2008-March 3: Lydgate, South for sunset

Lydgate is a place we like to stop at when we were around the East side during the daytime.  Many look at it as only a place for beginners, but I've seen some interesting critters there that I haven't seen elsewhere.  Plus it's a pretty safe place to hang out most of the time.

 Love seeing the school of these yellow fin surgeonfish.  

 and these stripeys that I haven't seen anywhere else but here and the Waikiki Aquarium.

 After a fun afternoon of snorkeling, we cleaned up, then headed South to wait sunset.   I love this gazebo on the grounds of the Kauai community college.  We pass it whenever we're riding through Lihue on our way South.

Another of my favorite views on our ride South.

 Since we were still early, we rode around a bit.  Stopped here at the Spouting Horn.  This is looking South/West of the Spouting Horn.

 across the street from the horn is this big clump of multi colored bougainvillea. 

 I think I've failed to include anything about the chickens on Kauai in my previous blogs. As anyone who has been there knows, they're everywhere. These are the Hawaiian Moa (Ornamental Red Jungle Fowl) introduced to the island centuries ago by the Polynesians. Since that time these birds have been intentionally and unintentionally cross bred with many other species of chicken, from fighting birds to wild fowl. Hurricane Iniki helped to scatter them throughout the island. Since there are no mongoose on Kauai, they don't have many natural enemies.

 Someone told us that several hens lay their eggs in one nest, then when they hatch, one hen takes care of the whole bunch.  Haven't researched to see if that's true, but I never really thought about how they would end up with so many chicks of the same age.

 One of the more unusual colored roosters.

 By the time sunset rolled around, we parked ourselves at Poipu beach.   It always amazes me when I see surfers still out near sunset. 

 getting artsie

 clouds were pretty heavy, but the views were still great.

 even got more color in the sky then I had expected.

We're in Kauai mode now.  Too bad it's not permanently!

2008-March 2: sunrise, Tunnels, Kee

I  like to try and get up early a couple days to watch the sunrise by our beach at Kauai Beach Villas. That usually isn't too tough the first couple days we're there since there's 4 hours difference in time here from our midwest home. But we do adjust to Hawaii time pretty quickly. We make a point of living by the clock and not by how tired we are. That seems to really help with dealing with jet lag.

 Ken even helped the sun rise.

 Must have been low tide this morning. The rock shelf isn't always this visable.

 We even found out where golf balls come from!

 There's a drainage ditch that runs along the property line of the Kauai Beach Villas to the ocean. Another place to check out the Kauai wildlife. Here are the black swans that must live on the KBV grounds. Usually we see them in the lagoon at our resort. They, or ones just like them, have been there all 9 years we've been going there.

 Since the north shore was so calm most of the first week, we headed to the north shore several of those days to snorkel and watch the sunsets there.
Tunnels was as fabulous as ever!

 Love this view

 Tunnels is usually the clearest place we snorkel around Kauai

 a couple of the many ring tail surgeonfish

 One of the many wrasses we see around Kauai.

 schools of assorted fish

 saddle butterflyfish

  One of the many shells we've seen in the waters of Kauai.

 white bar surgeonfish

  Near one of the drops offs at Tunnels.

 a pair of threadfin butterflyfish

 a convict tang and tear drop butterflyfish

 a pair of endemic blue stripe butterflyfish

 4 spot butterflyfish

 After a couple hours there, we decided to see if we could get a parking spot at Kee.  We did.  So we snorkeled there for awhile---the ocean was like a swimming pool!

 Love the mountains right at the beach

 Looking down the NaPali from the outer reef at Kee.

 one of the urchins here.

 back on the beach, someone had built a fire.  I'm not sure that's allowed, but the fire was pretty to watch.

 It was getting close to sunset, so we sat on the beach and waited.

I love the late day lighting

 A diehard snorkeler.

 Almost sunset.

 Not the more brilliant of sunsets.  The clouds at the horizon were pretty thick.  But it was a beautiful evening to be sitting on a beach watching any kind of sunset!

2008, 3-1:  The East side walkway; and ride to the North shore:

Today we woke up to a beautiful morning.  Ordinarily that would have meant we would have hurried up to the North shore beaches to snorkel as soon as we could. But after a long flight, today we were more into hanging around the east side and getting rejuvenated. That didn't mean we did nothing, though. We decided to take a walk along the new walkway/bike path (Ke Ala Hele Makalae, which means “the path that goes by the coast”).

  With lots of access and great views of the ocean, this is a great path. For non-hikers who want an easy trail, this is great.