hey annie j: Kauai!

First airplane ride together!

Oh my gosh, what a trip! We are a couple of lucky kids! Months ago we talked to Aunt Marion and Uncle Evan about renting their house in Kauai and we made it happen! Somehow, our one week trip to Kauai turned in to 2 weeks, split between Oahu and Kauai. It was magical! I took a million pictures (on my Dad's fancy camera... so let's not judge quality here!) and made a billion memories. Oh my heart... it misses this place even as I just talk about it! Of course I never want to forget a thing about this stay in paradise so I'm going to document every moment here! The pictures are in random order so that's annoying but seriously I still don't understand Blogger. This trip turned into a second anniversary celebration for us, and a third anniversary trip for Linz and Chad! We're so glad they came for part of it!

First stop: Kauai!

We got there late Friday night, and Marion and Evan welcomed us with traditional leis! How awesome are they? They took us to one of their favorite restaurants, and then we hit the grocery store - then it was definitely bed time!

Sitting at the Honolulu airport, waiting to island hop!

Saturday morning we were up and at 'em to go scuba diving!! Unfortunately the ocean was too rough for us first timers, so we didn't get to go. What we did end up doing was just as great though - we ended up heading back to the house to have breakfast with Marion, Evan and Uncle Don and Aunt Mary Lou. Then Evan took us to get our own snorkeling gear, and we headed out! We had a blast and stayed out there till we could drink salt water no longer. When we came back we had lunch at Keoki's.... YES! One of my favorite restaurants of the trip by far! I loved the food and the place!

Spouting Horn

Windy Spouting Horn!

We took a ride to Spouting Horn and watched that for a while, then we made the trip to Costco to load up on food for the week!

On Sunday we watched the day start and end over the ocean... we watched the sunrise at a point that I cannot remember, and we watched the sunset right below our house, at Breneckes.

We went to fast and testimony meeting in Koloa, had an awesome Sunday dinner and a fun beach walk.

I told Tim we MUST watch the sunrise!
Uncle Evan took us to a beautiful spot bright and early!
And as you can see below... it didn't disappoint!

Fishermen

Awwweee!

A Sunday walk on the beach!

Sunrise!

Walking back from our sunrise spot.

Tim and Evan
Evan showed us all over Kauai and it was so much fun!
It was a new adventure each day, we loved it!

Wind surfers

Sunset at Brenecke's

Monday, we finally got our scuba diving in! It was so cool... I couldn't get over the fact that I was swimming around with all these awesome creatures, not needing to be surrounded in oxygen! We saw a lot of cool things, including a sea turtle! We got to dive twice. Uncle Evan came with us too! After diving we ventured to the north end of the island and went to a sweet mini golf course! It was in this crazy garden and there were some really fun holes that we all laughed about. We stopped at the Kilauea lighthouse and stopped to shop a little too. We met up with the family and Marion's friends from the ward for dinner at Dukes!

Koloa Landing, the dive take off spot!

Cheyanne made a RIDICULOUS hole in one shot,
over this stream, bouncing off the fence and into the hole!

Hula pie!!!!!! Happy anniversary!

Tuesday we took Cheyanne up on her offer to take us surfing! And by us I mean Linz and Tim. I have eaten sand too many times to really be interested in that any more... But the beach at Hanalei was absolutely gorgeous and we had fun playing in the waves and playing with Theo! Tuesday was Linz and Chad's anniversary! So they went for a sushi date and Tim and I met up with the family for lunch at Calypso. Evan and Marion took us on a tour all the way through the northern part of the island... it was incredible! I couldn't stop staring!

All three brave surfers

Go Timmy!

Tim and Chad boogie boarded forever! It was
so funny to watch them get pounded or to ride awesome waves
and then cheer for each other!

Theo is the cutest sand covered baby ever.

Wednesday we skipped to the West ish side of the island to see the beautiful Waimea Canyon. OHhhh my gosh. It's a sight. It's incredible. We stopped at several look out points and were in awe each time. Tim and Chad had a tee time to make it to... so we hurried home and dropped them off! Linz, Marion, Mary Lou and I went to have the famous Puka dogs (yummy but filling!) and shop around a little. Linz and I snorkeled and then picked up the boys!

A million shades of green

Love these crazies!

I spy a waterfall!

At the last lookout point, it was COMPELETLEY foggy!
We could not see more than 20 feet ahead of us,
so we definitely didn't get to view the canyon from this one!
But we got cool pictures so hey!

Thursday we decided we were sick of treking around the island in the car for a few hours each day... so we stayed close to home! We went to the beach just below our house and oh good heavens it was so hot! But there were a lot of sea turtles out so we stayed. :)

We had dinner with AJ, Cheyanne, Theo, and Chey's brother at Brennecke's and it was delicious! AJ told us that if we walked down to the beach, there would be sea turtles out. AND THERE WERE!!!!!!!!!! I love them.

PC: A.J. Mellor Photography

Tim is so tan.

We don't have many digital pictures of Friday's adventures! They are mostly all on our waterproof disposable camera. We dropped Linz and Chad off at the airport in the morning after visiting AJ and Chey one more time. :( Then Tim and I headed further north to have lunch at Kauai Pasta and then head on our kayak/hike/waterfall tour! This was by far one of my favorite things we did! We rented a kayak and kayaked 2 miles up river to a spot where we tied up the kayaks and then hiked (through SO much mud!) to an incredible waterfall!
We were starving when we got back home, so we ordered some pizza and hit the hot tub to finish the day off! :)

On saturday morning we got the house cleaned up, packed up, and headed to one last stop on Kauai! Wailua falls is an amazing view... it's just, amazing!

Begin random pictures...

Mini golfing!

Wailua falls

Heeyyyy there handsome!

Many, many plane rides! This was the first one though so we
were happy as clams!

#airportselfies

Sunday hike/walk with Uncle Evan

Obviously with a rock like that, King of the rock
had to be demonstrated!

Skipping rocks:

Sunday Sunset

Tim kind of liked his book more than us!

Yes, there is a palm tree coming out of my head!!

Front porch sittin'

Kilauea Lighthouse

There are a lot of pictures of Tim... I was practicing my photography skills!

CRAZY cave!!!

From the back of the cave looking out

From the center of the cave looking out

That dark opening in the lower left?
That's the cave! It was so cool!

Tunnels beach - gorgeous and deserted!

You'll never know if we're in the desert or the tropics!

My view every morning!
I loved getting up early to come sit on the porch couch
and just ponder, enjoy, read, whatever!

The backyard, on our way to the beach!

Funny story from this day, Tim and Chad were boogie boarding
in the waves and there were SO many turtles out! You'd see them
in almost every wave! Tim totally smacked his foot on the
shell of one of them when he was getting on his board once!
His foot swelled and got red and tender from it!
Funny/cool/painful experience! :)