Day Two.
I got up about 7AM, DW still was on the NY clock so she got up at 5 and got to see sunrise. Went to swim in the hotel pool. Swam in the salt water lagoon which is nice since it’s the only pool with deep water, but the salt in it is very strong.
For Tuesday we had planned out to go up west, and that’s what we did. Left the hotel about 1PM, popped open the convertible top, cranked up the music, and here we go.
We were debating if we should stop at lookouts on the way up, or work our way down. In the end we decided to start at the top. The way up is really beautiful; you actually see how your car is climbing up the mountain. There is nothing but tourists on this road, and everyone is in good spirit.
I was a little worried as we were going late in the day. I was told that afternoon it gets more cloudy, and indeed it was. We could see what should have been a nice picture, but the clouds were blocking the whole view. However after 5-10 minutes of standing there, the clouds moved out, and we were taken back by this wonderful view. It’s crazy how nice it is.
To give you an idea how nice and high it is, I’ll quote a piece of the Ultimate Guidebook. “according to historians, there used to be a steep trail into the valley from here across a bridge called Kapea, a Hawaiian word for scrotum. It was so-named because the trail was so steep, that it made your… well you go figure that out”.
Same place, a little more to the right down the hike:
Then we drove down to the Waimea Canyon Lookout. The view is crazy!!!!! We stopped at a few places along the road to see the canyons. I’ve never been to the grand canyon, but boy is this nice.
Afterwards we drove down to Polihale-Beach/Queens-Pond for sunset. The road to Polihale is a dirt road and I didn’t know if I can do it with my car, We watched a few cars going in, so we decided to try it. After about a half mile I turned around, the road was BAD, I was afraid for my car. So after making it out alive, I stopped to discuss with my wife to see where we should go. So we decided to go back in (don’t laugh!), we made it till here, we wanna see sunset, we are going in! So in we went, we stopped at queens pond and settled there.
We arrived about two hours early, so we went down to the water. Water was not too calm, so I didn’t trust myself to go in. We just sat at the edge, semi in the water and watched surfers and someone catching fish(he got a nice big fish).
After about two hours the sun went down, it’s beautiful and I have the pics to prove it!
Then we took the hour long drive back to the hotel.
On the dirt road:
Monkey Pod Tree before queens pond:
Sunset:
