Hawaii
Family Vacation
May 2019

8:00 AM	arrive at Nawiliwili, Kaua'i
all day	rent car, explore Kaua'i
by sunset (7pm)	return rental car, return to ship

Fitbit stats:
To bed: 11:05 pm, Got up: 7:03 am (7:08 asleep)
Steps: 16,146 (7.58 miles)
Floors: 107

After breakfast, we took the free shuttle from the port to the airport to pick up our car that we'd rented through Expedia while on Hawai'i ($45 for the day). Then we drove west, out to Waimea (red water) Canyon and up to the lookouts for Kalalau Valley on the Nā Pali coast, which we saw again the next day from the ship.

Waimea Canyon

	[21.992793,-159.67422]

[22.009074,-159.676896]
[22.071855,-159.66161]

[22.089197,-159.671559]

Kalalau Lookout

Pu'u O Kila Lookout

Then we drove down to Spouting Horn on the south coast, which we happened to (accidentally) time perfectly for high tide, so the spouting was fairly impressive.

Spouting Horn at high tide

*38s video (5.6MB)*	*22s video (2.7MB)*	*31s video (1.3MB)*

https://youtu.be/bwsYFVadbxA

From Spouting Horn, we drove back around to the east coast, north of Lihue, stopping briefly at Opaeka'a Falls and the Wailua River. (The falls are north of the road; the river is across the road on the south side.)

Opaeka'a Falls & Wailua River

Then we continued on (to the end of the road once again) to hike Kuilau Ridge Trail (1.5 miles to the bridge where Kuilau trail ends and Moalepe Trail begins at [22.089057,-159.412936]).

Kuilau Ridge

After our hike, we stopped again at the Opaeka'a Falls overlook to use the restroom. Feral chickens are all over Kaua'i, and many have reverted to the wild junglefowl phenotype. There are no mongoose on Kaua'i, unlike some of the other islands, so when chickens escape their coops during hurricanes, there are no predators around to take them out.

Feral chickens at Opaeka'a Falls

We didn't have anything else we wanted to see on the island, so we returned the rental car in Lihue before 6 pm and spent the evening lounging on the ship, including karaoke at the Gold Rush Saloon. And no, I did NOT sing.

all day	sleep in, lounge on ship
2:00 PM	leave Nawiliwili port
5:00 PM	cruise along Nā Pali coast

Fitbit stats:
To bed: 12:26 am, Got up: 8:26 am (6:37 asleep)
Plus a short nap in the evening from 6-7:26 pm (0:43 asleep)
Steps: 5,203 (2.44 miles)
Floors: 19

We decided there wasn't much to do in Lihue, and had already decided not to bother with renting a car for the half day we had left in port, so we slept in and spent the day taking it easy on the ship. We had an onboard credit, as a benefit of booking through Costco, that we were told could not be applied to gratuities ("service charges"), and only a small amount had gone toward the taxes on the 'free' drinks Dad & Chad got with their drinks package. After thoroughly exploring the onboard shops, Chad found a pair of swim trunks, and I selected two necklaces to purchase with the credit so it wouldn't go to waste.

In the afternoon, the ship left port and sailed around the north side of the island to the Nā Pali Coast State Park, including the Kalalau Valley, which we saw the day before at the end of the Waimea Canyon drive.

We might've stayed up to stargaze on the trip back to Honolulu, but we had already determined that the moon was too bright to see much of the stars, even out on the ocean. :-(