Kauai - The Beaches

We visited three beaches on Kauai. The first photos are of the hotel grounds where we stayed and the beach where the hotel was located.

 We stayed at the Hyatt, and the grounds there were impressive. They had a large pool with a water slide, and a restaurant nestled in the water. We ate dinner there one night, and while it was good, I don't think it was worth what we paid. Here's photo of my entree - swordfish and a lobster tail with broccoli and mashed purple sweet potatoes. Smallish portions, big prices. The service was great, and the view was beautiful, so I guess you're paying for the whole package.

A photo in the foyer of the hotel after dinner. The leis smelled amazing. There was someone waiting for us at the airport in Kauai with them when we arrived. They lasted about 3 days. We stored them in the fridge when we weren't wearing them.

 These are photos of the beach that they hotel was on. We had hoped to swim here, but we quickly learned that the beach is named "Shipwreck Beach" for a reason. Before we walked down to the beach, James called the front desk to inquire about how safe it would be to swim there that day. The hotel employee told him that the while the water was calmer than usual, they do not ever advise guests to swim there. We decided to see for ourselves. I didn't bother with my snorkeling gear because of what we'd been told. James got in the water while I snapped a few photos, and he came out after just a few minutes. He had cut his foot on a rock, and he told me not to try to swim there. I heeded his warning, and after attending to his foot, we spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel pool.  Red flags were posted at the beach for the duration of our stay. We saw some magnificent waves there.

Our last full day on Kauai, we spent the most of the morning at Poipu Beach. We stopped by a small beach called "Lawai Beach" on our way there, which was also too rocky to swim at. The photo above was taken there. We didn't stay there long. 

Poipu beach has been named one of the best beaches in the world, and we had a blast there.

We were able to snorkel here, and we saw a lot of very colorful fish - along with a couple of eels. While eels are kinda creepy, I was excited to see them in the wild for the first time.

 We saw some humahuma fish and some parrot fish.

I was also really excited to see a Hawaiian Monk seal on the beach. It stayed there the whole time we were there.

One other animal that we saw a lot of specimens of at the beach:

That would be chickens. Kauai has a bit of a problem with wild chickens. Many of the locals see them as pets, and it's not hard to see why after seeing them all over the place - the beach, business areas, shopping centers, you name it. The only place we didn't see them was at our hotel. I don't know how they kept them away, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had an employee or two who had the job of relocating stray chickens on a daily basis. I will say that they are not as pesky as Seagulls though.