Hawaii Honeymoon!! (Part II)

Updates from Days 5-7! We were lamenting this morning about how quickly time passes - we are on our last few days of our honeymoon! It's hard to believe that pretty soon we'll be looking back at all of our wedding and honeymoon activities as a thing of the past. When important and thought-provoking events like this happening, you wish that you could savor them longer than time ever allows. Luckily, as we've written our honeymoon blog posts, we've been able to look back and reflect on everything we've done, and smile. Thanks for reading! 

A note about the chickens: we did not expect there to be chickens all over the island! They roam around the way squirrels do back home. It's weird to be sitting and eating a meal and have a chicken walk passed you! And they are always cockadoodledooing all day long. A Kaua'i specialty it would seem! 

Day Five (Friday, Sept 27)

• Breakfast - We ate bread, peanut butter, and fruit while drinking tea on our Lanai before our early morning departure to Lihue. Pretty special to start the day to the sound of waves crashing on walks and a beautiful sunrise over the water!
• Helicopter Tour - We took a helicopter tour of the island on Blue Hawaiian. This was pretty cool for a number of reasons. The two biggest reasons were 1) neither of us had ever been in a helicopter before and 2) the views of the island were phenomenal from the sky. I took a Dramamine the night before and still felt a little motion sick on the tour, but not bad enough that I didn't enjoy it! It was an unreal way to explore the island overall - the views were unbeatable, and I thought the feeling of "hovering" in front of gorgeous sites was awesome. 
• Kauai Bakery & Cinnamon - Our book raved about the apple turnovers at this place, so we decided to check it out for ourselves. We also got a pepperoni and cheese roll. While both were tasty, we weren't totally sure we understood what all of the hype was about. We grabbed an iced tea from McDonalds to have with it and were surprised that it had a different flavor than it does back home! It reminded us of the tea we drank at Halele'a Spa, a little fruity. 
• Kmart & COSTCO - We went into Kmart to get some things for the condo. We then noticed that COSTCO was next door to Kmart, and couldn't resist going in. We also were on a quest for a backpack (neither of us actually had a good day pack at home, and it proved much harder to find on the island than we had anticipated). No backpack at COSTCO or Kmart that fit our needs, but we did enjoy all of the COSTCO samples! 
• Wailua Falls - We swung by these falls because they were right near Lehue and you could drive to them. 
• Backpack hunting - David spotted an "outdoor gear store" in a shopping mall. It turned out to be a very small store that was also a zipline company, but they did have the style pack we were looking for. We had intended to buy just one to share, but we liked them well enough that we each bought one. I bought this pack, and David bought this one. Overkill for what we needed on the island, but good to have long term. 
• Spouting Horn - An attraction on the south shore - there is a hole in the rocky coast and water sprays through it like a blowhole when the waves come in. 
• Smith's Tropical Paradise Luau - While munching on our apple turnovers and browsing through our guidebook, we decided we should experience a luau, even if they are a bit touristy. Smith's Luau got the best reviews, so we booked tickets for that very evening. The luau began with a tour of their gardens (less impressive than we had hoped for). They then had a "pig roasting ceremony" where they showed their method for roasting the pig over hot lava rocks in the ground - they dug a pit, lit coals, placed lava rocks on the coals, and then when the coals had burned down and the rocks were hot they put the pig in with a bunch of banana leaves and other leaves to help "steam" the pig, then covered it all with a tarp and shoveled sand on top. Kind of neat, and gross at the same time. The pig ceremony was followed by the "feast" with live Hawaiian music. The food was quite good, I especially liked the pork and the fried rice. We tried new foods such as poi, coconut jello, and a mai tai. We actually ran into a couple, Katie and Steve, who had been on our boat tour of the Na Pali coast. They are about our age so we decided to all eat dinner together and it made the luau much more fun! Not that we don't enjoy the company of just ourselves... but it was great to get to know Katie and Steve better. The feast was followed by a show complete with hula dancers and a fire dance. I have to tell you that until that show David thought hula dancing involved a hula hoop :) :) 

Helicopter Tour - the life preserver belts make us look like we both need to consider a diet after this honeymoon! 

