Episode Transcript
[00:00:13] Speaker A: Welcome to two Travel Dads podcast. Here we share our favorite destinations, travel tips, stories from our adventures, and bring on awesome guests to share insights into their travelsome lives. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and check out our detailed show notes at.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: Dash episode.
Hey, there. I'm Rob. I'm still Chris, and this is two travel Dads podcast. Today we are going to keep on talking about Hawai, and specifically we're going to talk about the island of Kauai.
[00:00:45] Speaker C: I love Kauai.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: Which did you like more? Did you like the big island, kauai or Oahu, which is your favorite right now?
[00:00:51] Speaker C: I'd say kauai, which is also known as the garden island, right?
[00:00:54] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:00:54] Speaker B: Okay, so you like the garden island the most?
[00:00:56] Speaker C: It's beautiful.
[00:00:56] Speaker B: I like the big island the most.
[00:00:58] Speaker C: I didn't dislike any of them.
[00:01:00] Speaker B: So the island of the. Besides Molokai is the farthest west, so to get there, there's very few flights that actually go directly to Kauai. So you usually have to fly to Honolulu first or what we did. We actually flew to Kona and then Honolulu, and then it was a journey. It was definitely a journey.
[00:01:20] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: No, it's really different from the other islands. Trying to think of kind of how to characterize what makes it so different.
[00:01:26] Speaker C: I think, just imagine Jurassic park. What I remember is just all of the huge, green mountains. It was super lush. There's tons of waterfalls, there's tons of just. I think it's just really beautiful and green, and I think that's why it's called the garden island.
[00:01:44] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: And I think something that makes it interesting to me, or at least way different from the other islands. So, like, Oahu is just so very developed. Right. Like, around Honolulu and then south shore, east shore, it's just so many people, and then the big island is not like that at all. Yeah, it's just lava, lava, lava. And it's so natural and quiet. And then you get to Kauai, which is super duper lush and green when you look up towards the mountains. But then there's traffic.
[00:02:15] Speaker C: There was a lot of traffic, but it's also because it's not a big city either, so it wasn't, I don't think, developed for that. But, yeah, there's traffic.
[00:02:21] Speaker B: But there's a lot of traffic. And then Kappa, which is. That's where we stayed. That's on the eastern shore, it had a lot of traffic and a lot of hotels. Really concentrated people.
[00:02:31] Speaker C: But I think if you get up early in the morning. You can beat that traffic.
[00:02:35] Speaker B: That's true. We did that.
[00:02:36] Speaker C: Yeah, we did that. And where was that place that we had that really delicious coffee?
[00:02:40] Speaker B: Each morning we'd go to? Java kai.
[00:02:42] Speaker C: It was amazing.
[00:02:42] Speaker B: It was amazing.
It was kauai coffee, not kona coffee. Kauai coffee.
[00:02:47] Speaker C: Delicious cold brew. And I'm very picky about cold brew. And this cold brew was smooth and sweet.
[00:02:54] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:02:54] Speaker B: I will say, having been to the big island a couple of times and had lots of kona coffee and all sorts of other things, the kauai coffee from Javakai was my favorite coffee I've had anywhere.
[00:03:04] Speaker C: And I recommend any one of the bagels.
[00:03:06] Speaker B: Well, there you go.
[00:03:07] Speaker C: I think I had the surfer girl, which was quite delicious.
[00:03:09] Speaker B: Wow. You just couldn't go without talking about the food.
[00:03:12] Speaker C: I love food. That's what I enjoy.
[00:03:14] Speaker B: So then, well, then let's talk about a couple other food things. Even though I had a different plan for us. What other delicious food things did you really enjoy on kauai?
[00:03:22] Speaker C: I think I remember also having some poke. There was this interesting. I don't call it food court, but it was like, what do you call those places where you just have a ton of outdoor restaurants in a condensed area? Food village.
[00:03:34] Speaker B: Yeah, a food village.
