Kauai we went - Summer of 2019

This WAS a very last minute trip - USCIS uncertainty dates on naturalization, plus expensive plane tickets (cheap ones were all gone earlier in summer).  In fact, we were about to go to Maui, if not because of HA website clunked out on us when paying for the trip ($159/person/way).  As a result, we hopped on the 2nd lowest price, and that was Kauai, flying from OAK though...

Kids knew we were going this time - except that they thought that we were going to Maui at first!  They were really disappointed about the clunked out thing, but they were still thinking of Maui.  Anyhow, let's continue...(work on progress)

Since we flew out from OAK, I gotta admit that SFO is a lot nicer.  Not just the airport, but the planes too.  We weren’t able to select seats until the day before (unlike those flying off the SFO) on the A321 Neo, but its 3+3 arrangement meant that we had to sit separately.  Moreover, there’s no TV screens so everything was running off from our iPads/iPhones.  What is wrong with it you may asked?  Well, no HA safety videos, and we couldn’t play games AND view the screen at same time.

Right off the bat after the plane has landed (and we got our rental car), we went shopping for groceries at Walmart and Safeway.  Now, the last 2 times we went to Kauai, we didn’t really go visit any of the “smaller” shopper centers recommended by Fodor’s Hawaii guide, solely because we were staying just 1 and 4 days.  This time, 11, so we did our homework.  What we didn’t expect was the VERY HOT weather - over 90ºF EVERYDAY!  Thus, instead of getting food, poke, milk or any other groceries, we got Hot Wheels!  Keko’a was kinda upset when there wasn’t any good ones at Walmart, but boy, did he hit the jackpot at Safeway Kapa’a.  Poke at $9.99/lb, but it’s too hot to sit in the car for several hours before we checked in to our resort (plane landed at 10:30 am, reached Safeway around 12 noon, checked in at 4:30 pm).  There’s also ABC Stores (which we got MANY ABC Recyclable shopping bags on Hello Kitty, Gudetama and Doraemon exclusive to Hawai’i), Fun Factory and a Ross Dress for Less store there at the same mall.

Oh, we also went there for Taro pie at MacDonald’s.

Then we went to Foodland RIGHT NEXT plaza for more shopping, before we started our 1st planned visit of the day, at…

Kilauea Light House and Reserve at Kilauea town, Kauai.

We were lucky to make the last guided tour of the day inside the lighthouse at 2:30 pm.  Volunteers pretty much explained why or how it was built - not really for safety reason of boats running aground, but to let airplanes and boats of the time - mostly airplanes - that this is the last land location before flying another 3000 mi to mainland… = crash in the Pacific Ocean due to running out of fuel if planes didn’t land in Honolulu.

Kids also got their Junior “Power” Ranger badge for Kilauea Lighthouse since it’s a State Park.

After we left, we went to Kong Lung Trading Company - recommended by Fodor’s - and that place is kinda nice.  However, it’s not really for everyday shopping as there are several stores at that location and they are pretty tourists focused, both merchandizes and prices…

Drive from Kilauea town to Princeville is quite close, and we went food shopping at Foodland there since resort is just few minutes from there.

Remember what I said earlier about 90ºF?  It was such a blessing when I saw a whole bunch of kids drawing face mask outside of Lappert’s, which is right next to Foodland…so Keko’a and Ma’e Ma’e drew theirs and got their free ice-cream…

We had problem finding the resort at first because the short cut - the only way I knew - was closed.  After we unpacked, we went to the pool - and was disappointed at how small it was.  Oh well, Makai Club Resort really isn’t as nice as it pictures to be.  The place is pretty run down - thin walls and floors, so we heard everything our neighbors did.  In fact, one of them woke up at 4 am and started talking and watching TV.  Next night a guy from downstairs came up to complain about the kids playing (thin floor).  Lots of roaches too.  The BIGGEST PRO?  A/C…(you will see why later - just keep reading).