View of Waimea Canyon - the glare through the window was pretty bad for most of our helicopter pictures

Na Pali coast from the helicopter 

COSTCO

Luau Dinner at Smith's Tropical Paradise

Luau Dance Show

Day Six (Saturday, Sept 28)

• Living Foods Market Breakfast - Our friends highly recommended some of the breakfast optoins at the grocery store / cafe that we had found previously. We decided to give it a try - I had pineapple brioche french toast and David had blueberry pancakes. 
• Blogging / reading / relaxing - I was really tired for some reason on Saturday so we spent most of the day hanging out at the condo. That's when we posted our first blog entry for the trip! 
• Puka Dog Lunch - We dragged ourselves out of the condo around 3pm and had lunch at Puka Dog - polish sausages in a surround bun (think cylindrical roll with a hole in the center) with lilikoi mustard, a tropical relish of your choosing, and some special sauce. They were delicious! 
• Poipu Beach - After lunch I lay on the beach reading my kindle while David snorkeled. We then walked all the way along the beach, gazing (i.e. snooping) at the fancy hotels along the beach. We decided that while some of them seemed really nice, we prefer our condo on the rocks! 
• Dinner at home - David grilled chicken and pineapple, which we ate with salad, tomatoes, and sourdough bread. Nice to have a home cooked meal for a change. 

Puka Dog @ Poipu Beach

Snorkeling @ Poipu Beach

Day Seven (Sunday, Sept 29)

• Breakfast at home - Greek yogurt and local granola. Healthy and filling but not the most exciting. 
• Hanakapiai Beach and Falls - The real highlight for Sunday was our hike to Hanakapiai Beach and Hanakapiai Falls. The beach is 2 miles into the Kalalau trail, along the Na Pali coast. This part of the trail is well maintained and while it did go up and down to get over each mountain peak, it wasn't too difficult. The views were absolutely stunning. We had seen the Na Pali coast by boat and by helicopter, but it was quite different to get the view down the coast from the trail. Once at the beach we decided to continue another 2 miles into the valley to see the falls. I had been nervous about doing this leg of our adventure because the trail is unmaintained and can be quite muddy and slippery. There are also several streams to cross that can be dangerous if the water level is high. Luckily for us it was not raining and the streams were low enough to cross easily by hopping from rock to rock. The beginning of the trail was definitely muddy, my shoe footprint seemed to double there was so much mud on them. The mud was sticky enough that if you stood still for too long you started to get stuck! After we passed the muddy section the rest of the trail actually wasn't too bad. David was SO excited that we did this hike :) The bamboo groves that we walked through were particularly cool - I liked the sound of the swaying bamboo. The falls themselves were beautiful - we sat at the bottom on rocks in front of the pool that formed at the bottom looking 300 feet up to the top of the valley and the top of the falls. It was very cool at the falls, which was welcomed after our hot and humid hike. A bunch of people were swimming in the pool and under the falls, but after watching two large rocks/boulders fall from the cliff into the water I decided swimming wasn't for me. The water was actually really cold too. Despite my protests, David of course still went in. He insisted that I take a picture of him sitting under the waterfall. I was just glad he made it back to where I was sitting without being pummeled by a rock (after the first two we didn't see anymore fall the whole time we sat there). I was pretty happy to enjoy the scenery while munching on PB&J and goldfish crackers. Oh, and did I mention that I insisted we bring about twice as much water as we ended up needing? My shoulders are thanking me for that today. 
• Ke'e Beach - From the trail we had a great view of Ke'e beach and could clearly see why this beach is so popular and considered to be such a nice beach. The reef is actually pretty far from shore but kind of surrounds the beach, creating a very sheltered sand pool area. Unlike Poipu Beach where you are at the reef almost immediately after going in the water, Ke'e beach allows you to swim in pretty deep water with a great sandy bottom. I'm a big fan of the sandy bottom so after seeing this view of the beach I decided we should cool down with a swim once we got back to the trail head. It was well worth it! We didn't have our suits so more or less swam in our hiking cloths, but it was a great way to end the 8 mile round trip hike. On the way out of Ke'e beach David was excited by a guy selling coconut on the side of the road. I watched as the guy used a machete to lop the top half of the coconut off, and then David happily sipped on the juice during our drive home. He looked a bit ridiculous. 
• Ono-Char Burger - At the recommendation of my Aunt Cindy, we stopped for lunch/dinner at Ono-Char Burger. The seating was all outdoors on concrete picnic tables, complete with cats and chickens (live ones). We both had the "Local Boy" which was a burger with teriyaki sauce, pineapple, and cheddar. Good recommendation! 
• Hee Fat Shave Ice - David wanted to go back for more shave ice at Hee Fat. Tasty, but we were too full to finish it all. These shave ices are HUGE! 
• Groceries, hot tub, "dinner", and TV - We didn't really like the main grocery store down by our condo so we stopped at Safeway in Kapaa. We then relaxed our aching bodies in the hot tub, had some popcorn and caught up on the TV shows we brought from home. 

On the trail to the beach. Wow. 

Hanakapiei Beach. The waves were huge! No swimming here, the current is too strong, partially because its beyond the reef. There was even a sign tallying how many people have died swimming at this beach... 

