-o-kaha'i for stealing her husband. These stories are just so cool. We will have to go back on the next trip. You can see Waipo'o Falls from the road though. Our first stop was Waimea Canyon Lookout. While not on the scale of the Grand Canyon, it is more stunning. After this we stopped at the Pu'u Hinahina Lookout. You can see the Canyon Trail across the valley from here. We saw people walking along the ridge and thought they must be crazy. We walked across the parking lot over to the Ni'ihau overlook but it was too cloudy to see across the channel. Yet another reason to come back. Next we were off to the Koke'e Museum. While there we bought a trail map. The lady behind the counter told us to take the trail to the falls but if we were going to the Kalalau Lookout we should do that first before the clouds roll in and obscure the view. That is what we did but we didn't make it in time. Supposedly the clouds roll in and out so if you wait awhile it may clear up. We waited about 10 minutes and decided to leave so we could get our hike in before it got too late. We figured we would come back later in the week and drive straight to the lookout. Back down the valley to the trailhead for the hike to Waipo'o Falls. This was a tough hike with lots of ups and downs on a wet, muddy trail since it had rained the day before. We got to the portion of the trail where we were on the ridge that you can see from the Pu'u Hinahina Lookout. Who's crazy now?! This is an amazing view point. You feel so small being below the top of the canyon. After you turn the corner when you descend the ridge you hike down a narrow trail to a small water fall with a pool below. Even though it was gorgeous we were a little disappointed. We thought there was going to be a larger water fall at the end. Then we started thinking we made a wrong turn somewhere since this definitely is not what you can see from the highway. Found out later there is another trail that goes to the larger drop of the falls and that this is basically the beginning of the falls. I was a little irritated that I had to keep taking hits off the inhaler. There was no vog so it must have just been the elevation. So then we had to look forward to the long trek back to the car. We were actually whistling the song from Bridge on the River Kwai on the way back. Gotta have a sense of humour. Of course on the way back I slip in a patch of mud and leaves my feet come our from under me and land right on my ass. Luckily we both had worn trasher clothes. I figured I would now have a pair of "Red Dirt" swim shorts. On the way out we were almost back to the trailhead when we came across a couple hiking in. They were dressed to the nines in white shorts and tennis shoes with nice shirts. They had that back east either Philly or Jersey accent. They were going to hike the trail with one bottle of water between the two of them. We told them that it was a hot tough hike and that they were going to get dirty. In that cocky eastern way they told us they could handle it. This is bad karma but I hope they slipped and ruined their clothes! We had sandwiches from Grinds in Hanapepe waiting for us in the car. We also had a very persistent rooster trying to snake our grub. We had to keep shooing it away. I really thought it was going to start chasing me like that stupid Thai junglefowl the parents used to have that chased me every time I went over there. Of course after a hot and tiring hike you need to reward yourself with a nice frosty shave ice! So we hit Jo Jo's once again. I chickened out on the Halo Halo even though there were a ton of people ordering it. We ended up with another Tropical Rainbow to split. When will I learn to either get the bigger size or order my own? This really is the best thing ever invented. We had some rain again in the afternoon but we just hung out and rested after oure eventful day. We had quesadillas for dinner then took a walk over to the Sheraton for sunset. They had a luau going at the Sheraton that you could hear all the way over to our place. I told Matt that I couldn't belive people were paying $85 to get rained on when they could go to the Polynesian Cultural Festival in Lihue for $10. We saw some turtles off the beach on the way back. We spent the rest of the night watching the visitor channel and reading before crashing early thanks to the long hike.