KAUAI Day 6

Thursday we were up and out the door by 7am so we could start our 8-mile round trip hike on the Kalalau trail to Hanakapi'ai Falls. The trail goes along the Nepali Coast and is absolutely gorgeous. I really think there are colors in Hawaii that simply don't exist anywhere else. It's been one of my favorite hikes and one of my favorite activities of the trip.
Two miles into the hike, you come to a a beach- we stopped for a bit to see the water and admire the rock towers that had been built up all around the beach. They were made by stacking rocks on top of each other and covered most of the beach. It was a pretty cool sight to see all the unique creations. Daniel and Jeff added a couple of their own.

The next two miles of the hike were beautiful as well, and led us to Hanakapi'ai Falls. The waterfall was beautiful! It was so tall you literally had to lean back a little to see the very top.
After making the hike we were ready to take a swim! The water was freezing and took your breath away when you first got in. It was probably a good thing I slipped and partially fell in the water because I might have chickened out if I had tried to go in slowly. It was cool to swim behind the waterfall.Then and Jeff and Daniel found a ledge to climb up, and provided some good entertainment jumping off into the water. It would have been fun to join them, but at that point I was frozen!


The hike back was even more beautiful now that the sun was out and shinning along the coast. We were glad we started out wet because at that point it was pretty hot. When we finished the hike, we went for a quick swim at the beach that was right there.

The definition of paradise:

We headed back to the condo where we enjoyed some lunch and some relax time. I think that was also one of my favorite aspects of the vacation- being able to sleep though the nights (seems like we always have at least one child getting up at least once- we were hoping the kids were good for family!), sleep in (a couple times), and just having some time to sit and do nothing but enjoy the beautiful views.

Thursday evening we had the fun opportunity to meet one of the missionary couples that were with Daniel on his mission in Africa. They happened to be in Hawaii at the same time, and thought it would be fun to spend an evening together. We enjoyed visiting with them at the condo-sharing stories, and laughing at funny experiences, then we had dinner together at the Postcards Cafe. The food was fantastic- their specialty is fresh fish and it definitely didn't disappoint. I think my favorite was Jeff's monchong with macadamia nut butter topping. It was nice to spend the evening with friends and family.