David in front of the bamboo grove on the trail to Hanakapiei Falls

Caroline in front of the bamboo on the trail to the falls

Hanakapiei Falls

David getting ready to brave the cold water. And the falling rocks. Questioning his "smarts" right 

Muddy from the hike in, sitting on the rocks eating lunch at the falls

@ Hanakapiei Falls, about to start the hike back

David enjoying his coconut on the way home from Ke'e Beach. He looks so goofy, but he was so happy! 

The rest of our pictures can be seen by clicking here. And a few more from my phone here. We are working on consolidating all pictures and adding captions in Flickr. We will post the final album when we finish! 

We want to go to Hawaii too!

Dear Mom and Dad,
One week ago you LEFT us in the middle of the night; it took us completely by surprise! When we woke up and found you missing, we were so sad!

So alone...

Why did you leave me here??

We thought - maybe this was a mistake, you would come back and pick us up!

Waiting for the cab

My bags are packed and ready to go!

Even though we were TOTALLY ready for Hawaii, you were nowhere to be found.

Getting tired of waiting. 

Eventually, we decided to go experience our own version of Hawaii! We went to a wildlife reserve to check out the local flora and fauna.

Sniff sniff - a Hawaiian monk seal has been here!

We saw some really cool birds! 

Suuper interesting sights to see

Next time don't forget us ok? 

We bet our leis are fancier than yours...

Love, Ash & Pepper

***Disclaimer - post written by dogs(itters) with an excellent memory for passwords! ***

Hawaii Honeymoon!! (Part I)

It's been a long time since we last wrote a blog post. We were very busy with our wedding prep and events and so decided to take a short break from our blog so that we could better enjoy the very important time in our lives. We will be sure to fill you in on the details of the wedding itself, as well as the dormer project that continues to progress. For now, we are going to skip all of that and talk about our honeymoon in Hawaii, on the island of Kaua'i.

We left for Hawaii on Monday morning, bright and early after only two hours of sleep. With everything going on we hadn't had much time to pack in advance, so Sunday night after we returned from our wedding in Vermont was unpacking and packing time. We used miles to get first class tickets, which meant Caroline's feet didn't touch the floor again (the seats were too big). She was happy though. We landed in Honolulu early (after flying through Dallas), so we had some time to kill before our little plane took us to Kaua'i. We took some pictures from the top of the parking garage and enjoyed a drink and a snack at an outdoor bar.

Looks pretty big, no idea how tall

When we finally landed at the Lihue airport on Kaua'i, it was already dark out. Our Jeep was waiting for us though! I at first had really wanted a convertible, but after learning about some difficult roads on the island leading to cool places, we opted for something 4WD.

The wedding-mobile

Our plans included spending the first three nights at the fancy St. Regis hotel in Princeville - we figured we should indulge in a little pampering on our honeymoon. We weren't exactly prepared for how fancy the St. Regis was, however. When we drove up to the main entrance to drop our car with valet parking several guys swooped in to welcome us. We were greeted as "Mr. and Mrs. Porter" after the first guy discreetly asked me for our last name, took our bags, took the car, gave us leis, and helped us check in - all in under three minutes we think. They seemed to have memorized that we were on our honeymoon (from a previous phone call) because we never told them but they knew. At the reception desk (an area with three desks and two chairs at each for the guests to sit in) we were given chilled bottles of water and told that they had upgraded us to a junior suite which came with complimentary butler service.  By this point our heads were spinning so we more or less just nodded and smiled. The bellhop showed us to our room, someone from the butler staff introduced herself and explained the services they offered (including unpacking our suitcases, which we declined), and then we were left standing in our room in a stunned silence. 

Champagne, Cheez-its, and Honey Roasted Peanuts. Perfect. The Champagne was complimentary. 

Caroline Inspects the Light

Our view of pitch black - in the morning it became obvious that it was a gorgeous view of Hanalei Bay

Large bathroom with a switch to frost and unfrost the window in the shower

The view in the morning - lots of random rain showers so a bit cloudy. Double rainbow though! 

After the butler left we began poking around the room and got a little bit nervous after Caroline read in the guest services book that the resort had a dress code. Whoops, didn't plan well for that one. Apparently "resort sophisticated casual" was expected at all times, and "casual sophisticated" expected in all restaraunts. We weren't even sure what these terms meant, but a quick google search made us more comfortable with the clothes we had packed. Cotton dresses and flats for Caroline and polos, nicer shorts and boat shoes for me. Once morning rolled around and we ventured into the resort more we realized that we had no need to be nervous at all because many people were walking around in flip flops, gym-style shorts, and printed T-shirts. Now that we've covered our "arrival" and fancy lodging, I'll give the quick version of the highlights from our days at the St. Regis on the north side of Kaua'i.

