We do love helicopters……

 

Indeed, we really enjoy helicopter rides….  They are cool and they bring you places you can’t get to otherwise.  And they fly next to rainbows………..

So we left early (again - indeed, like every day on this trip), in the morning showers.   

By the time we got to the heliport, a full rainbow was a sign of good things to come. 

The weather in Kauai consists of many microclimates.  The top of the mountain, at 5243 feet, is almost always in the rain, and almost never visible (indeed, we did not see it, our guide says it is only clear about 10 days per year).  So the valleys that are fed by all that rain are extremely lush and green, and waterfalls come out of every cliff.  

But then, in the areas on the other side of the mountain, there is hardly any rain, and you get to see the “Grand Canyon of Hawaii”, with its dry slopes.

That is also a good way to see the many layers of lava that have accumulated for a couple millions of years, before the volcano went extinct.  

The most dramatic, and probably most photographed, area of Kauai is the west coast, with its dramatic cliffs, that are at some point over 3000 feet high.  

The colors, shear magnitude, and carvings made by the sea are spectacular, and hard to convey in just a couple of pictures.  

We then flew over the north coast, where all the fancy people live - that’s where Zuckerberg has his estate, with it’s large underground bunker…..

It is pretty, but then again, all of Kauai is pretty….

On the way back, we flew over the agricultural area: coffee and cattle ranching have replaced sugar cane in the last 20 years. (This is a coffee plantation). 

We are on the South shore, and the beach is quite spectacular: it is a little cove surrounded by sea carved lava cliffs.

So after our helicopter ride, I walked to the east side, which is very rugged, and provides a great view of the surf and the magnificent power of the ocean.  There are some houses built right on top.  It must be very beautiful, and very noisy up there, because that surf was pounding!!!

In the pools left by the waves, you can find many of these tiny shells:  these are used by the native population to make traditional necklaces that are sold for more than $10,000 these days….. (It takes many shells….) 

On the west side of the beach, the cliffs have a different texture (I don’t know why).  The water is very clear and I saw several large turtles swimming in the surf.  They did not seem to mind the big waves at all.  It was up bit windy up there…..

The waves are great for dramatic landscapes, and for surfing, but I got quite tossed around when trying to get in for a dip….  (The amount of sand that came out of my hair and bathing suit when I hit the shower was impressive!)

So I gave up and instead went in the hotel “lagoon” to recuperate with some “liquid aloha”…..The lagoon is man made but sea water fed and very pleasant. The hotel has MANY water features, including a bunch of pools, a lazy river, waterfalls, koi ponds, water slides….  It is honestly a bit decadent, bordering on the ostentatious, but, I will not lie, it is also very pleasant.  So after my toss in the ocean, I sat with Joe by the lagoon - me with a Margarita, he with a Mai Tai, and just enjoyed it.  (More pictures of pools and water features at end of the blog).

There are of course many birds on the property:  the egrets stalk the tourists and follow them around, begging for food.  

I think this is a golden plover - which I had not seen previously.

There are also large parrots in the atrium (these are real)…. As I said,,,  a bit ostentatious, but nice.  

I went to the beach near sunset hoping to see some turtles coming in for the night 

 

 I did not,  

 but the light was lovely..

We then had a great dinner with some of our traveling companions and are now ready for bed for another early morning start off to Maui!

Here are more pictures of all the water stuff at the hotel.

Green and red all over…

 

We flew to Kauai early in the morning, from the tiny Kona airport (it’s cute, everything is outside.  Not sure what they do in a storm…).

We flew over Waikiki, and if you really look carefully, you can see where we stayed there and the Diamond Head volcano!.  We landed on the island of Kauai, AKA - the garden island.  Geologically, it is the oldest of the islands in the archipelago, at about 2 millions years:  since then, the tectonic plates have slowly but surely moved it away from the hot spot that has created all the volcanoes (and thus all the islands), so that it has had plenty of time to transform the lava into red sand, and the landscape into a tropical explosion of green. (Interesting side note:  a new island is being formed as we speak, and will in time replace the Big Island as the newest on in the archipelago, but it still needs to grow about 13,000 feet before breaking the surface of the pacific).

We drove along the coast first to a waterfall, and an overlook:  this is the only navigable river in all of Hawaii.  It is 15 miles long and a favorite of kayakers.  It starts in the central mountain, which is the wettest place on earth- it rains up to 600 inches/year, which, among other things, ensures that the water fall is always flowing.   

We stopped for lunch at an old sugar plantation (all commercial sugar production stopped in the 1990’s), where the old mansion is now a restaurant.  

We started with MaiTai’s - it was only 11:00am, but - they still extract their own sugar cane juice and make their own rum - so it would have been rude not to!.

They still grow sugar cane, but only for local rum and restaurant production.  They even still have the donkeys that were so important to the trade.  They are quite well…… endowed?   

Lunch was accompanied with local music and hula dancing, and I embarrassed myself by learning a few hula moves….  My hips just don’t move that way…..

We next headed to the National Botanical Garden, where we had a great tour of the gardens (first owned by queen Emma, and then purchased by one of the sugar magnates.  

It shows a lot of the original gardens, and beautiful water features, but its aim is really to preserve local plants and provide an environment for critically endangered local birds- this is one of them (Gallinula) -  All of the birds I’ve shown so far, while interesting, have been brought to the island from Asia at some point.  

That includes the chickens - which are EVERYWHERE!  The pretty Asian painted ones were already all around when a big hurricane hit in 1992, destroying most of the domestic chicken coops.  Since then, they have cross bred with the Asian ones and feral chickens are everywhere you look.  Some are very pretty!

In the botanical garden, they also had this pair of Muscovy ducks - one of which was brought here as a gift 9 years ago, the other one just showed up 2 years ago, so they just kept it.  He follows the tourists, hoping for crumbs….

The gardens are very lush, even though they are in the “rain shadow” of the mountain - meaning it doesn’t rain much there.  But there is so much rain on the mountain that irrigation is very easy, thus the many water features, including my favorite,- this reflective pool.  

Of course my favorite part was the huge banyan trees!  They were planted in 1950 and are just  magnificent.  I also love the little gecko at the top of the blog….  And this one too…..

On the way back, we got a good look at the valley where the gardens are,

and the stopped by a blow hole by the ocean just at the bottom of the cliff.  The sea is rough on this side of the island - so the blow hole blows quite consistently.  

At last, we made it to our hotel, by the ocean in Koloa.  It is very pretty and we will have more time to explore tomorrow.  We had drinks and a lovely dinner at the terrace restaurant.  

Here are two other birds we saw:  A black crested night heron, and an Erckel’s Francolin.

And here are a few more pictures of the garden (I particularly liked that bamboo trail).