This was my view from corpse pose:
We planned to head south today, so after Sam and I ate some yogurt and cereal we loaded up the car again (well, we had left much of the beach gear in the car so it was getting quite fragrant and sandy!) and got on the highway headed south.
Incidentally, one of the reasons I wanted to stay in Kapa'a this time was because of the conventional wisdom on TripAdvisor that traffic is just terrible through the town and it's impossible to turn left on to the highway at any point. I decided to play the guinea pig for the sake of research, and I'm happy to report that even in early July as the high season is ramping up, we had no problems getting through/around town at all. We did manage to avoid rush hour, but it's just common sense to avoid most places at rush hour!
Anyway, so we turned the GyPSy app back on as we drove towards Poipu and the narrator (we named him Bob) starting talking about local foods. When he got to malasadas, I told Sam to grab his phone and google "malasadas Kauai" to see if there were any bakeries between us and the South Shore that we could stop at.
Conveniently enough, the Kauai Bakery at the Kukui Grove Shopping Center was just a few miles farther down the road so we made a quick detour to stop for some fried pastry goodness. They only had a few in the display case but had a full sheet on the back table they were in the process of filling, so we each got one - the boys chose plain with cinnamon and sugar and I opted for strawberry cream-filled. I ordered a vanilla latte and Sam asked for drip coffee - which they didn't have, but could happily make him an Americano (espresso diluted with water - WAY stronger than a regular coffee).
The malasadas were fine, but not the hot deep-fried goodness we used to get from the lady who had the green shack outside Kmart. Those were divine! However, we were happy enough with our carb bombs and returned to our original route.
As we drove past Poipu, Bob the GyPSy narrator started talking about Glass Beach and the boys said they wanted to go there, so we took a left at Ele'ele and drove around behind the big industrial tanks at Port Allen. Sam and I had been there on our first trip and found some really lovely pieces of smooth beach glass and explored the old Chinese cemetery that overlooks the beach, but it didn't occur to me that my little magpies would want to explore it. This visit yielded more in the way of broken beer bottles rather than fishing floats, but they were happy enough searching for all the colors.
I warned them that we shouldn't take any pieces of glass, much like we wouldn't pick flowers or take rocks on hikes, but a couple still made their way into small pockets.
The kids have never been to Salt Pond Beach Park so I thought we would head there next and see how the waves and snorkeling conditions were. Turns out the Junior Lifeguard camp was taking place there that day, and there were local families who have obviously set up camp the night before and were going to celebrate all weekend long, so the beach felt a bit crowded, even though there were very few people actually in the water.
There were also no waves, so the boys declared it no good for boogie boarding. We piled back in the car and drove back towards Poipu. I wanted to stop in Hanapepe and visit the Talk Story bookstore - in ten visits we've never made it there. There was construction on the old bridge and we ended up getting routed onto a detour that wound up around behind town, and ended at a river crossing (no bridge). If we had been driving Sam's big truck we would have had no problems fording the river but I didn't want to risk it in the rental Rogue (ironic, given the model name).
So we turned around, waved at the construction workers again, and got back on the highway to take the main entrance to Hanapepe - now that's a tricky left-hand turn, with the blind corner and the endless stream of traffic.
Finally we made it into town, found a parking spot, and walked down to the bookstore. Oh, what a bookstore! It's the westernmost bookstore in the United States, and it has a great variety of stock from brand new bestsellers to used backlist, to vintage finds and plenty of books about Hawaii. Ryan and Jack found two novels they wanted in the kids' section, and my husband picked out Captive Paradise: A History of Hawaii, which he said is really good but rather slow reading (not as slow as Michener's Hawaii, but still slow).
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| In hindsight, this would have made a great souvenir. I actually really like SPAM... |
I'm so used to getting books cheap at our neighborhood thrift store or free through the library (and library app) that I couldn't justify paying $10+ for a book I would only read once, so I picked up a book of Hawaiian crossword puzzles. All told, I was happy to spend a chunk of our souvenir money on books - supporting a local business - instead of knickknacks and random crap that would end up in the bottom of a drawer somewhere.
We also stopped at the jewelry/knickknack story next door, where Ryan's souvenir money was apparently burning a hole in his pocket. He picked out a beaded shell necklace and matching bracelet, which I gently suggested was perhaps more feminine than he would like but he was adamant about his choice (modern parenting FTW). He was thrilled to discover that the bracelet could attach to the necklace to make it even longer, so it was a hit.
At that point Jack started to complain with all his might - he claimed I had baited and switched them by saying we were going to the beach but instead SHOPPING - so I told everyone we were on our way to Kiahuna beach in front of the Sheraton, where I knew we would find big waves to pound their little boogie boarding selves right into the sand. I just needed to make one stop first...
Last summer we took a sunset dinner cruise with Captain Andy's (I HIGHLY recommend it). On our way to Port Allen we passed Warehouse 3540, which I had read about in passing on some blog or trip report. We didn't have time to return on that trip, so I wanted to make sure it made the list this trip.
I'm a sucker for a good farmer's market/craft fair and this one had the distinct advantage of being housed in a large warehouse - so while it was still hot, at least there was shade. The boys got in line for Fresh Shave shave ice while I went in to do a little shopping. I had gotten quite sunburned the day before at the waterfall and at Hanalei Bay, so I went looking for an after sun spray - and found it in the first shop I entered, Hawaii Says Hi. I talked story with the owner, a lovely woman originally from Glenwood Springs, CO. We talked about whitewater rafting and skiing and then her boys, who are each a year older than mine, came in. While mine were on skis starting at age three, hers have been surfing since before then!
I bought a little bottle of after sun spray (a mix of water, aloe, and witch hazel with lavender and spearmint essential oils I could have made at home but at that moment felt so heavenly - even at $14 for a 2 oz bottle!) and wandered off to other shops. The boys and their shave ice found me at a jewelry shop (Lily Koi) and Ryan helped me pick out a necklace with a single marble-sized freshwater pearl strung on it.
That tapped my souvenir budget, so we returned to the car and drove to Kiahuna. We got the last open parking spot in the public lot near the Sheraton and the boys took off for the water. The beach was crowded, the water was crowded, but at least no one was playing music near us (my biggest pet peeve this side of misused apostrophes) and the waves were cranking.
I had originally planned to get lunch at the food trucks at Warehouse 3540, but it was so hot nothing sounded good. I had packed some snacks for the beach, but eventually real hunger set in. If we had eaten lunch before going to the beach, we probably would have made it to my next plan - seeing local band Falling Down Romance perform at Kauai Island Grill in Kapa'a at 6 pm.
As it was, we barely made it to 3 pm, so we decided to just hit the happy hour menu. The boys enjoyed the many geckos who visited us and the food was pretty good (I think - the happy hour drinks were REALLY good). Ryan and Jack were excited to get virgin lava flows, which now make up a specific line item in my vacation budget...
Stuffed and sunburnt, we drove back to Kapa'a. No one had much energy to do anything, so we showered off the layers of sunscreen and sand and then decided to just veg in front of the TV with a few episodes of the Netflix show How to Train Your Dragon, which the boys have been obsessed with this summer. We called it a night fairly early, as usual.