[00:03:36] Speaker C: An outdoor food village. But there's. What was the name of it up in Hanalei.
[00:03:41] Speaker B: In Hanalei, which is on the north shore. And thank goodness we're still on track, because we're going to talk about the north shore today.
Up in Hanalei, which is the cutest little town that's totally walkable back and forth. Lots of little restaurants. But Hanalei poke was where we definitely, hands down, that is the best poke I've had in Hawaii, across the different islands. So delicious. Yours was very interesting. I feel like you had poke with melon.
[00:04:05] Speaker C: Yeah, it had some mango in there and watermelon, actually.
[00:04:08] Speaker B: Yeah, it was very colorful. And I think that just ahi with avocado is delicious. And that's basically.
[00:04:17] Speaker C: Yeah, well, they have options there for everybody.
[00:04:20] Speaker B: Yeah, options there for everybody. That's the point. It's so delicious. And since we're talking about Hanalei before we get into all the other fun stuff to see, that's also where there was that really amazing oceanic and tribal art shop. It was called Hevake. Remember that? And it had all the tikis outside.
[00:04:39] Speaker C: I do. Because we have one of the tiki statues in our house.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: That's true. We did come home with a small carving. Love it. Really, really cool. But that, I think, is one of the really neat things about walking around in the town of Hanalei is that there actually are lots of carvings, and there's lots of art all over, which is really neat because it's actually more difficult than you might think to see those traditional hawaiian carvings on any of the islands. You really have to kind of seek them out. So in our podcast episode about the big island, when we were talking about the Kona coast, there was lots of opportunities, know, from Pu ohana, Ohanaonao National Historic park to some other spots on the Kona coast. There's lots of carvings. Over here on kauai, there are fewer and far farther between. So when you see one, you have to stop and admire them. One other food thing or what you look like you're going to.
[00:05:30] Speaker C: No, no. Yeah. What's the other food thing that you're going to mention?
[00:05:33] Speaker B: So there was lots of good food on kauai, of course. But the only other thing that really stood out to me that I really wanted to make sure to mention was, again, we talked about this in one of our big island episodes, malasadas, which are kind of like hawaiian donut balls that they kind of stuff with all kinds of things like fruit or custard. Delicious, whatever. But the passion bakery and cafe in Kappa makes the most delicious lilikoi malasada I've ever had. Now, I've had so many from lots of different places, and their frosting, their filling, everything about it is the most delicious thing. And even if you're not staying in Kappa'a, it's really easy to pull off the highway and get them.
[00:06:11] Speaker C: Yeah, I was going to say the only other thing, those are super delicious. You can't go wrong, really, with the malasada. But I just recommend you also check the hours of operation for the places that you want to go and eat. So when we were in Hanalei, there were so many amazing places that were being recommended, but then we'd go and it would be closed. So do your due diligence ahead of time to make sure that the places you want to go are going to be open.
[00:06:34] Speaker B: Yeah, lots of things close or have really weird hours. Like they open at 02:00 instead of opening at regular lunch hours. So, yeah, just something to keep in mind. All right. So anyways, let's talk more about the north shore of Kauai and some of the absolutely beautiful sites kind of want to start with. So we had a plan, and then there's what we did. And our plan was to get there to go hiking, doing the nepali coast, they're going out of Hynes State park and hiking on the Kalaloo trail. And then we got there and we discovered, oh, you have to have reservations. Not just reservations to get into the state park with your car, but reservations if you want to walk in or take the shuttle or do anything at.
[00:07:18] Speaker C: All just to access. You have to have reservations.
[00:07:20] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:07:21] Speaker B: So we learned, and the guy at the booth was super helpful by saying, at 05:00 we release the next day if there's anything that's going to be available. And at 05:00 we were actually on another hike and we were able to get into our phones and actually get logged in and score walk in reservations for the next day.
