Travel
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Kauai: things to do & restaurants?
We are heading to Kauai at the end of the month and I have not really done much planning at all yet! We are brining our little guy who just turned one. We are staying in Lihue and will be renting a car. What are your favorite things to do? We like hiking/outdoors, good beaches, snorkeling, pretty much anything. Food is pretty much the same, we are not picky but restaurants will need to be for the most part kid friendly. Our little guy is a great traveler and generally pretty laid back and go with the flow. He is not walking yet and is still comfortable riding in the ergo baby carrier or stroller. Any help would be appreciated!!
TIA!
Re: Kauai: things to do & restaurants?
I rec getting the Kauai revealed book. It is a great guide to all the activities listed above. We explored almost all of the places in that book.
Some of my favotites:
Blue Hawaiian helicopter tour
Waimea Canyon-
There were seveal beautiful falls, some that required a hike and some that you could drive up to.
Mouth of the Waimea River meeting the ocean.
Poipu Beach- We saw Hawaiian Monk Seals there everytime.
Kilauea Light House- bird watching and whale spotting.
Queen's Bath- Furry of Nature at her finest.
Hanalei Bay
Ke'e Beach and Kalalau Trail- Loved the Napali Coast. There is a beach at the other end of Napali coast on the other side of the island that escapes me right now, but it took a ridiculous drive to get to, but was completely worth it! I will try to look it up.
We stayed in Lihue as well and it was a good central location to explore either side of the Island and close to the airport:)
Most of the restauraunts we ate at were in Poipu. The best meal we had was at Merrimens. We also had great meals at Beach House and a tapas place. Puka dogs was a fun lunch. Bubba's burgers was okay
In Lihue, we enjoyed 22 North, Kalapaki Grill, Hula Girl
We had great burritos on the north side of the Island at Red Hot Mama's-they only accept cash. Jo-Jo's Shave ice homemade syrups were good- but not as good as Ulani's in Maui.
I will have to ask my husband what his favorites were.
Adventures of A Girl and Her Apron
We were there in September, here's my review I previously posted:
TO DO & SEE:
Spouting Horn (Poipu) - kind of cool but I'd only come to see it if you're already in the area, nothing spectacular:
Poipu Beach, very nice, but can get extremely packed with tourists (I took this pic lying down, lol):
Salt Pond Beach - nice beach we stopped at on our way to the Waimea Canyon. Had nice little lagoons you could swim & snorkel in (as you can see...):
Waimea Canyon - the Grand Canyon of the Pacific, quite stunning! After stopping at the main lookout area, we drove all the way up to the top to see the view on the other side, the Na Pali Coast side, and dang it, it was all foggy!! So make sure you check the weather conditions at the top before you drive there.
This is the main lookout where everybody stops at:
Kauai Coffee Company- highly recommended for coffee lovers, like us! No entrance fee and they have unlimited free coffee tastings, yay. They show videos on how the coffee is made, there's showcases with old Hawaiian coffee memorabilia, and also a bakery/ice cream counter. Outside, there's a nice little walking tour of the plantation grounds.
Now that's what I call a cup of coffee, LOL:
Wailua Falls - absolutely gorgeous! These are the falls that were shown at the beginning of the Fantasy Island TV show:
Opeaka'a Falls (pic taken from Kuamo'o Road):
Wailua River:
Kamokila Hawaiian Village (on the Wailua River) - a re-creation of an ancient Hawaiian Village, very pretty, lots of peacocks running around. They also do kayaking tours from here:
Coconut Grove, along the side of the road when you drive into Kapa'a:
Coconut Beach (the main beach in Kapa'a):
The sunset was incredible that evening, the sky turned pinkish:
On the other side, it looked like this, so it was almost a 360 degree sunset!
Bike ride along the Coconut Coast - I highly recommend renting bikes and doing this, it was so much fun! There's a designated bike trail that starts in Kapa'a and goes all along the coast, took us about 3 hours total there and back:
This is where the bike trail starts in Kapa'a:
There were lots of pretty (but deserted) beaches along the way:
Some beautiful beach we came across way down near the end of the trail:
My H checking out the waters, but it was too rough to swim, dang it. You have to be really really really careful of the riptides, especially this time of year:
Kilauea Lighthouse - we didn't do the tour, just stopped and took this pic outside the gates:
Anini Beach (North Shore) - very pretty, smallish beach with clear calm water, did some snorkeling here:
My H getting ready to head out to the reef... Yes, we use those adorable life preservers when we snorkel, lol, better to be safe! (FYI, we rented our snorkel gear from Boss Frog, highly rec, they're awesome. Also, make sure you get the higher end snorkels with the valve, keeps the water out if a wave goes over your head).
