After leaving The Big Island, we made our way to the island of Kauai, posted about here and here.  Today, I wanted to share a list of my favorites and top things to do on Kauai, after all of our research, planning and the time we spent exploring.

1.)  When visiting Kauai, my biggest recommendation is to rent a car and explore this beautiful island.  Make sure you book in advance, because lots of people are thinking the same idea and rental companies do run out of cars!
Since the island of Kauai is a rather small island, it’s easy to circumnavigate the entire thing in one day, but I wouldn’t recommend it.  The island is circular in shape with one main road connecting the North Shore and the West Side of the island.  I recommend breaking up the trip into either two, three or even four days, depending on how much time you have on the island.  Remember, it’s vacation, so relax and don’t always feel stressed to see EVERYTHING!  That’s my biggest problem.

2.)  Now after you have your car, you can place some trips.  First, plan a trip to Waimea Canyon.  See my detailed post about visiting the Canyon here.

3.)  Also, plan a trip driving North up to Ke’e Beach.  Wherever you are staying on the island, just look on a map and drive due NORTH, stay on Road 51 until it literally DEAD ENDS at the beach.  This is as far as you can go without hiking the rest…the rugged and beautiful Na Pali Coast makes it impossible to drive further.

The sights along the way…

Watch out for the one-way bridges…

4.)  Stop at the Hanalei Pier, which served as a backdrop for the famous scenes in Rogers and Hammerstein’s “South Pacific”.  We walked down the long pier and took some pictures of the scenery…in the distance to the left you can see a waterfall.  Next to the pier is a long stretch of beach which served great for parents to relax and enjoy the sun while watching their children practice how to surf in the calm waters.

5.)  Pull over for a photo-op of the Kilauea Lighthouse perched at the northernmost tip of the island.  It was built in 1913 as a beacon for traveling ships and although its warning light was turned off in the 1970s and replaced with an automatic beacon, it still serves as a beautiful Kauai landmark.  If you have time, hike over to the lighthouse and take a tour.

6.)  Wherever we travel, we always make it a priority to try the local cuisine.  It’s no different in Hawaii, even if you are from the U.S.  Every place you travel has their specialty!  Throughout each island, our favorite was trying the fresh fish…we even kept a count on how many different kinds of fish we could try…last I remember, we were up to 12!  Two places that I would recommend on the island for local cuisine are Kauai Pasta and The Right Slice.
We were too busy cramming pasta into our mouths to take a picture at Kauai Pasta, but I have to say it was some of the best pasta I have had in a very long time!  And I’m not just saying that because we live in Asia, ha!  It was amazing!  A cute little dive and definitely a must stop during your vacation.
The Right Slice was a bit unusual, I have to say.  When we researched the shop online, we pictured a cute little diner serving any pie you wanted by the slice…ala mode, with whipped cream, cherries – the works!  What we came to realize was The Right Slice was located completely off the beaten path in an industrial park and very hard to find!  Once we did find it, we drove up to an empty parking lot and walked into the quiet shop (consisting only of an ordering counter).  It was just a grab-n-go place with a few picnic tables outside.  So, all in all, I was a bit disappointed by the lack of diner-atmostphere I was hoping for, but the taste of the pie made up for it.  It was delicious!  Another fun and interesting stop during your trip.

7.)  Visit a waterfall!  This was one of our favorites…Opaekaa Falls.  “Opaekaa” means “rolling shrimp,” which were once abundant in the stream.  Usually this waterfall falls in a double cascade, but with the rain fall high on the day we visited, it was a triple!

8.)  Take a trip down south towards the Poipu Beach Park and pass through the Tree Tunnel.  It’s amazing!

9.)  Visit Shipwreck Beach on the southern point of the island.  Does that big rock look familiar?  Well, it did to me!  This is where they filmed “Six Days, Seven Nights”…one of my favorite movies, I sheepishly admit.  When of the coolest parts of this rock (which I didn’t realize while we were there) is that people actually jump off the cliff into the water…it’s actually allowed!  I wish I would have known that…maybe next time.

Stay for a while and watch the locals come to the beach after work to surf.  Man, were they good!  I took a picture of one local’s decal on his truck.

10.)  And last but certainly not least, be sure to take in all the beautiful sunsets you can…

I hope you enjoyed my Best of Kauai!  Please let me know if you ever have any questions about visiting this amazing island.  Happy Thursday!