[00:07:40] Speaker C: And walk in means you've got to find some legal parking. Yeah, I was going to say legal approved place to park so that you can then walk the mile in to access the park.
[00:07:50] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:07:51] Speaker B: So we actually.
[00:07:51] Speaker C: So worth it, though.
[00:07:52] Speaker B: But we parked at Highness State beach and then walked a mile along the highway. I think the shuttle bus drove past us. It did. And then we entered Highness State park and we had to prove our reservations and all that. And that is how we were able to then hike the Kalaloo trail, which.
[00:08:10] Speaker C: What I was going to say is those are the different types of reservations you can get. You get a reservation where you find a random place to park that's legal and you walk in or you get a reservation that's for a shuttle. So you go to a designated parking lot still outside the park that the shuttle picks you up and then brings you in the park.
[00:08:28] Speaker B: And it's timed also.
[00:08:29] Speaker C: And it's timed.
[00:08:30] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:08:30] Speaker C: Or you can get a pass that actually lets you drive into the park and park.
[00:08:34] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:08:34] Speaker B: So best of luck in all your endeavors.
[00:08:37] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:08:37] Speaker C: Plan ahead.
[00:08:38] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:08:38] Speaker B: So they open up reservations 30 days in advance. And this is not something that's just temporary. This is their plan for the foreseeable future to minimize the number of people that are doing the big, famous hikes on the nepali coast.
[00:08:52] Speaker C: If you know a local, if you.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: Do know a local, you can enter with your comma in a friend.
But, yeah, it's best our locals lived.
[00:09:03] Speaker C: On a different island.
[00:09:04] Speaker B: Yeah, our locals live on different islands.
But since we're talking about it, let's just talk about what that is actually like doing that really wild hike. I haven't written about it yet, but I feel like it's worth writing an entire article about because if for nothing else, just so that we can use all the pictures of the mud well, yeah.
[00:09:21] Speaker C: So I was going to say. So with the mud. I just recommend when you're in Hawaii and you know you're going to go hiking to wear a nice pair of not open toe, but just keens. Right. Like waterproof keen sandals that are open to just let the mud and water flow through. So we saw lots of people wearing tennis shoes and hiking boots, and it is just so muddy.
[00:09:45] Speaker B: You can see the visible discomfort on everybody who walks by wearing tennis shoes and flip flops.
[00:09:51] Speaker C: We had just nice.
What do we call those type of keens. Right. It's like kayak keens or something. Right. Where you can go in the water, you don't have to wear socks.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: They're like all terrain, all weather, all terrain. They've got the closed toe, so you.
[00:10:05] Speaker C: Don'T stub your toe.
[00:10:06] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:10:07] Speaker C: But you can get them wet. So our feet just got super muddy, but then we just clean them off and they're running streams.
[00:10:14] Speaker B: So one of the things on all the hawaiian islands, you'll see places that are called Waimea. Like, there's the town of Waimea, there's the Waimea valley, Waimea Canyon. And what that means is reddish water. And when you hike on the Kalaloo trail on the nepali coast, you fully understand exactly what that means, because even if it's not raining at that exact moment, the trail that takes you along the coastline is just nothing but this red mud from all these tiny baby little waterfalls and the mist that's just ever present, continually making the trail into this reddish water, into this wimea mud, it stains you. Like, even after we got cleaned, like, my toenails were nasty.
[00:10:57] Speaker C: But still, on this hike, where there was rain, there was mist, there was mud. No bugs?
[00:11:04] Speaker D: No bugs.
[00:11:04] Speaker B: But there were lots of wild orchids, which were gorgeous.
[00:11:07] Speaker C: Beautiful. So, I mean, just a wonderful hike. Strenuous. It's not easy.
[00:11:13] Speaker B: It is not for.
[00:11:13] Speaker C: Especially when it's dumping rain.
[00:11:15] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:11:15] Speaker B: It's not for somebody with bad knees or a limited amount of time.
