Waimea Canyon & Napali Coast

Words cannot describe how beautiful Kauai is, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves, though they don't do it justice.

Waimea Canyon (notice the waterfall on the far left)

It truly looked like a painting

Trung has been into taking pictures of clouds

Just over the hill

The Napali Coast

We considered taking a catamaran along the coast, but heard it can be a bit rough, so we will save it for next time.

We took a slight detour and hiked down to see another view of the canyon

The girls were exhausted and quite moody during the hike, but we made it

Split tree

A closer look at the waterfall

Maybe we can hike closer when the kids get older

Kauai's famous ice cream

Double licking

Poipu Beach, a few miles from our hotel

Around town

We decided to drive up to the town of Koloa for brunch and found out from the restaurant's hostess that a parade was happening in about an hour.  Since we didn't have anything planned that day (or any day in Kauai), we stuck around to enjoy the festivities.

We sat right behind the entertaining emcee.

Apparently we caught the tail end of a week full of activities celebrating the town's "plantation days"

The parade was simple with lots of old cars

 and beautifully decorated floats.  Sadly, it came to an abrupt end when an elderly lady sitting right next to Trung suffered from heat stroke and the local paramedics had to be rushed in.

After the parade, we got some awesome, very filling smoothies at Aloha Aina Juice bar located inside a grocery store.

This Chunky Monkey smoothie was to die for!

We took the smoothies to see a blow hole located nearby where a family of chickens welcomed us.

There she blows!

My friend Katja happened to be vacationing a five minute walk from our hotel, so we met her family at the pool.

We spent the remainder of the day checking out the hotel, playing in the game room, and chilling at the pool.

Island hopping

After five wonderful days in Maui, we boarded a tiny plan and hopped over to Kauai to spend the last four days of our vacation.  Trung and I had never been to this island and were very excited to share the discovery with the kids.

Lydia lost a tooth earlier on during our trip

What happens when a stubborn kid refuses to rub in her sunscreen

Boarding our Island Air plane to Kauai with a layover on Oahu

We hung out with wild turkeys as Trung got our rental at Hertz

A farmer's market located near the airport happened to be going on the day and around the time we arrived, so we stopped by

$5 for a bag of tomatoes, 3 papayas, a bunch of apple bananas, a mountain apple, and a couple of passion fruits...what a deal!

The girls were happy when we finally arrived at the hotel because they wanted to hit the pool.  A greeter with leis was ready for us.

My Hawaiian girls

The garden view from our room

Lydia was anxious to go on the infamous slide and we caught it just thirty minutes before it closed.

Sophie let out a scream each time she hit the water

Lydia's lagoon

I stayed out of the water to let my cut heal an extra day, while the rest of the family had a ball

How we should spend every evening.

We let the girls have the queen bed, but we still sent up "safety nets" in case Sophie rolled off the bed again

Beaches

On our last day on Maui, we decided to hit the beach(es).  The girls love the hotel swimming pool so much that it was hard to pull them away from it, but we can go to a swimming pool anywhere.  We are in Hawaii for crying out loud!  The kids complained when we left, but they did enjoy the snorkeling and building sand castles in the long run.

Black Rock

That is Lydia and I at the very edge getting ready to jump

Trung got the tail end of our jump.  Lydia hurt her hand as it slapped the water going in, so it wasn't the best experience for her, but I'm still proud of her for going with me.

They ran out of lau lau last time, but we came early and got some this time.  Lydia discovered that she loves spam musabi too!

Sophie chasing birds at Banyan Tree Park

Peek-a-boo!

Trung and the girls (between the trees) walking to the ice cream parlor next door

Ice cream with eyes

The girls chose ice cream as their treats, while Trung and I went for the "shave ice"

Napili Beach, just north of Kaanapali Beach

I heard that there were turtles at Napili Beach and though I know they are gentle creatures, when I saw the silhouette of one, I totally freaked out and cut my foot on a reef.  (I also felt a turtle brush against my leg)  Fortunately, I had packed alcoholic drops for swimmer's ear which did a good job to disinfect the wound.  It wouldn't be a "Grace" trip if I didn't get some kind of wound.  :/

Swans and Hula Dancers

Where we found Sophie this morning

The view to the left of our room

The view directly in front of our room.  We got 50% off with the construction going on.

I could wake up every morning to this view.

Trung's pickled plum (umi) had a little face on it.

I didn't mind at all eating breakfast with a view of Swan Court and this little cutie

I think there was food underwater near where we sat, which brought the swans closer to us

A scene from "Swan Lake"

Pretending to pet the swan

Fashionable flower girl

Behind Whaler's Village

We watched a free hula dance show in the middle of the shopping center

The girls were interested and sat through the entire performance

Sophie asked if we would hear the "HookiLa" song which she and Lydia hula-ed to in preschool, and I didn't think we would actually hear it, but here you go...

Lydia thought this hula dancer looked like my niece Jocelyn, and she really kind of did.  It so happened that she choose Lydia to have her lei at the end of the show too.