So the day after our wonderful surfing day, we went down to the south of the island to see The Grand Canyon of the Pacific at Waimea Canyon. The earth on Kauai is red (a bit like Devon!!) so the mountains here are beautifully coloured in green and red which makes them even more striking.
""The 3500 foot deep canyon's beauty and size is awe-inspiring, including the waterfalls visible in the distance. Blue sky, glowing red rocks, and brilliant green foliage combine for a study in color and contrast. The canyon rim is home to unique native tree ferns and loa forests, with temperatures noticeably cooler than at sea level.""
In the time since, rainwater from the slopes of Mount Wai'ale'ale have eroded Waimea Canyon along one edge of the collapse. The cliffs on the west side of the canyon are composed of thin lava flows that ran down the surface of the Kauaʻi volcano. On the other side of the canyon, the cliff walls are built from thick lava flows that pooled in the depression. Over time, the exposed basalt has weathered from its original black to bright red. ""
Derek also tried to get in the wrong car at the car park and I have to admit I just stood and watched him from our car - the look of sheer bewilderment and puzzlement on his little face when the doors didn't open was one of the funniest things I had ever seen, I was crying I was laughing so much, much to the enjoyment of the other people in the car park too. In his defence, the car was the same colour but not even the same make! It must be his age!!
So coffee looks like this .......
And always when we see things like this you have to think to yourself how did they first get to know and go about it? Did someone light a fire near a plant one day which roasted the dried beans on a plant then they bothered to put it in a cup and pour boiling water on it and say "That'll catch on". I mean hey. Do you get what I mean? Or is it just me!
Their ice cream was good too!!! Yum macadamia nut and vanilla!
We had a very busy day today actually but then as we were over here we thought we may as well and we were aching after our activity in the water yesterday.
We popped in to the National Botanical Tropical Gardens but as it was getting late, the last tram up to the start of the gardens had left as they are too huge just to go for a walk around most of it, so we just had a look around the bottom part that goes down to the sea and The Spouting Horn.
The gardens are lovely what we saw of them, maybe one day we will go back and see the rest!! As I took lots of photos of plants, I'll put them on a slide show so hover over them and be a little patient.
There is a famous restaurant here in Kauai called Brenneckes which is right on the beach here so we decided to go in as we had a voucher for free pud. It doesn't look much from the outside but inside the atmosphere and place are great and the food to die for, lots of fish and yummy cocktails.
So that's it for today.
TTFN glad you are still hanging on in there. I did take over 700 photos but deleted a lot and am not going to put them all in my blogs I promise but I'm a visual kind of person so sometimes things can be told better through pictures rather than words.
xxxxxx love each other lots xxxxxx