[00:11:19] Speaker C: Saw a lot of people with braces, though, and walking sticks.
[00:11:22] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:11:23] Speaker B: So when you're doing this, like I said, this is a famous hike. This is like the hike that you hear about people doing on Kauai. We just did the short version of it because we did not get the wild backcountry permit. So for us, we just went as far as Hanakapai beach, which is worth it. Oh, my gosh. Who cares that we didn't do the rest of the trail?
[00:11:48] Speaker C: Yeah, it's the great reward for the hike, which has amazing views throughout that whole entire journey. But then you end up rainbow like, crossing that river or stream. And then you access the beach and you just have this amazing view. And not just that, there's that awesome cave that's there, too.
[00:12:09] Speaker D: Oh, yeah.
[00:12:09] Speaker B: So there's sea caves. There's like this interesting Brackish pond that is separated from the waves by a big sandbar. It is absolutely amazing. So you get to Hanakapai beach and then you can either just chill there or you can swim, or you can do the two mile hike up to Hanakapai Falls, which is, again, strenuous. And then it's your really picturesque hawaiian waterfall that's streaming off of a cliff and in the jungle. And it's beautiful. But even if you don't have that in you, it's 7.7 miles round trip. If you don't have that in you, that's okay. The beach is well worth the hike, and you will feel so good about doing it. If you want to continue doing the rest of it, you can go across. Oh, what is that? I think it's called Scrambler's ledge. Or there's some really scary parts of the trail. I know. You should see his face.
[00:13:03] Speaker C: Scrambler's ledge.
[00:13:04] Speaker B: No, there's literally part of the Kalaloo trail is called Scrambler's ledge. I'll look it up while we're looking at this. But no, if you want to do the entire thing, you do have to get a permit. And then it comes out on the kind of the northwestern side of the island over by Waimea Canyon State park. Yeah, it's kind of crazy. So it's okay to do the short one. It's called Crawler's ledge.
[00:13:27] Speaker D: That's what it's called.
[00:13:28] Speaker C: Crawler's ledge.
[00:13:29] Speaker B: That sounds a little bit better, but no. So it is this really crazy. I'm showing a picture to him right now and I will include a picture in our show notes. It is this crazy cliff above the ocean where you literally just. You have to be brave. Be brave. We're not doing that anytime soon.
[00:13:47] Speaker C: Good times.
[00:13:48] Speaker B: Anyways, I think that's all that we need to talk about with this specific hike. It's amazing. It's worth it. Get your reservations.
[00:13:55] Speaker C: Yeah, I think. Tips, reservations, sandals. Yeah, that's it.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: And I think it is safe enough to do with kids who are responsible hikers.
[00:14:03] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, for sure.
[00:14:04] Speaker B: Totally. A couple other things, though, in that area. If by chance you forget to get a reservation or you can't get a walk in or anything like that. Right there by Heine State park is just this absolutely beautiful and actually historic spot called the limahuli, or Limahuli gardens. And they are. What's a good way to put it? It's a historic botanical garden, but also it has ancient terraces from where the hawaiian people used to have this whole farming setup. So as you go through the gardens, you've got ancient structures, you've got really rare plants that are native to specifically just that part of kauai. It looks like you were going to say something.
[00:14:49] Speaker D: What's up?
[00:14:49] Speaker C: No, extremely rare plants, I think some which are only, like. They don't exist anywhere else in Kauai. It's like they have the last of those specimens that are native and they try to, of course, maintain them.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a really fascinating place. And again, it's one of those places that they do request that you make reservations, both because they've got limited parking and they try to limit the number of people tromping through the ancient gardens. But, gosh, it's amazing.
[00:15:20] Speaker C: Another thing about just trumping is you will notice, as you go through to different places throughout kauai, they make sure that you're cleaning and sanitizing your footwear, so you're also not bringing other bacteria that could actually be harmful for some of the native plants.
[00:15:34] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:15:34] Speaker B: Do you remember what that was called?
