Kauai

Up at 5.30am not a time I'm at all familiar with! Flight to Kauai (Kawaii is more or less the pronunciation) completely on time and apart from the inevitable security more like getting on a train, flight time 25 minutes.

 It is the oldest of these volcanic islands and therefore has had more erosion by rivers and the breakdown of the lava into soil so is lush and fertile.

 It is the island where Captain James Cook first landed in this bay

and along with most of the larger islands used to have a huge sugar cane industry most of which have declined due to other world producers having lower production costs. It has also suffered a number of bad hurricanes and a particularly severe one in 1992 which left much of the island without electricity for 3 months put the final nail in the coffin. Coffee and macademia nuts replacing the cane in some areas. We travelled on the Waimea canyon (wai = water, mea =red) and as you can sea pretty impressive.

Carried on to the hotel enjoying the natural beauty of the island. Including this blow hole by the coast

and this waterfall

The island has many wild chickens who can apparently run pretty fast if required!

 

Lovely hotel on the beach, changed and out to a luau set in lovely gardens with a peacock doing his thing, perhaps he fancied the little train we were on!

As in all south pacific islands the meat is cooked in a pit with hot coals for a long time and is very tender, a ceremony to open the pit

and after a buffet including not only the pork and various salads but also fish and chicken. We were encouraged to try poi which is made from the taro roots and is high in protein but doesn't really taste of anything by itself but goes ok with the meat or spicy salsa type dishes. Not at all popular amongst my fellow travellers but cheap way of including protein in the diet. This was followed by a show of 'local' dances from around the south pacific

 including hula and fire dancing. Pretty tired by the end of the day!

We had pre-booked a movie tour of the island as its different climate zones and vegetation means that many movies have been made here including South Pacific, Elvis Presley's Blue Hawaii, Jurassic Park and more recently The Descendants with George Clooney. It has taken the place of various places in the world including Australia, Vietnam and Costa Rica.

 This is part of the Coconut grove hotel severely damaged in the hurricane but a number of films made there including the one with Elvis Presley and many stars stayed there in between including Frank Sinatra when he was making a film here. Lots of faded grandeur and would cost millions to put it right I suspect.

 We finished with lunch in the bar which featured in the Descendants so I may have sat on George Clooney's chair!

Quite windy on the beach in the afternoon but pleasant to have nothing to do for a bit before packing for the Big Island (Hawaii!) tomorrow.