Vacation to Paradise

Ben and I just returned back from an amazing trip to Kauai. I guess you could call it a 6-year-long-overdue honeymoon of sorts, since Jaimason wasn't with us and since we never really took a honeymoon after we got married.

To tell the truth, I have been putting off doing this blog post, though, because there is so much GOOD to say, and not enough time to say it!

I finally decided to give brief highlights (because, lets face it, nobody really cares about our trip except us!) and lots of pictures (because we all know that's the only thing people care about anyway). If you want to see more pictures, visit http://trenholmkauai.shutterfly.com

We stayed in a BEAUTIFUL condo in the Poipu area, which is on the south side of the island. This is the view from our back door:Not too shabby, right? You can't see it in the picture, but the pool is beautiful and exotic, with a waterfall, and right beyond that, of course, is the ocean! We got to listen to the crash of the waves as we fell asleep every night.

CRUISE ON THE NA PALI COAST
We took a cruise up the Na Pali coast on the west side (accessible only by boat). It is breathtakingly beautiful! The pictures will not do it justice, but the enormous colorful mountains against the sea are truly amazing. There are awesome caves and waterfalls as well, and the history is cool, too. A lot of movies have been shot on the Na Pali coast beaches.
On the cruise, we had an opportunity to snorkel and see lots of sea life: honu (Sea turtles) and spinner dolphins particularly.
The dolphins get their name from the tricks they like to do. They jump out of the water and spin themselves around in the air before landing. It's pretty cool. They are the only dolphins to naturally do this in the wild. Bottle-nose dolphins, like you see at Sea World, are trained that way.

NORTH SHORE
We saw King Kong's profile, the Kilauea lighthouse, some more caves, and went snorkeling on 2 of the best beaches on the island-- Ke'e and Haena-- where we saw more honu and TONS of beautiful fish. We took some pictures of the fish and turtles, but they aren't developed yet (can you BELIEVE we have to WAIT for the pictures?)
One of the coolest parts about the north shore was Queen's Bath. It's a natural lava shelf against the ocean with a crater carved into it. When the waves from the ocean splash against it, it fills with sea water and fish. We hiked down there and swam around in it for a while. (That's us in Queen's Bath, and beyond us and to the right is the ocean).

WAIMEA CANYON/ WEST SHORE
There's a beautiful canyon on the west side of the island called the "Grand Canyon of the West." We spent the better part of a day visiting it. It was beautiful!

On the way, there was this area right off the side of the road with red dirt and a waterfall coming through. Back in 1992, when Kauai had a terrible storm that wiped out most of the island, a man began dyeing shirts with this red dirt that's all over the island and selling them. Well, his efforts were a success, and the Original Red Dirt Shirt was born. Needless to say, you don't want to get THIS stuff on your clothes!

On the way back, we stopped at the mouth of the Waimea River, where the sand is black (though you can't tell in the pictures), and Glass Beach, where the sand is made up of tiny pieces of colorful glass.

LU'AU KALAMAKU
One of the most fun things we did was the Luau Kalamaku. We ate a pig roasted in an imu pit, purple mashed potatoes, poi (wouldn't recommend it), fresh pineapple, jasmine rice, hawaiian seafood salad, and a whole bunch of other yummy food. We also watched fire dancers and hula dancers and had a great time! It was one of the only times we actually weren't in our swimsuits and/or salty from the ocean with wind-blown hair.

ZIPPING
We went on a 5-hour zip tour at Kipu Ranch (home of Jurassic Park). We got to ride one of the longest ziplines in the country at 1800 feet long! The scenery was beautiful, of course, and the history was even cooler. Kipu Ranch is situated right in the middle of a once-active volcano! At 17 miles across, it was magnificent. When it blew (many many years ago), chunks of one side of the mountain were blown 90 miles away to Oahu.At the end of the day, they take you to Blue Pool, where you can zip and jump off the high platform to cool off.

SECRET FALLS
We rented a kayak one day and headed up the Wailua River in "search" of Secret Falls. It was a very pleasant day. We spent some time kayaking, then docked our boat at an island and hiked a mile or so to Secret Falls. The falls are about 100 feet tall, and land in a beautiful, clear pool where you can swim. It was perfect!
There are wild chickens and cats that run around everywhere on Kauai...seeing one is as common as seeing a bird. It struck us as funny, though, to see chickens on the beach, and to see signs that read "don't feed the chickens or cats." It was a fun time of year to go, though, because there were a lot of newly-hatched chicks following mom around, too. Let me just tell you that you don't need an alarm clock in Kauai. The roosters will do a fine job of waking you at 4 am!

We had SUCH a good time and want to thank Ben's parents and Grandma for helping us get there, our friend Wendy for encouraging us to go, and the Parkers, Freemans, and Williams, who watched our boy. (Ok, ok, I know this isn't a Grammy acceptance speech).
We took well over 300 pictures and videos, and obviously there's no room or time for them all here on the blog, so if you want to see the others, go to trenholmkauai.shutterfly.com