Kaua'i on our Own

Thursday, February 13, 2020

It is now a wild guessing game as to how long it will take for our stateroom cabin toilet to flush after we push the magic button.  If it actually flushes right away, it's PARTY TIME!

Today the ship was docked on the island of Kauai, until tomorrow.

imagecredit:https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kauai_County_in_Hawaii.svg

Kauai is the 4^th largest island and the most northern island in the Hawaiian chain, and thus the oldest. It is 53 km long and 40 km wide. 

The population of Kauai is roughly 72,000 people. There are more pigs than people.  Although all we've seen are chickens and roosters everywhere!  We've been to countries where there are feral cats or feral dogs.  Here, there are feral chickens!!!

Kauai is called The Garden Island. It has more rivers, streams, waterfalls, and beaches than any other Hawaiian island.

This makes it very popular for filming movies and TV shows, including Jurassic Park, Pirates of the Caribbean, Fantasy Island, BayWatch, and Gilligan’s Island.

imagecredit:https://www.metv.com/lists/11-little-details-you-might-have-missed-on-gilligans-island

The temperature on Kauai stays between 24C to 29C any time of day or year.

An average of 450 inches (1143 cm) of rain each year makes Mt. Waialeale the wettest spot on earth. The northern part of the island receives 4-5 times the annual rainfall as the south. So we stuck to the south today.

imagecredit:https://twitter.com/hashtag/waialeale

There is no road to drive completely around the island, and 70% of the island is not accessible by foot.

No building on Kauai can by law be taller than a coconut palm tree.

imagecredit:https://www.hawaiimagazine.com/content/rise-and-fall-legendary-coco-palms-hotel

Today we rented a car for the day and took off on our own.  It was easy because the shuttle picked us up at the ship and returned us when we were done.

It was a nice half hour drive before we arrived at McBryde Garden. The purpose of this garden is to preserve endangered tropical plants. There were not a lot of flowers in this 50 acre reserve, but some very interesting trees.

We stopped to see Spouting Horn, which is a blowhole caused by water being trapped in a lava tube.

Then we drove to Poipu Beach and parked where we hoped we wouldn't get ticketed (we didn't). This beach claims to be the nicest beach in Hawaii.  We have no idea. We walked along the beach for awhile.  

Watched some surfers:

We made it back to return our rental and then back to the ship by 3 pm.

At 4:30, we were off on another excursion, the Kalamaku Luau at the Kilohana Plantation, only 10 minutes away from the ship.

When we arrived, we had time to walk around the property, they had shopping stalls.  Frankie got a henna tattoo on her leg.  Don't worry, Mom, it will come off.

They buried a large pig in a pit to cook it.  When the roast pig emerges from the fire pit, this is called the traditional imu ceremony.

They did an amazing job of feeding us all quickly, about half the ship's passengers were there! 

The entertainment was hula dancing, fire dances, and story and song, all relating to how the original Hawaiians came here from Polynesia. Hula dancing was originally performed by highly trained men as a form of worship to the Hawaiian god Luka.