In case you missed it, I shared Part One of our Kauai Adventures
earlier this week. The post started getting so crazy long that I had to split
it into two posts to keep from overwhelming you (… and me).
Here’s Part One: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday
Let’s pick up where we left off…
Sunday
On Sunday it was another sunny and beautiful day so we
decided to head East and North. We started out by following the signs to the
Opaeka’a Falls. There was a nice little parking lot for us to stop in and we
walked over to the viewing areas to catch sight of the falls.
It was so beautiful and quiet. We hopped back in the jeep to
go find the Wailua Falls, which had a much busier lookout area. There were cars
and jeeps packed on the small road that took you to overlook the falls and lots
of people selling fruit and food. We ended up buying some white Sugarloaf
pineapple, which was absolutely delicious. We also got a homemade
mochi/rum/pineapple cake thing that a nice German lady was selling. What can I
say, eating random road food is what you do in Kauai!
Here is our view of Wailua Falls:
After visiting the falls, we decided to keep going North to
visit the little town of Hanalei. As soon as we got to the North side of the
island it got humid and would rain on us every 45 minutes or so. We walked
around the town a bit and then decided to work our way back towards Poipu. We
ended up stopping to see the Kiluea Lighthouse.
We also got a delicious taco lunch from a random food truck.
We ended the day with yet another visit to Puka Dog (what can I say, they are
so good!) and topped ourselves off with a visit to Lepparts Ice Cream.
Monday
We had another lazy coffee and HGTV morning on Monday with
another serving of Little Fish Coffee acai bowls for breakfast. From there we
grabbed our beach chairs and set out for a beach we saw on the way to Spouting
Horn. We did some beach sitting and snorkeling for a bit and just enjoyed the
quiet. We grabbed lunch at Savage Shrimp and then showered and prepared for our
evening adventure… a sunset cruise of the Napali coast!
We went through Holo Charters, which offered a sunset dinner cruise. We shared the catamaran with a couple dozen guests and enjoyed snacks on our way out from the island. There was a little rain and fog here and there, but mostly it was cool and calm.
The views were absolutely beautiful. There were cliffs and
caves and waterfalls. There were even mountain goats climbing up on the sides
of cliffs and pretty much defying gravity. At about the halfway point, the crew
served us dinner – all the makings for some homemade tacos, with fresh
pineapple on the side and cookies for dessert. There was an open bar too with
local beers and Mai Tais. The return ride was breathtaking.
And then the sun went down:
We couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful night!
Tuesday
On Tuesday we decided that we wanted to do a fancy dinner
for our last night, which meant that we had to buy a nice shirt for Travis to
wear. Everyone on the island sports Hawaiian shirts, so we decided to venture
out to buy one for him. We stopped at the Hawaiian Trading post and they had
some silly photo opportunities outside:
From there we visited Old Koloa Town and stopped by the Fish
Market for an authentic and delicious poke bowl:
Travis and I are both fans of sushi, so the poke bowl was so
delicious to us! From there we hit up a pie shop that we had driven past a few
times and had some mini pies for dessert. THEN, we went rum tasting at the Kauai
Rum Company.
To do a tasting in the Rum Company Tasting Room is free, you
just have to be 21 years old or order. We tasted: Koloa Kauai Dark Rum, Koloa
Kauai Gold Rum, Koloa Kauai Spice Rum, Koloa Kauai Coconut Rum, Koloa Kauai
Coffee Rum, and Koloa Hawaiian Pineapple Passion Rum Cocktail Punch.
Travis has a stomach condition, so he can’t really drink
hard alcohol (only beer and wine), so he would basically stick his tongue in
the rum to try it and then I’d drink both our shots. We were being sneaky about
it so that nobody got annoyed, but apparently the couple next to Travis was
giving me the hairy eyeball for being a rum glutton. My favorites were the
Coconut Rum and the Coffee Rum and Travis really liked the Pineapple Passion
Rum Cocktail Punch.
After rum, we got yet another shave ice. This time it was a
snow ice from Uncle’s Shave Ice. It was really cool how every single place we
tried had a different take on the shave ice. I, of course, loved them all.
For our fancy anniversary dinner we went to Keoki’s Paradise (find it here) . We went online to reserve a table and put in the notes that we were celebrating our anniversary. They had a live band and the food was AMAZING. There was a poke appetizer, fish and scallops’ risotto for me, a double fish meal for Travis, and their famous Hula Pie for dessert. They surprised us with the hula pie for our anniversary and it was an amazing end to a delicious dinner.
Also, Travis looked awfully cute in his Hawaiian shirt.
Wednesday
After having a super relaxing and amazing week, I woke up on
Wednesday feeling rather horrible. Something hit me stomach bug-ish, so we just
spent the morning hanging around the condo, watching HGTV and drinking a ton of
water. We packed up and drove to the airport to return our jeep and jump on the
1pm plane.
The first 5-hour plane ride was absolutely miserable for me.
I felt a combo of nauseous and feverish, so I basically was just trying to keep
myself together and not vomit. I had some ginger ale and basically dabbed my
forehead with ice water for 5 hours.
We got off the plane in LA and had a 90-minute layover, so
Travis had a terrible airport burger and I slowly drank a coke. We hopped on
another 5-hour flight – this one a red eye – which would take us back to
Maryland. I was feeling a little better by this point. I was still nauseous but
the feverish feeling was gone.
And THEN.
In the middle of the night while everyone on the plane was
trying to sleep.
A MAN VOMITED 4 times on the 5-hour flight.
He didn’t even bother to get up from his seat. He just got
out his sick bag, loudly vomited and then went back to whatever else he was
doing. So. Gross. Even if I had not been fighting back the pukeys for the last
10 hours, it would have made me ill listening to him. I can’t believe he didn’t
take his dang butt to the bathroom to do it there. But instead just did it
WHILE SITTING NEXT TO STRANGERS.
Ew.
Thank god he was on the other side of the aisle from me.
But, really. EW.
I am happy to say I was NOT sick on the plane coming home.
We landed around 6 am Maryland time (that 6-hour time change really bit us on
the return), scooped up Jack and Ollie from my parent’s house on our way by,
dropped Jack at school and then went straight into our house and took a 5-hour
nap.
All in all, it was an absolutely wonderful trip. It was
relaxing and exciting and fun and romantic. Basically everything I hoped it
would be! The only thing we didn’t fit in was going to a luau, but considering
that we did everything else – well, so much stuff it took up two blog posts – I
feel like we really crushed the whole grown up vacation thing.
I think I covered
everything, but I’m sure there are bits I forgot here in there. Do you have any
questions about our Kauai adventures?
