Kauai Adventures: Wrapping it up--July 22nd-23rd

Thursday was our last full day in Kauai. We decided to relax away and did lots more reading, both finishing another book and lounged by the pool in front of the beach. After a pedicure (my first in a decade at least) we watched our last sunset and grabbed some pizza from the Tiki Man pizza joint to finish out the evening.

The next morning, we set our alarms early so we could enjoy our last morning to the fullest. We got breakfast from the Napali Cafe and headed outside to a private dining cabana. Usually, people have to pay around $600 to enjoy a private dinner in the cabana right on the beach. However, this morning, it was early and no one was around! So, we ate our fresh fruit, yogurt, croissants, Kona coffee and watched the rain come in, followed by the sun, of course making rainbows over Hanalei Bay as we said good-bye! After we checked out of our hotel, we made one last trip to Hanalei for more shave ice and a happy for Luke and Charlie. Then it was off to the airport after exploring a little more of the island.

We are so incredibly thankful to our parents, who stayed with our boys for us while we were gone! Chad and I know they had a wonderful time--such a treasure of time for them! We love you Moms and Dads!

And for any of you thinking of a honeymoon, a babymoon, a special anniversary or ANY trip for that matter, come talk to us----we will talk you into going to Kauai!! Thank you Beth and Peter for talking us into it---we had such a fabulous 10th anniversary!

Our Hawaiian sunsets

As the sun is setting on our last days in Hawaii (boy am I cheesy or what?) I thought I'd share some of the beautiful sunsets we were able to enjoy! Chad and I were in awe every single day and night of just how awesome the Lord is--especially as the Creator and painter of the ending to our days in Kauai! Enjoy and double click on any of them! And--if you aren't utterly sick of all of our stories and pics, stayed tuned for one more post as we wrap up our trip!

Amen!!

Kauai Adventures: Days 4&5--July 20th, 21st

On Tuesday we woke up and had breakfast on the 4th floor lanai. Chad read us the newspaper and updated me on current-ish events. We then lounged by the pool/beach and read the rest of the morning and early afternoon before heading back up for our massages at 3pm. Definitely the favorite pregnancy massage I've ever had--so comfy! We met in the relaxation room, complete with waterfall walls surrounding us and read some more! We then showered up to get ready for our special dinner night at the world famous Kauai Grill! Can I just say Melt. In. Your. Mouth? It was absolutely delicious. Hearts of palm and coconut salad, bacon wrapped shrimp, Ono (fish) sweet and sour and Scezhuan encrusted Ahi--one of the best dinners we've ever had!!! Oh, and I had a mint pineapple drink to go along with my meal--yummy too!

The next morning we woke up and drove in to Hanalei to grab some snorkel gear and get breakfast from Java Kai--a delicious and funky coffee/breakfast joint in town. So good. We then made our way to Ke'e Beach for our big hike up the Kalaui Trail---a grueling 11 mile hike, intended for some serious hikers. There are several other enticing points on the trail like Hanapali Beach and some waterfalls down the trail, but we only made it to the beach. Actually I only made it just 20 minutes short of the beach. I was feeling fine and hanging in on the hike, but it was the people returning from the beach up a steep and in the middle of sun part of the trail that started scaring me. I asked a couple of people their thoughts on me returning, and they thought I should just turn around. Completely bummed that Chad and I decided I might need to wait until our next trip, I turned back and let Chad head to the beach to see the views, etc. Anyway, when all was said and done, it was a 4 mile hike that took several hours. AND--it was completely worth it---just for the sweat and exercise alone, but the sheer beauty of seeing the Napali Coast was amazing!! No one can drive on the Napali Coast--it can only be seen by foot, air or boat, so we were so happy we hiked it!

During our hike and after it, we fueled up with bananas, beef jerky and water--normally not a great combo, but perfect to give us the energy to survive! Chad was amazing because not only did he do the hike, but he carried my big camera, our bags of food and water (since we didn't have a backpack) and our snorkel gear because we thought we might snorkel at the end of the hike at Ke'e Beach. All of it on him, up and down the steep, rocky trail! My hero!! It turns out we were told that the snorkeling would be much better at Tunnels Beach. So, we drove back to Tunnels Beach. I was pretty ragged after the hike, not thinking I could walk another step, so I chilled on a towel while Chad went out to snorkel. After a little bit he came back in and I thought we were going to head back to the hotel. However, he mentioned that he swam with a sea turtle!!! That completely changed my mind and I could not leave without trying to snorkel with sea turtles! So I mustered up some energy and we headed back in the water! How we wish we had underwater cameras! The fish were beautiful--all different colors and patters AND we saw a whole family of sea turtles---right in front of us. We could have touched them if we wanted to! It was awesome!!! I'm SO thankful Chad came back telling me what he saw and convinced me to go in---it was one of the highlights of our trip!

Finally, completely tuckered out and not having had lunch, we drove back through Hanalei and ate our lunch at 5, grabbing some Bubba Burgers and Hawaiian shave ice---something I HAD to do on our trip! Delicious and refreshing. And I'm wondering as I'm writing this how we even had the energy, but after we got back to our room, we still managed to shower and go back down for yet another, beautiful sunset---what would be the prettiest of our trip (a sunset post to come too)!

Hawaiian rainbows!

