Kauai Day 5

Today we spent most of the day exploring Waimea Canyon and Kokee State Park.  Waimea Canyon is referred to as the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific."  It's pretty similar in nature (though not nearly as old since it's only 6 million years old or something).  It was beautiful.  We drove all the way to the "top" of Kokee State Park first, stopping periodically to look out across the canyon.  At the top, the clouds had come in, so we couldn't really see Kalalau very well.  We went back to the visitor's center to get some information about trails and picked out two hikes to do.  The first one was along a piece of the Pihea Trail, which went into the Alakai swamp, the highest swamp in the world (so we were told).  We saw a very different set of vegetation than we've seen so far... tons of ferns, including many different types of fiddlehead ferns.  We also got some really nice views of Kalalau (after the clouds had cleared).

When we finished this short piece of the Pihea Trail, we went to grab some lunch at the park's lodge, then headed to the Canyon Trail (the most popular trail in the park, so we were told).  This one was 1.7 miles almost entirely downhill to the Waipo'o Falls.  In the early pictures, you can see a very tall falls across the canyon.  That's Waipo'o Falls; we hiked into the top of it.  The hike took us down along a ridge, and we got some additional great views out across the canyon.  We dipped our toes in the stream then turned to head straight back (since 1.7 miles in downhill means 1.7 miles out uphill).  We had psyched ourselves out so much about the hike back that it was actually surprisingly easy.  We drove back into Poipu, cleaned up, and then walked along the coast to the Grand Hyatt for a DELICIOUS fish dinner (Tim had Ahi, I had Ono, and Maya had Mahi Mahi ("mom, you have to say "mahi" twice!")).

The EveryTrail trip for today includes the drive plus the two hikes.  It's here.