Well the storm decided to hang around ANOTHER day, so today (Friday) I wasn’t able to do much, and hiking was a complete no-go, half the trails are flooded, and visibility is zero so it wouldn’t be a good idea to head out, and I wouldn’t see anything anyway. Yesterday I decided to head to the “Sunny” South Shore for a Lu’au at the Grand Hyatt in Po’ipu. I decided to head south on the earlier side and take in a few sights on my way down there. About 10 miles south it became sunny and my first stop was at the Kilauea Lighthouse. This was pretty spectacular, they had a great little scenic lookout and I grabbed a couple photos from there:
As I went further south it became darker, and darker. Apparently the storm was so strong it made it all the way across the island and it was now crappy out on the “Sunny” South Shore, oh well- I was hoping it would clear prior to the Lu’au…anyway, the next stop was “Spouting Horn” which is a hole carved into some lava rock that spouts out water (best at high tide, which is wasn’t at the time) when good sized waves come in. I was there at the wrong time, and Thunder Hole in Acadia National Park is much more impressive, but again I guess I just caught it at the wrong time. At this point I was only a mile or two from the Grand Hyatt and it began to POUR. I checked out one more beach, Shipwreck Beach, but couldn’t really see much due to the weather. I checked in at the Grand Hyatt and they told me that the Lu’au had been moved inside into their Grand Ballroom and I could choose not to go and there would be no worries, and a full refund. Since I was all the way down there, and I wanted to get a Lu’au in, I decided just to go ahead with it. I spent 30mins or so walking around the Grand Hyatt prior to the Lu’au kickoff, that place is NO joke, it’s a sick resort to say the least. When the time was right I walked into the Lu’au and immediately got lei’d. I didn’t have to buy her any drinks, do any dancing, or work on being “funny” for an extended period of time, what a great start. Once you got in and seated they were pushing Mai Tai’s like there was no tomorrow. I only had a couple because I had to get home that night, and didn’t want to drop $700 on a room for a night because I was too bombed to drive home. The show was pretty cool. They told a lot about Polynesian history, and all the different dances associated with the different cultures. The food was also AWESOME, and I must have dieseled 2 pounds of Kuala Pork, super tasty. I think it would have been much better outside, but what can you do? Anyway, here’s a picture and a video [UPDATE: Video wouldnt upload, I'll try again some other time, and it f'ed up the entire format of this post, but I'm not going to bother with it right now] from the Lu’au, the “fire dance” was definitely the best part (and the grand finale): 
This got out about 9pm, and I headed back home and called it a night. The preliminary plan was to get up an hour before sunrise and head up to Ke’e Beach for sunrise and then hit the Kalalau Trail for an 8 mile day hike. Well I got up this morning and it was still crappy out. I checked the early morning news and they said that the storm had stalled and it would be another day of “bad” (it’s still 80 degrees out!) weather. I decided to bag the hike, as I said earlier in the post, and hit a few more sights on the North Shore (and write this post…). My first stop was back at Waikoko Beach to see what was rolling in for waves. The surf was still pretty big, but not nearly what it was yesterday. Here is a picture from there this morning:
Next I hit the Kahalahala portion of Lumahai Beach (a spot I hadnt hit yet), and it was pretty cool. There was this ledge area carved into the volcanic rock and it was pretty powerful to see the waves crashing into this carved out little notch, here are a couple pictures from there:
Lastly, before I came back for lunch, I hit the actual Lumahai Beach. This was apparently made famous by the 1957 movie “South Pacific” which I have never seen. Here the waves were breaking pretty much ON the beach, like 12 footers or so, here’s a pretty cool video and a few pictures from there, hopefully the audio on the video comes out alright [UPDATE: video, again, wouldnt upload, I'll try again some other time], these waves were LOUD when they broke: 
So not sure what I’ll be up to this afternoon/night, probably heading to a couple local bars in Hanalei and see if I can meet up with the locals I met the other night. But probably nothing too crazy as the plan is to, again, wake up an hour before sunrise tomorrow and hit the Kalalau trail for a day hike, hopefully it’s nice out, I can go on the hike, and get some sick pictures… Also, how about all the jealousy coming out as cheap heat within people’s “comments”? Bring it on b!tches! First off, I’m not flexing, but 1) I actually know how to locate a gym and was using one quite a bit prior to sacrificing my body, inside and out, on this trip, and 2) I actually have to use sunscreen for protection because I don’t have a nappy-haired perma-sweater to protect me from the sun, ha! And TomD, nice call on the "permanent" vacation, although YOU may enjoy me getting the boot, I dont think I'm quite ready for it, sorry Pauly.
Hope you guys are enjoying the cold up there, it stinks that it’s been not great here (but not uncommon for this time of year here) the last two days, but 75-80 degrees has to be better than 0-10 degrees…I cant wait to get a sinus infection and a serious cold a week after I get home, fantastic. Added more photos the photobucket Kauai album as well. Also, just a little teaser, there’s a rumor of a special guest joining me my last week here (which is yet to be determined), more to come later….
Take it slow all.
With Aloha,
-Murph
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