Tunnels Beach (North Shore) - beautiful huge beach, but way too rough to snorkel or swim in when we were there:
The other side of Tunnels Beach:
Ke'e Beach (North Shore) - this beach is all the way at the end of the road, can't go any further than this. This is a beautiful spot, excellent snorkeling! Make sure you're there for the sunset, it's spectacular!
Beginning of the sunset, you can see the Bali Hai way off in the distance:
My H and I coming back in from snorkeling, my awesome bro snapped this pic of us (my fave!).
The sunset was totally breathtaking!
FOOD:
Duke's (at the Kauai Marriott) - very good! They have an oceanview diningroom upstairs, and the Barefoot Bar is downstairs where they have a great Happy Hour and good live music playing at certain times.
Here's their famous Hula Pie (I totally love this dessert, my H knows there's no 'share-sies' with this one, get that other spoon out of there, lol):
Tip Top Cafe (in Lihue) - not a fancy joint by any means but they have cheap delicious food and excellent service, the locals go here. They have the best Banana Macadamia Nut pancakes we've ever had (and we've tried a few!) and I also loved the corned beef patties with poached eggs.
Here's their Banana Macadamia Nut pancakes and Kona coffee (great combo!):
Kalaheo Cafe & Coffee Co. (in Kalaheo) - a must! We had an awesome breakfast here and the coffee is top notch! Make it a part of your itinerary for breakfast or lunch if you're on the way to the Waimea Canyon, nice newer place:
Java Kai (in Kapa'a) - very good coffee, I liked the Surfer's blend, and yummy organic treats, my H devoured 4 peanut butter cookies!:
Scotty's Beachside Bbq (in Kapa'a) - nice oceanfront casual restaurant, we gave the smoked beef brisket dinner a big thumbs up!:
Apparently Robert Downey Jr. was a fan of their chocolate cake (while in Kauai filming Tropic Thunder):
Lappert's (3 different locations, this one was in Poipu) - loved their ice cream!:
I tried the Black Peppercorn flavor, my H thought it was disgusting but I actually liked it (go figure, lol); but for real, the Coconut Macadamia Nut Fudge flavor was the bomb diggity!:
Kilauea Fish Market (in Kilauea, north shore) - A small take-out place with nice outdoor seating and excellent food, specializing in fresh fish:
The Ono fish tacos were pretty amazing (right), as was the chicken teriyaki plate (left):
Kilauea Bakery - the baked goods were impressive, I loved the tropical style bread pudding and my H liked the sticky buns. The coffee, however, was just okay.
My H had a mouthful here, haha:
Hee-Fat General Store (in Kapa'a) - serves the BEST shave ice around, seriously, the ice is shaved so well, it's like fluffy snow, and the flavors are so yummy! Make sure you get ice cream at the bottom and a "snow cap" on top. They serve it at a counter at the back of the store:
Ono Family Restaurant (in Kapa'a) - very friendly staff, busy popular place, large portions, we really enjoyed our breakfast here.
Hamura Saimin (in Lihue) - surprisingly this was a miss for us. My H had the saimin soup which he thought was decent and I had the fried saimin noodles which were pretty ick, they actually warmed them up in the micro, so not cool. We had to double check to see if we were in the right place based on all the rave reviews...
Eggbert's (in Kapa'a) - We had a really good breakfast here except for the fact that they ran out of macadamia nuts for the pancakes, what the?? The egg dishes were very good though, my H really liked his omelet and I enjoyed my eggs benny.
Merriman's (in Poipu) - had our anniversary dinner here. The food was incredible, very tasty, but a little pricey. Nice ocean views from the verandah, go at sunset.
In addition to all the above food & activity recs, on our first trip to Kauai we went to the Smith Family Luau which we thought was really good, great food & show. Also, a must MUST is a boat cruise along the Na Pali Coast, it's truly stunning. We went with Kauai Sea Tours and they were awesome, we had so much fun! The Beach House was fantastic, had a delicious dinner and were there for the sunset which was super nice and romantic.
HTH!
Love these suggestions! We're going to Hawaii at the end of the month, and going to spend a couple of day in Kauai, so we'll be checking some of this out as well!