If you’ve been to Kauai, you know what it’s famous for.  No, not Taro.  So we snapped quite a number of this…

We spent 7 days at North Shores, and of all the things that I haven’t seen, this gotta be #1.  We passed by it DAILY, but because I’m the driver - which means eyes on the road…only my passengers were able to see the water fall by looking sideway.  All I was able to see was the rock stand at the bottom.  This water fall is on a bridge, sloped, on a 1 lane highway and on a curve.  If I was to see it, pretty sure that the vehicle would also see itself testing its safety crash test rating on the rock stand.

We also visited the Longs at Coconut Groove Shopping Center and the Costco at Lihue, and saw 2 things that utterly took us by surprise!  Seeing how exciting Ma’e Ma’e, the Dipping Dots in Kauai is actually cheaper than that from mainland Safeway!  $3.29 vs $3.50!  The special fridge also has special Hawaii prints too!  That also means future Ohana Shave Ice will have 1 fewer thing to sell…

We were looking crazily for Stream Machine at mainland Costco; well, we were looking for clearance price.  They were sold out at the beginning of August at most Costco nearby, but we’re able to find the last batch at the SFO Costco.  On remaining inventory, but at REGULAR price.  Image ho UPSET we’re when we saw THIS…

I almost have the urge to buy all of them in boxes, ship them back to mainland, and resell them for a profit.  People would buy them at $10/pop and it would still be a big steal for the price!

Because there’s really nothing much to do other than snorkeling - for us - in the North Shores, we visited, per Fodor’s, the famous Ching Young Village at Hanalei.  It’s NOTHING spectacular to be honest, just an old shopping plaza, but I guess that the history of it is what makes it famous.  Just your typical tourist stores, a Times Big Save Supermarket, and the famous L&L…ok, that and Chicken & Barrel, which we tried.  If it’s not for the free Pull Pork Sandwich when you order item 1-7 from menu (with a coupon), I wouldn’t have tried it.  Mainly because I ain’t a chicken person, except KFC’s extra crispy (CiaB is more like smoked chicken, hence its name).  Its menu is pricy for cheap travelers like us…well, everything is pricy, but chicken meal for almost $14 is a bit too much.  1/2 chicken with salad and mac…it makes the beef and pork plates (around $17-19) sound cheap!  Since it’s a chicken place - NO FISH on the menu from what I recall.

The infamous HEE FAT is not on Fodor’s, but on the local coupon book.  BEST (price) SHAVE ICE.  EVER!  $3!  5 different syrup favors.  HUGE portion (see from image).  PLUS A FREE ICE-CREAM!  Now that’s what cheap travelers are talking about.  In fact, we went there every other day (at 90ºF+), even when we were living at Poipu later in our trip!

What’s Hawai’i without the rainbow?  From our unit overlooking Napali Coast…barely overlooking…

We went to Haena State Park twice, both to Ke’e Beach.  Had to get up at 3 am in the morning 2 weeks earlier just to sign up from the limited admission (which turned out to be super nice and we didn’t have to look for parking unlike a year ago, and beach was NEVER crowded).  On the way was Haena Beach Park (free) which we snorkeled at the famous Tunnels Beach once (day before Ke’e Beach visit).  To be honest, I don’t get why these 2 beaches are held so highly in places.  Sure, Ke’e was featured on “The Descendants,” but they are small and there’s not too many fish around even with claim weather!  Not to say that they aren’t very good, but top?  Not in my opinion.  One more beach that we visited was the also “famous” Anini Beach, but really, nothing that special in our eyes, and I’ve nothing more to say about it.

RIght across from Haena Beach Park there’s a dry cave, and at Ke’e - steps away - there’s a wet cave, which is currently closed but we “stumped” upon “accidentally” - notice the quotations.  I was actually looking for the latter cave as I wasn’t able to see it on first visit, when I was following all the rules…

They are basically remnants  of lava tubes, with the wet cave filled with bacteria laden water (probably why the State stopped allowing people to get in, but used the “Danger!  Falling Rocks!  Leave Immediately!” warning sign…

BTW, one thing that I tried 1st time since iPhone 6s plus - Panoramic Shots on both XS Max and XR.  Awesome!  It wasn’t as easy to use on the 6s, and I’m guessing that the dual lens have a lot to do with it.

