Honeymoon Blog: Day 5

Thursday 6/30

After a quick breakfast, we headed back to the North Side of the Island to hike the famous Na Pali Coast. We figured we should get the inside view before we take the catamaran on Saturday! We arrived and found a spot relatively easily. We started the hike on the Kalalau trail and were instantly rewarded with breathtaking views of ocean, the beaches below, and the coast line. After 2 miles, and exactly an hour, we made it to the first stop,  the Hanakapi’ai Beach. We had brought our snorkel gear, but after seeing a sign the said “Do not go near the water, the unseen current has taken many visitors lives” which also had over 40 tallys to indicate these deaths, we decided to stay close to shore, though other people were not as smart. We had a quick lunch here then headed up the mountain for another 2 mile hike to the Hanakapi’ai Falls. 

The trail to the falls was nothing like the trail to the beach. We had to cross 4 streams, trek through mud, and dodge low trees along the way. This took us about and hour and fifteen minutes. Elise’s boots, needless to say, are thoroughly broken in. Once we reached the falls, it was totally worth it! They were beautiful. Connor even swam in the pool the falls had created. It was not as secluded as our previous hikes, but we were able to say aloha to everyone we passed and saw along the way. We ended up flying back, making it back to our car in less than 2 hours total (dropping about a half our off our time to get there). 

The trail head, nicely enough, was right by the best snorkeling beach in Kauai! The Ke’e Beach. We ran  (and by ran I mean barely walked) to our car, grabbed our snorkel gear, and headed out to the reef! We snorkeled over the reef with a clearance of about 5 inches between us and the coral and fish. Once we reached the other side, which we probably should not have gone out that far, we saw two ENORMOUS sea turtles! We could hardly stand it. They bounced along in the waves and current, close enough to touch. After about thirty seconds, they moved on, and we decided it best to head to shore. 

After our excitement of seeing the turtles, we thought we should start the 2 hour long drive back to the hotel, but not until after we stopped at HOT MAMA’s Burritos. We each got a chicken burrito and could not have been happier. 

We arrived back to the hotel, cleaned up, then headed down to the bar to obtain our complimentary champagne. We also decided another Hawaiian pizza was in order, being that we are in Hawaii. After scrounging up a table (hard to come by) and ordering, Con ran back to the room to get Elise a jacket, of course. And being her father’s daughter, Elise saw a couple looking for a table and invited them to join. Bev and Ken were probably about 60 and on their honeymoon as well. It made for great conversation. The pizza was later complementary after a 45 minute wait and the champagne remained free, making it a relaxing night after a solid day of hiking and adventure!