One door closes, another opens

FRIDAY....I parked at the complete opposite end of the airport...two terminals away from where we needed to be....but anyways.... Our plane was a little late (30mins) arriving in Kauai. This posed a slight problem as we had to set-up camp. We were supposed to arrive at 6pm with a 30 minute drive and stopping for food. We got McDonald's and set up camp around 8:30pm. There wasn't much to do so we went to bed early. During the evening...we realized that we had setup camp on the beach where little crab creatures lived......

SATURDAY..... I was up at 5:25am and we were off around 6:30am...We drove almost two hours to the other side of the island stopping at the glass sand beach and grabbing breakfast at a local GRINDS place. We checked in at 10am for our Zodiac raft adventure tour of the Na Pali coast. We all agree that this was by far the most fun and we really had a great trip. The Zodiac is a large raft with motors... it held 30 passengers ad two crew. We actually sat on the edge holding onto ropes and with one foot under a rope on the floor (Coast Guard Regulations). It was pretty scary at first, I really thought I might fly out.... but I soon relaxed and enjoyed it. We toured the entire Na-Pali coast past the missile range stopping at secluded beaches to look and other beautiful sights. We also went into some caves.... including one that the captain had to time just right or else we would have been crushed. He said that he is only able to tour that cave like 6 times a month because it has to be just right. During the tour we stopped and jumped into the ocean to snorkel (it was amazing) and had a nice snack on the way back to the harbor.

After that adventure we drove back. We stopped at Waimea Canyon... the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific" it was really cool. We also saw some waterfalls. Once back at camp we took cold showers and headed to Princeville to have dinner. It was another early night for us.

SUNDAY......We slept in a bit (like 7ish). We packed up camp and decided to go have breakfast on the North Shore at Wake Up Cafe. It was a very nice little cafe. After that we went looking for "Queens Bath". "Queens Bath" is a spot in the lava where water pours in and forms a pool. We were able to hike down to the beach and traverse the lava rocks (seeing numerous sea turtles) to the Bath. We waited a bit and were able to have the entire Bath to ourselves.
It was amazing....... After we dried out we headed back to waste time prior to checking into our hotel room. That evening we went to an all you can drink/eat Luau within walking distance of our hotel. We got a great locals rate of $38. Again we were in bed pretty early.

MONDAY.....we were up at 4:30am to catch our flight home....

Over all the best experience here on the island. Kauai is a MUST see.... the REAL Hawaii...