[00:15:36] Speaker C: I don't.
[00:15:36] Speaker B: The rapid Ohia death. So the rapid Ohia death is what it is that you're trying to prevent from spreading around. And what they do is they've got these shoe stations, and you can find this on each of the islands. They've got these stations, before you hit a trail with a spray bottle. I'm not sure what's in the spray bottle. I think, actually just soap.
[00:15:56] Speaker C: No, it's like sanitizer, really.
[00:15:59] Speaker B: There you go. And then scrub brushes, or they'll have one of those shoe scrub stations that you move your foot back and forth through and it helps to remove or kill the fungus if you've got it on you to prevent this spreading through the islands. So it's a problem and they've got solutions. What else on the north shore do you think we need to talk about? Probably the actual beaches.
[00:16:21] Speaker C: Yeah, I was going to say, like, sure, if you don't get a reservation there, if you don't have money to go to one of these gardens, there's a lot of free beaches that have beautiful clear water and amazing snorkeling and you can just relax and hang out there.
[00:16:33] Speaker B: Yeah. Do you remember what your favorite beach was that we went to on the north shore?
[00:16:36] Speaker C: The one that had all of that sand?
[00:16:38] Speaker B: The one that had all that sand. The one that we hiked to?
[00:16:42] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:16:42] Speaker B: No, that was amazing. But there's lots of beaches on the north shore. So thinking about what is going to be the easiest to access if you're driving all the way to Heinea State Park, Highness State beach is absolutely awesome. So it's got a fair amount of parking, but again, it's one of those things where if you don't get there early, you might not get the parking that you want. And then the beach actually continues to wrap around to the east and goes over towards tunnels beach, which that was some really remarkable snorkeling. It was really, really pretty. And then as you continue along the coast, you'll see so many different places, like Hanalei Bay, which was famous know being movie set for lots of different things like South Pacific and stuff. And then wrapping around to Killauea. Not Killauea the volcano, but Killauea the town. That's when there's even more beaches. You've got like Anini beach was one that we went to. There's lots of beaches in Kappa. Gosh, there's so many that it's really easy to just have a beach in the morning and then an afternoon hike or hike early in the morning, be the first one on the trail, and then chill the rest of the day on the beach. Easy to do, cheap. Just make sure that you read the parking sign.
[00:17:55] Speaker C: Yeah, read the parking signs.
[00:17:56] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:17:57] Speaker B: Parking is the thing that is really key. So if you're going to go for beaches, if you need more suggestions, we've got a whole list of them in our article on the blog, but I'm just going to rattle them off real quick. These are the ones that are really easy to access, that are right by Kappa or kind of just within that range. On the eastern shore, Anahola beach has tons of access points. That's just north of Kappa'a between Killaway and Kappa'a. Donkey beach is one that everybody says, oh, you've got to go to that one. We skipped it because it was busy. And then Kappa beach is a really long beach and you actually have to kind of drive past it anyways, so you might as well stop. You'll see people running along the trail that goes past all the beaches. So if you're a runner, just join them and follow them to the beach. But yeah, tons. And tons of awesome beaches that are really easy to access. And then one other thing that I wanted to do, a quick little chat about that we didn't get to do, but I researched a bunch, and I'm really sad we didn't do, is the Wailua river.
[00:19:04] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:19:04] Speaker B: So we drove over it several times. But the Wailua river is the longest navigable river in Hawaii. Did you know that?
[00:19:14] Speaker C: I had no idea. Can you kayak on it?
[00:19:16] Speaker B: You can kayak on it and you can paddleboard. And as you go upriver, it actually comes to this really beautiful place. Comes to secret falls, which there's this fern grotto.
[00:19:31] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:19:31] Speaker B: No, it's totally magical, and I'm really bummed that we didn't go and do it, but there's this whole fern grotto, and there's a cultural site that they've got back there, a village that. It's the Komokila hawaiian village. And you can paddle up river and then check out the village, check out the grotto, and then do the short hike up to the secret falls. Again, we didn't get to do that, but all of my research makes me feel like we completely missed out, and it's something we're going to do next time.
