Last night we finished off the day by heading down to the Seaview Terrace for cocktails and the Keiki Hula show. This show was primarily young local girls from one of the local hula schools, with two fun local musicians providing music and vocals. Think of the Hula school from Lilo and Stitch and you get the right idea.
When I say mostly the young local girls, I'm alluding to the funniest part of the evenings entertainment... Half way through the show, the girls headed out into the audience to drag some lucky volunteers on stage to "learn" the Hula. I was one of the fortunate selectees. Heather was "nice" enough to try to figure out how to use the new camera on the fly to preserve the occasion.
This morning we headed out to see some additional sights on the South and West shores of Kauai. Tomorrow and Tuesday we're heading to the East and North shores, which are sure to provide some interesting new discoveries.
Our first stop was the Spouting Hole. This is a place where the ocean rushes into a lava tube to shoot skyward like a geyser. There were originally two lava tubes here, but the more spectacular of the two was destroyed by a sugar plantation foreman to keep the salt spray from stunting the growth of a few acres (out of thousands) of the company's cane. The smaller of the lava tubes still provides quite a show.
From the Spouting Hole, we headed west beyond Waimeia and Mana (which really doesn't exist anymore) to Poli Hale State Park. Leaving the main road, we took a rough dirt road 17 miles north up the West coast of the island. This road is navigable by determined drivers in sedans, but we were really happy to have the Jeep Commander we rented. Four wheel drive would definitely be required if it rained on the road, and also if you decide to drive on the beach, which we did not.
The beach provides views of the southern portion of the Na Pali coast and the Pacific Ocean. This stretch of beach has no protection from the vagaries of ocean weather, so you have to be careful. Today we were there as the tide was coming in, and there was a stiff breeze (20 mph) from the North. Heather sat on our beach blanket while I took some photos of Na Pali, the beach, and the Pacific. We skipped the sand dune area in order to head back to the Hyatt for tonight's luau...
Heading back to Poipu, we stopped in at JoJo's in Waimeia for more shave ice. This time we ate it at the Waimeia Pier, only a block away. The water here is murky and red from topsoil runoff from the shore. The beach sand is grey like ash.
More tomorrow, as it's time to get ready for the luau.