Kauai - Part 2

        

The road we like to call "The Tree Tunnel"

Merry Christmas! What better way to spend the day then driving out to Waimea Canyon? Waimea Canyon is on the west side of Kauai and an easy drive that takes approximately one hour. We read in the guide book about a different way to drive up, but couldn’t manage to figure it out when we were actually there… so we drove up the regular way. The regular way is well signed, you can’t miss it!

Waimea Canyon is aptly nicknamed “The Grand Canyon of the Pacific”. Having never been to the real Grand Canyon (yet) I can’t say if that’s a good nickname, what I can tell you was that it was absolutely beautiful! How amazing to be able to see the ocean and a gigantic canyon like this all on one tropical island! According to my research the canyon is about 14 miles long, one mile wide and 3600 feet deep. We stopped at the main lookout and took some photos and admired the view.

 

   

Then we drove down the road a bit further and looked at the canyon from some other lookouts. At one of the stops we saw little goats wandering along the side of the canyon. You’d be surprised how agile (and cute!) the little things are!

On the drive home we managed to find the other road back which had gorgeous views as you were driving back down towards the ocean. In my opinion it’s actually  better to drive back on that road; this way you get to see both roads, and the scenic road on the way back has the view towards the ocean.

View on the drive back from Waimea Canyon

I wanted to stop at the Shrimp Station in Waimea on the way back home (highly recommended by many), but it was closed because it was Christmas Day. I vowed to come back another day!

The next few days continued with walks, beach trips, reading and laying by the pool. Steve gave Uncle John some boogie boarding lessons, and the rest of us supervised from the beach. 

The lessons...

The Supervisors!

We also went down to the beach in Poipu, by the Beach House restaurant. Our neighbour recommended this as a good snorkeling place to us. I didn’t find it much better than Poipu Beach Park, and there wasn’t much beach to sit on. After looking at the Beach   House restaurant (and remembering I had read about it) we thought we might try to get a reservation. Nope. Still a week left and all the tables are reserved every night if you want to be there at sunset time. So… if you really want to go there during sunset you should make your reservation before you get there! Keep in mind it was Christmas week so perhaps it was busier than usual…

Somehow Steve managed to find a municipal golf course that you can play on for $9 for 9 holes! I am not kidding! If you want to rent clubs it is another $9. If you’d like a power cart $9.   Now that’s a deal!  Here is the best part…if you bring your own clubs, once you play your $9 green fee, you can golf the course as many times as you like for the entire day. Amazing!   

They didn’t think they would be golfing because lots of the courses on Kauai are crazy expensive… but they actually managed to make it out twice to this course in our two weeks in Kauai. Now don’t expect a $150 course for $9, but the whole family enjoyed golfing this course. It’s a Par 72 course (if you do two rounds), lots of room to bring out the driver, well managed and not once did they have any delays.  Oh, and don’t be surprised if a rooster joins you in your golf cart!