We also visited Kapa’a (top) and Princeville (bottom) Public Libraries during this stay.  Kapa’a must be a not so safe city, because, metal fence and security guard at the entrance of the library?  It’s really old too.  Princeville is much newer, and I’m guessing 1990’s-ish.  Much nicer too!

As I said earlier, there’s not much else to do at North Shores in terms of anything else but snorkeling and hiking, so we drove down to Kapa’a or even Lihue everyday, and we passed by Coco Palms Resort - or whatever remain of it - so sad…

We moved to South Shore - Poipu - on Friday the 16th.  We were hoping to catch the helicopter round the island tour on the way down, but alas, it didn’t have space at the specific time on Friday.  Good thing that happened too; there was some sort of unknown thing happened on the way down and we were stuck in traffic for a long time in Kapa’a/Wailua Bay, right outside of Coconut Market Place (another dead mall in Kauai - pretty all shopping malls/centers are dead malls in Kauai, not counting Ching Young or Kong Lung as these are more tourists specific destinations, EXCEPT…)

The shops at Kukui’ula!  This is the only outdoor shopping mall, well, all shopping plazas/centers/malls in Kauai are outdoors, that does NOT have an empty store space…yet.  It’s also the most Hawaiian themed location out of all of the malls.  Priciest too, as it has pretty much all brand name stores.  The only thing we bought there?  Dipping Dots from Longs!

The resort we stayed at…big mistake to be at in the summer!  Kiahuna Planation & Resort does NOT have AC on all their units.  We stayed at 238 and it felt like 100ºF with the humidity in there.  Although it has a deck toward the makai and hawaiian windows on the door toward the mauka, there’s ZERO draft, despite wind you could feel once you stepped outside the door toward the parking lot (mauka side).  We were all sweating like hogs and there’s only laundry facility on site.

Kids were really looking forward to using the swimming pool which turned out to be 1/2 mile away, as the building of 238 was the furthest from the Poipu Athletic Club.  False advertising there KP&R!  It’s free to use, but we’d to drive there or walk some 15 minutes in 90ºF.  Nevertheless, kids had fun at the water slide.  Another reason why we picked this place was the location to Poipu Beach.  Again, the unit was furthest from it (and we asked for a closer one but the “Deluxe” room we got was where we had to go…yeah right!), so we had to drive some 1.5 mile just to get there (it’s about 0.5 mile just to walk across the resort, up and down a slope, in 90ºF weather).

Our Saturday started off with a trip to Hamura Saiman (tried Dani’s a day earlier because it closed at 11 am on Saturday - it was pretty good at the price).  Frankly, I think that it is overrated…except the Lilikoi Chiffon Pie!  It suffices for a quick lunch…so quick that we finished it before 11 am!  So that means 1.5 hour to kill before our “Deluxe” Round the Island Helicopter Ride by Island Helicopter (as of this writing, I’m still waiting for its replacement on a flash drive that has 60+ of Kauai’s aerial images.  The 1st one was corrupted in the drive).  Where did we go?  Walmart of course, which Keko’a got another haul as the workers were opening NEW BOXES = JACKPOT!  He was so happy not because of the ride, but because of the Hot Wheels.

Weather wasn’t perfect as there was rain at the highest point along Waimea Canyon/Napali Coast, and the low clouds = we weren’t able to see Ni’ihau/Lehua, but it was better once we headed north past Napali Coast as we were able to snap many images of the wonder.

Kids were excited - well, not really for Keko’a; he was falling asleep at the end of the tour because, the night before, he shared his bed with Ma’e Ma’e.  I unlike the last 6 days, was full of energy and wasn’t snoozing off at 1 pm!  They drew the pictures below, celebrating their ride of a lifetime on a chopper.

