Kapa'a, Kaua'i

Aloha! It's been a decade since we last visited the island of Kaua'i. Last time we here we went heavy on the adventure -- with a doors-off helicopter ride over the Napali Coast. This time around we have a more relaxed agenda, starting with a couple of delicious Mai Tais and some live music at our hotel in Kapa'a, on the eastern side of the island (also known as the "Coconut Coast").

Our hotel offered beach yoga, so we gave that a try. As it turned out, it was actually more like "grass yoga" but at least we weren't covered with sand by the end!

Kaua'i is the lushest and greenest of the Hawaiian islands; its nickname is the "Garden Island". This is due to the generous rain that falls at Mount Wai'ale'ale. Wai'ale'ale is an extinct shield volcano that is the heart of the island of Kaua'i. At its summit, this peak gets nearly 400 inches of rain per year - that's a LOT of water! When the sugar cane industry got started on Kaua'i in the mid-1800s, farmers were able to use the heavy rainfall to their advantage. Teams of workers hand-dug long irrigation canals to bring freshwater down from the mountains straight to the cane fields. In the photo below you can see misty clouds covering the summit of Wai'ale'ale.

The last commercial sugar cane plantation closed in 2009 and sugar cane is no longer harvested as a commercial crop here on Kaua'i. But the Lihue Plantation's former Hanama'ulu irrigation canal is still in use -- as a tourist attraction. 

The best way to see this part of the island is to do the tubing adventure with Kauai Backcountry outfitters. They kit you out with helmets, gloves, and headlamps, then load you into a 4x4 shuttle vehicle for the scenic drive to the launch site. Everyone climbs into an inner tube and then it's off to the races.

There's no steering involved, you just float and spin along with the brisk current through the 2-mile run of the "ditch". Along the way, you go through five tunnels that have been carved right through the hillsides. The longest tunnel is about 1/2 mile. It's pitch black in there, which is what the headlamps are for.

Everything about the tubing adventure exceeded our expectations -- the guides were great, we learned a lot about the history of sugar farming on Kaua'i, and we even got to see a part of the island we wouldn't normally get to see because the route goes through private land. If you're ever on Kaua'i, we recommend checking it out!