Back to the condo to finish cleaning and packing up, and then we headed to Nom Kauai for brunch. We had to wait outside for about 20 minutes, but that's usually a good sign for a small restaurant. Once seated, I ordered a mimosa and Sam got the Thai coffee. The kids were full from their Cheerios, so I let them order root beer floats for breakfast (hey, it's summer vacation!).
I ordered the Ultimate ("Waffle Bun. Fried Chick. Bacon. Sunny Egg. Pineapple Butter. Maple Syrup.") and Sam ordered The Southern Chick ("Fried Chick. Spicy Sausage Gravy. Cheddar. Sunny Egg. Biscuit."). I love brunch because you can stuff yourself silly and then stay full for a good part of the day.
Driving south, Bob the GyPSy narrator began talking about Wailua Falls again. We hadn't been there since our first obligatory stop way back in 2004, so I took the turn up the road toward the falls. We found a spot right by the lookout and hopped out. Now that we've actually been up-close and personal with other waterfalls, it was a little anti-climactic to see them from the look out, so we snapped a couple pictures (giving the 8 year old ample opportunities to practice his scowl) and resumed our drive.
Finally we made it to the Grand Hyatt for our fourth visit. I had decided to splurge with points to stay in a Club Level room this time, even though I knew we would be farther from the pool. When I made the reservation, though, it wouldn't let me indicate there were two adults and two children. I put that in the notes field and requested two queen beds, but when we arrived in our room, it had a king bed and a twin-sized fold out couch. I decided we'd deal with it later and got ready to go to the pool.
Our room was two floors above the club lounge, so we walked down there after changing into our swimsuits. The boys were thrilled to be allowed to get a soda, and I grabbed a cub of wasabi pea snack mix and filled our water bottles.
The Poipu Wing of the Hyatt is quiet because it is far from the pool, so it took us a good 5 minute walk to wind through the corridors until we found ourselves back at the lobby. From there we went down to the pool area, on the hunt for loungers in the shade (my sunburn had not magically healed itself overnight). The hotel and the pool area did not seem very crowded, but there were a lot of loungers that looked saved but not occupied.
We ended up at the deck overlooking the pool where the lazy river ends and the waterslide begins. The boys are confident swimmers and were looking forward to spending a lot of time in the river and on the slide, so Sam and I settled in with our books and snacks.
The waitress eventually found us and we ordered virgin lava flows for the boys, which they drank between floating and sliding. We all made our way down to the lagoon to float in the salt water, and just generally enjoyed relaxing with no where to go and nothing to do.
Around 5 pm we called it a day and headed back to the room to shower and cool off. We stopped into the club to check out the evening offerings - the boys were able to make a decent meal out of potstickers, dumplings, and veggies. Sam and I decided we would go to Stevenson's Library later for dinner, so we just had a few snacks.
We left the club and walked down to say hi to the swans and koi and to stroll around the grounds. We had hunted unsuccessfully for a geocache over by the Point at Poipu last year, so I suggested we go back and see if we could find it this time.
There was another family hunting too, and when they heard us talking about it the mom pointed us in the right direction, a completely different area than where we searched last year. I spotted the cache and waved the boys over and Ryan pulled it out. I was happy to changed the DNF to a smiley while we watched the waves crash on the rocks.
We returned to the room to figure out the sleeping arrangements. I called down to the front desk to order a rollaway but they wanted to charge me $25 for it, so I just requested another set of bed linens. When those arrived, we used the cushions off couch to make a nest for Jack on the floor and called it good. Theoretically both boys could have squeezed together on the twin, but after sharing a bed with his brother all week, Jack was tired of being kicked.
We then attempted to link our Netflix account on my phone to the smart TV, but were unsuccessful. The kids were fine watching more How to Train Your Dragon episodes on my tablet and lined their stuffed dragons up to watch with them.
Sam and I strolled over to Stevenson's, where there was a 15 minute wait. We left our name with the hostess and then walked back out to Seaview Terrace, where the John Rivera Trio was playing. They were great musicians playing really fun island covers, but we were hungry so went back to the restaurant. Oddly for a sushi joint, it smelled liked grilled steak, and I found I had lost my appetite. I ordered miso soup and Sam got a nigiri platter, but we eventually decided to go back to the terrace and enjoy the rest of the show.
We agreed that we should have just stayed out there and ordered off that menu - the performers were that good. We'll look for them again on our next visit - it looks like they often play at the Hyatt on Sunday evenings.
Exhausted from our hard-core poolside lounging, we tucked in the kids and then ourselves, sad that we would be saying good-bye to Kauai the next day.