The ride started about 15 minutes earlier, so we were back on LIH before 2 pm.  To kill the rest of the day, I decided to go to the West for some exploration.  We visited Kauai Coffee Company a 2nd time, which the kids tasted their coffee (Keko’a got a serious headache afterwards!), I bought my T-shirts, Neuf got her 2 bags of Kauai coffee, and all of us got a bunch of stickers.

Kids also decided to get their pennies destroyed.  Now, these pennies were special, because as of this writing, we’ve never seen them again!  Keko’a lost his somewhere that day, so we had to go back a couple of days later to get another.  Ma’e Ma’e lost her the night after we got back “home” - the real home for now (remember we’ll be moving to Hawai’i next year).  She lost it in her bedroom, and we’ve searched 4 days and came up with nothing!  Kids said that it’s the work of Menehune, and I kinda believe it!

We also drove to old Hanapepe to see the Lilo and Stitch mural.  Aloha theater is coming down, and I really don’t know how they moved the mural from the building wall to the wooden fence surrounding the about to demolished building.  BTW, that old Hanapepe is a dead town, as everyone has moved to the “newer” part of the town just steps away.

Very close to the mural is the swinging bridge.  Kids were having a blast walking across it 3 times.  It swings, and with Keko’a and Ma’e Ma’e running across it, it swing a lot!  We then made a stop at Kauai Kookie Company, but it’s closed during the weekend, so we went back a couple of days later (hence why we were able to get another penny for Keko’a).

We also visited Captain Cook's landing memorial at Waimea town again!

First day we went to Poipu Beach, we spotted a seal.  Keko’a was yelled at by the lifeguard as he was walking and splashing water close to the seal.  I asked him why, and he said that he actually didn’t see the seal there (without his glasses) so he was just randomly splashing water, until he saw the seal.

Then the next 2 days we spotted the turtle, and I think that it’s the same turtle, resting at the exact same spot!

We drove to Sprouting Horn late afternoon, and despite the fact that this is the 3rd time kids have seen it, they were still amazed by it..

Like I said above, we went West again on Monday, just to get the penny and visit Kauai Kookie again.  The 1st location of Kauai Kookie is a factory with a factory store in there.  Size of the store is about 500 sq ft, which isn’t that big.  Rest really is a factory, but for unknown reason, I couldn’t smell any kookie making fragrance while we’re there.

Less than 1 mile was their “warehouse” store and museum.  Museum is just 4 desks with cardboard display, in the corner of the warehouse.  Store is about 300 sq ft, but only maybe 1/4 of it sells Kauai Kookie.  Rest are souvenirs one can get from Whales or ABC General Stores.  It’s a small section of their warehouse, which to me, was kinda big.  However, I didn’t see much, if any, inventory at all.  It’s like an empty warehouse!  This location is right across from the Holo Holo Charter - the only Ni’ihau snorkeling boat tour on Kauai (just in the water region).  Kauai Kookie has a 3rd store location, but it’s bakery that sells gifts, hence we didn’t go.  We passed by it though as it’s right on highway (and there’s only 1 hwy across the entire Kauai), right when we exit Koloa going west.

Speaking of Ni’ihau, we drove to Kekaha Beach to see it, and Ni’ihau + Lehua we did see!  What a wonderful view of the forbidden islands.  There’s actually nothing more to see at the west side.  All about some factories, water treatment plants, US military bases, residential areas, and beaches.

After we got back to town, we had early bird special - the only way we could afford it - at Keoki’s Paradise (we had it the next early bird evening too).  

Scenery was just as nice as 3 years ago, and so were the many geckos that we saw (one was showing off its red throat).  Unfortunately, t-shirts were so-so and thus we didn’t get any (of the ones on sale).  Same could be said for Bernecke’s too!

We pretty much ordered the same thing for both afternoon - garlic fries, beer battered fish tacos and pull pork sliders.

On the last day before we got on the plane back to OAK, we drove to Walmart for last minute Hot Wheels shopping.  We had to stop at MacDonald’s to get one last Taro, and so we’d to make a slight detour through the side street in order to get back to the route to Walmart.  Guess what we went into?

One last thing I would like to share about Hawai’i’s life…