Over the course of our trip, we saw 21 rainbows! We saw multiple rainbows everyday except one I think. Absolutely beautiful and often, they took my breath away. We even saw a full-on double rainbow! (Okay, maybe it wasn't full-on, but have you seen that YouTube video circling around yet? Too funny!) I had a conversation with Luke recently about rainbows and trying to find the ends of rainbows. I'd never actually seen the end of a rainbow, but on this trip, we saw the ends of them and even once, saw the both ends of the same rainbow, in Hanalei Bay! Luke was thrilled to hear our rainbow count when we got back home! My friend, Betsy, has asked me since our return if that meant it rained a lot while we were there. Actually it rained almost everyday for a quick 5-10 minute shower, but mainly in the early mornings over the mountain range in front of us, so we woke up to rainbows, but the rain never stopped our plans! Perfect!! God's promise to us was everywhere!! I tried blowing these pictures up for you, but the format of this post cut too much of the rainbows off. You can, however, double click to see the pictures x-large!

Kauai Adventures: Day 3--July 19th

We had our last breakfast at our condo, out on our lanai, while observing our 8th rainbow of the trip thus far(I have a rainbow post coming)! We headed down one last time to Hideaways Beach and once again, I survived the trek! We watched the ocean and the silly, scared crabs and just soaked in the North Shore of Kauai!

Finally, we said goodbyes to Pali Ke Kua and headed less than a mile down the road to the St. Regis hotel (a 5 star hotel)! It was quite intimidating just walking in the lobby--so fancy schmancy! We unpacked in our room, which was fabulous---a huge window with sliding doors that opened to a screen, but one that could also open all the way up! Our new view was gorgeous like our old one, but we were even closer to Bali Hai! Here are some pics from our window at our new place overlooking Hanalei Bay. . .

After we observed our view, we made some reservations for massages the next day and headed down pool/oceanside! We ordered lunch and it was delivered to us pool/oceanside and we ate and read and relaxed! We were getting spoiled by the second! That night we ate at the Makana Terrace, a restaurant at the hotel, which was delicious. If I could remember the details of the food--you would be salivating, trust me! The ambiance was perfect--we were under a covered porch, right next to a fountain/pool type thing and it started raining---just beautiful!! A great way to end the day!

Kauai Adventures: Day 2--July 18th

We woke up this morning and while Chad went for a run on Hideaways Beach (up and down and all around) I chose to sit on our lanai and enjoy more rainbows while eating breakfast alone--I mean with the Hawaiian state bird, the Nene, who came right up to the table looking for some Cheerios! We then got ready and drove to Tunnels Beach (a beach that was recommended and ended up being our favorite) and the dry caves. Everything there was so beautiful and lush! The blues and greens were amazing!

Chad was convinced the waves were screaming his name and so he went out to body surf and brought back LOTS of the beach to the condo. He had sand in places he never thought anyone could!

We had such a fun time there and even bought a house. . .

Okay, well, we haven't bought it yet, but we are going to because of these views. . .

Okay, well, we probably can't afford it, but you want to buy it too, right?? After our beach outing, we drove back through Hanalei on our way back to our condo in Princeville and grabbed some lunch. We then showered up and took a walk over to the St. Regis hotel  to check in (we will be staying there the rest of the trip). We rented a movie there, and brought it back to our condo, for later that night, since there are no Blockbusters or movie rental places to be found anywhere near us on the island. We went back to Hanalei (you think we like this place?) to grab an early dinner so we could be back to read outside and enjoy our last Kauai sunset from our condo. Chad took a picture of me, little baby, sunset and Bali Hai and I got him holding the sun! We were a little delirious--all the fresh air and God's amazing creation!!

Kauai Adventures: Night and Day 1

We arrived in Kauai late Friday afternoon and after about a 45 minute drive to our Pali Ke Kua condo, we arrived just in time for our first Kauai sunset! We enjoyed the view we would have for 2 more days (before we moved to the St. Regis hotel) and then decided to drive to Hanalei, which turned out to be our favorite little chill town for the rest of the week! I marveled at the one lane Hanalei bridge and the driving etiquette that was posted on a sign before the bridge--so cute and such a sleepy, fun, relaxed town! We went back to our condo and hit the hay to get ready for our first real day in Kauai!

We woke up on Saturday at 6am--partly because our bodies told us it was 11am and partly because our bedroom had 2 huge windows on 2 walls with the bright sunlight streaming in! Our first rainbow was waiting for us too---not a bad way to wake up! We decided to hike down to our condos' beach, Hideaways Beach, and check it out! Chad likes to call it a .01 mile walk down to the beach but a 3 mile hike back up! The beach was beautiful and filled with lava rocks and skittish crabs, but the journey back up was not for the faint of heart---or a 30 week pregnant woman!! What a workout!!

After getting showered up for the day we headed to the Kilueau Lighthouse--the western most lighthouse in the US and also a humpback whale sanctuary, which we enjoyed because we knew Luke would love to hear that! We then drove to a hole in the wall burger joint, Duane's Ono Burgers---a place we heard not to miss and enjoyed some declicious burgers! Craziest thing there were the chickens that were walking all around our feet as we ate. We found out later on our trip, that chickens and birds are everywhere in Kauai---about as common as beautiful Hawaiian flowers, sunsets and rainbows! We also checked out another beach--Moloa'a Beach and chilled there for a bit before we saw some rain clouds moving in and headed to our condo.

Our lanai (porch) at our condo was fantastic. It was right on the edge of a cliff and our views of the Pacific and the Makana Mountain range (the jagged part of the range is known as Bali Hai--from the movie South Pacific) were incredible! I found myself in a love affair with Bali Hai, wanting to capture it in every photo and just feeling a sense of peace wash over me when I looked at it---which was the entire trip!! We enjoyed another pretty sunset that evening and realized that it would be something we would do every night in Kauai!