Kaua'i - Our Anniversary Trip

In June Matt and I will have been married 10 years. We've always wanted to do a Hawaii trip on our anniversary, so a couple months ago Matt surprised me with a booked trip to Kaua'i, Hawaii. We have some great friends, the Beckstrands that were all over the idea too, so they came with us to make it even more of a party! We arranged the sitters for the kids and we were off! Thanks so much to our family that helped with the kids - WE LOVE YOU!



We arrived in Hawaii in the evening and went to get our rental car. Matt and Brant went to get the rental car. Matt gave a warning to us that it was going to be tight because he reserved the cheapest car available - a Geo Metro or something equal. Well, the boys came to pick us up in a 4 door Jeep Wrangler - with the top down - What a way to start off the vacation - and yes it was totally worth it. The first stop was Costco, which Matt had researched before, so we could stock up on snacks and goodies. We then headed to the city of Poipu to our hotel The Sheraton.



First thing we did the next morning was wake up at like 4am. Yes we were a little confused with the time over there. It worked out great though because Matt and I headed for our daily run. Not knowing really where we were going, we asked the fellow at the front desk where we should go. He directed us to the Spouting Horn, which is a natural ocean blow hole. It was a PERFECT run. Along the beach road with waves crashing, bright stars and the fact that we were running at sea level was amazing.



The first day of our vacation we headed for the beach. Our friends had told us about a secret beach that not many people know about - only the locals. We headed over there. We felt like we were on our own oasis. We had to play mission impossible to get there (passed over some private property) but we made it there. One thing that is great about Hawaii is that there are no private beaches. No one can say a thing to you if you are on the beach. The water was a perfect temperature and very clear. We basically just chilled for the day. We rented some snorkeling gear for the week and covered a lot of ocean with it.





Kauai is known for rain. You're pretty much guaranteed to get some rain - depending on where you are on the island. Day 2 presented just that. We didn't let it damper our plans at all though. We cruised around the island in the jeep to get to know it a little better. We were amazed. We drove to a town called Princeville, on the other side of the island. This is where the famous Na'Pali coast starts. We toured a couple of hotels and went to our favorite one the St. Regis. It was beautiful. As we are sitting there looking around you can see whales in the distant ocean blowing water and breaching from the water. It was amazing. We rented a volley ball at the St. Regis and played volleyball for a while. We then hiked around the beaches and chased the crabs that were all over the place.



If you look closely in this picture you can see a whale in the distance that was breaching. Matt was lucky enough to get some shot of him.




Here's a picture of a local on his paddle board. They guys were loving the big waves.


This was one of our favorite grill/sandwich shops we found. We like it so much, we ate lunch here twice!


We then decided to hike up the Na'Pali coast to Hanakapia beach and then on to Hanakapia waterfall. It was a very rugged 8 mile hike. To make things worse, it had rained for most of the morning there so the trail was very muddy and slippery. We had to cross the raging Hanakapia river. This was kind of nerve racking because the water was to our chest at places. We made it just fine however - we even saved a group of people at the lower river. They thought they couldn't cross because of the river, but we helped them - they were pretty grateful.





We made it all the way to the top.


On day three, it was a little rainy again. We decided to head up to Princeville because we weren't able to see everything we wanted to. We headed to famous light house and then to a place called the Queen's Bath. Both places were gorgeous!




Our favorite restaurant!


This was the Queen's Bath. It is said that the Queen used to used this area for her bath - hence the name... The waves were so huge and powerful.








We found a cute shack along the coast that rented us some bicycles. We headed up and down the trail - so fun - so relaxing.






Matt taking pics of Brant and Nikki


Picture credit for this goes to Nikki - Nice Shot!


The best thing about Hawaii is the sunsets - We took every opportunity to watch them...






A picture credit to Brownie (just so we don't get sued ;))