Day Two (Tuesday, Sept 34)

• Breakfast - Explored the St. Regis resort and ate breakfast at their delicious breakfast buffet 
• Exploring the area - Visited the Kilauea Lighthouse and Wildlife Reserve. We had learned at the hotel that we had to turn lights off or close shutters in the evening so as not to confuse birds at night who use the moon to find their way, and some of these birds were at the wildlife reserve. We also walked around "Secret Beach" but ran out of time to look for the lava pools (salt water pools in the lava rocks) - its possible they weren't there (or wouldn't have been safe) because we are going into the winter months when the surf is different. 
• Couple's massage - Indulged in a couple's massage at Halele'a Spa at the St. Regis. Neither of us had ever had a professional massage before, so this was a real treat. Caroline took three showers she said because she wanted to try it all - the steam shower, the "experience shower" with a huge rain shower head, a waterfall, and many jets, and the "normal" shower with a smaller rain shower head and just a few wall jets. They had a great co-ed lounge area where you could relax before and after your massage and enjoy tea, flavored water, and cookies. 
• Dinner - We caught the end of the sunset at the St. Regis bar and shared appetizers with drinks while listening to live music.

Kilauea Lighthouse

Baby Newell's Shearwaters at the lighthouse reserve - the ones we turned the lights off for! 

Day Three (Wednesday, Sept 25)

• Boat tour of the Na Pali Coast - The Na Pali coast has been used often in movies and is inaccessible by vehicle. You can enjoy the coastline by boat, kayak, helicopter, or on foot. We chose to take a tour on the Na Pali Sea Breeze, at the recommendation of our awesome guidebook. We left bright and early and traversed the coastline on the catamaran with about 15 other people and two captains, one of which who used to be in the coast guard and almost died from leptospirosis. Yikes. We were able to go in a large cave and see gorgeous views on the trip. The water on the Na Pali coast is extra green in color because the reef isn't present for most of it. When the reef started again at the end of the Na Pali coast we were able to snorkel around the boat and have lunch. 
• Wishing Well Shave Ice - We drove up to Hanalei to find Wishing Well Shave Ice, which was recommended to us as the best shave ice on the north side by a friend. I really liked it, but Caroline seemed less excited. She was much more excited by our Day Four shave ice experience, which included ice cream. 
• St. Regis pool and sunset - After our tour we napped and then read our kindles by the St. Regis Pool. We swam some and didn't go back up until after the sun had set because the views were just phenomenal. It was a nice way to finish off the day. 
• Room Service and a Movie - We were still pretty exhausted so we opted to enjoy room service in the room (BBQ pork sandwiches, salad, and lilikoi (passion fruit) cheesecake) while watching Iron Man 3. 

Caroline on the boat, prepared from the impending squall 

View of the Na Pali coast

Wishing Well Shave Ice in Hanalei

Sunset at the St. Regis Pool

Room Service Dinner

Day Four (Thursday, Sept 26)

• Breakfast buffet - This was our last day at the St. Regis so we once again partook in their breakfast buffet, which has outside seating overlooking Hanalei Bay. Pretty great place to enjoy a meal! I really liked the papaya they offered and we both liked their sticky buns. Among other things of course :) 
• Ke'e Beach - We decided not to go swimming but we did drive up to Ke'e Beach, which is as far as you can go before the Kalalau trail starts, which takes you through the Na Pali coast. We checked out a few caves in the area and scoped out some of the day hike options that we hope to return for later this week. 
• Shave ice in Kapaa and saimin in Lihue - At the recommendation of our guidebook we stopped for shave ice at Hee Fat General Store. This shave ice was better than our first because we got it with ice cream, and the ice was a bit finer. We also got saimin noodles at Hamura's Saimin in Lihue as it is supposedly a local favorite. It was pretty good, but we didn't love the processed meat garnishes. 
• Whaler's Cove check in - We continued down the coast to our second accommodation - Whaler's Cove near Poipu Beach. This is a condo so that we can have a bit more homey environment and eat out a little bit less. We were assigned a first floor condo, which was super nice inside, but we went back and asked if they had a second or third floor condo instead to improve our view of the ocean. They had one! Caroline is in heaven. We are only about 40 feet from a rocky shore line, so we can gaze from our lanai (balcony) at beautiful aquamarine water while listening to the waves crash on the rocks. For our first night we stopped at Living Foods Market, which is a little bit like Whole Foods. We ordered a pizza and picked up some salad making ingredients and red wine, and then returned to our condo to enjoy a relaxed dinner. 

Ke'e Beach

David in the dry cave - he is nowhere close to touching the ceiling

View from our Lanai at Whaler's Cove 

View from our bedroom window

Living area 

View of the sunset from the rocks in front of our condo

That's it for Part 1! Stay tuned for more updates from our experiences on the southern side of Kaua'i :) So far, it's been a very relaxing honeymoon - just the way it should be! For more pictures, click here. **Note, our pictures in the albums don't have captions yet - we are working on that!