[00:20:00] Speaker C: I was going to say next time.
[00:20:01] Speaker B: Yeah. And then before we wrap up this short episode about Kauai, because we got one more where we're going to talk in detail about the south shore, because there's a lot going on down there. I did want to talk a little bit about kind of where to stay and a little bit of planning because. Yeah, that's, I think, one of the most complicated things about visiting Hawaii. So where we stayed on Kauai, we stayed at the Kauai Shores hotel, which I don't, um. It wasn't fancy, but it wasn't not fancy. I don't know. It was very standard.
[00:20:34] Speaker C: It was a place to stay. Nothing about it was. But we didn't hang out there.
[00:20:38] Speaker B: Yeah, we didn't hang out there. It was nice, but it was like the party, the party place. Like, there was live music all the time.
[00:20:47] Speaker C: Yeah. I wouldn't say it was relaxing. It's like the hot tubs were always, like, packed. It did seem very party like. And even though looking, it had a very diverse group of people there, but just wasn't our vibe.
[00:21:03] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:21:03] Speaker B: No. So there's lots and lots of options if you want to stay on the eastern shore, which, again, I think that's a really ideal place because it's close to the airport. And there are tons of food choices and you can have a home base there and then be able to bounce back and forth between the north and south shore really easily. But, yeah, so we stayed. The kwai shores wasn't exactly our jam. I would stay there again if we had the kids with us. I think it's really colorful and fun. Lots of everybody has a balcony or a patio, which is nice, but there's lots and lots of choices if you want to be in that zone. So when you're talking about your budget for Hawaii, that's one of the things I think is always kind of shocking once you start researching what a trip to Hawaii cost is, that a cheap place to stay is always going to be over $200 a night, which when you live in Florida and you travel around, it's like 120 a night for a nice place. So, yeah, just be prepared that especially on kauai and on Oahu, the cost of accommodations is quite a lot more. Do you have any opinions on that?
[00:22:12] Speaker C: No. I'd agree that it probably costs more, but I would think next time, and especially if we go with the family, trying to find a place that still has maybe a little kitchenette or something so that you think about trying to figure out where you can save money where you can. Part of that is also having certain meals or snacks and stuff at the house so you're not eating out as much and leveraging those type of amenities when you're traveling, especially with kids.
[00:22:38] Speaker B: I think that's a good call, too, is being able to do something with the kitchenette. So in Kappa and also down in Koloa, there's lots of condo resorts. So. Yeah, good call, actually. Next time, let's plan on that instead. I think that's all that I wanted to talk about for this episode. Did you have something else?
[00:22:58] Speaker C: No. I'm excited to talk about what's coming up in the other episode about Kauai, because I love checking it out from a helicopter.
[00:23:06] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:23:06] Speaker B: So in our next episode about Kauai, we've got everything from doors off helicopter tour to, again, another amazing hike, waterfalls, all kinds of cool stuff. So stay tuned or check back in with us later. As a reminder, you can always subscribe through whatever podcast service you use. We're on Spotify, iTunes, Pandora, iHeartRadio, everything. Google.
[00:23:31] Speaker C: Yeah, I'm sure there's one we're missing, but if you just search for two travel dads, you'll find it.
[00:23:37] Speaker D: Cool.
[00:23:37] Speaker B: All right, have a great rest of your day and we will talk to you later.
[00:23:40] Speaker C: All right.
[00:23:42] Speaker A: Two Travel Dads podcast is created by Rob Chris Taylor in St. Augustine, Florida. We'd love to answer your questions here on the podcast, providing both our experience and stories to share our own insights into whatever you're wondering about. Visitraveldads.com slash podcast episodes to leave your questions and to check out past episodes and show notes. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button and have an awesome day.
