Mt. Wai'ale'ale: The Top of Kauai

Waimea Canyon State Park is a major Kauai geological feature that some poetic-thinking person dubbed "The Grand Canyon of the Pacific." (It wasn't Mark Twain; he'd never set foot on this island) It's a grand place that has no comparison that I know of in the islands, although Haleakala Crater on Maui is  spectacular in a similar way.

To get there from here (the north shore of Kauai) you have to drive nearly all the way around the island, on a two-lane highway through several charming coastal communities, so even though it's a distance of about 70 miles, give or take, it takes about 2 or 2 1/2 hours to get there.  We set out after breakfast and found ourselves distracted by lots of things along the way.  We'll do them some other time.  The top of the island was calling today.

I'm not a good navigator for driving because as soon as I read a map or book while the car is moving, I start to feel queasy.  The road leading to the canyon is winding and climbs from sea level to 5,000 feet in about 18 miles.  I wanted to study the map, but my tender stomach would have none of it, so I just watched the centerline and hoped for the best.  We drove into the park and began noticing koa trees and other native Hawaiian plants like ferns and maile vines.  Koa looks similar to eucalyptus in the sickle-shaped silver-gray leaves and gives a highly prized hardwood that's now very expensive.  The park has a YMCA camp and a Boy Scout Camp as well as a few cabins that can be rented from the park headquarters.  In the area of the park cafe and museum, we noticed redwood trees and Monterey cypress growing.  Home away from home, I guess, planted by someone long ago who felt that the climate is similar.  About 90% of Hawaii's botanical growth is now made up of nonnative species, so every koa tree was very encouraging to see, holding its own against extinction and invasion.

When we finally got to see Waimea Canyon, it was splendid with color, several thousand feet deep, very wide and fed with many side canyons.  Apparently, a crater had originally been formed a few million years ago, which collapsed eventually into itself, and then a side formation of a different kind of stone gradually emerged, creating layers of color and two contrasting kinds of stone one on either side of the main canyon area.  Then, the Waimea River's headwaters gradually eroded away the ever-deepening canyon to its present form.

The top of the island is Mt Wai'ale'ale at 5,140 feet and the wettest place on earth, receiving about 400 inches of rainfall a year.  Mist was light today, thank god, because we didn't have a poncho or jacket to protect ourselves.

After exclaiming about the huge size and depth of the canyon, its tributary ravines and gullies, we drove on through more koa forest until we got to the final parking lot and took a look.  Before us was a mist-enshrouded expanse of whiteness beyond the railing, but soon enough features of geography began to appear in the mist.  There were no interpretive signs, so we weren't sure what to look for, but then the fantastic fluted mountainsides of the Na Pali Coast took shape, then the ocean far below and a rainbow arching between them.  We took a few dozen pictures and walked around looking for more viewpoints and talking with other visitors who were all looking dreamily at the vista below us.  It's free to drive into the park and see the sights and worth taking the time to get there.  Superlatives hardly touch the feeling of wonder you are left with.

We visited the museum, also free, although a donation is suggested and then drove back down to the coast to Waimea Town, down a road - Hwy 550 - that is the closest imitation of a roller coaster you'll ever find.  It has dips, drops, turns, climbs and then even more precipitous drops, and every single inch of it provides panoramic technicolor views of the canyon or the vast plains of western Kauai or the wide silvery-blue Pacific and islands beyond.  Or forest, ravines and coastal towns.  Or combinations of any of those.  It has just been paved nicely and is just fantastic.  I wonder if they haven't filmed a few car commercials on it; it wouldn't surprise me a bit.  Unbelievable.

We drove to Port Allen to an beach in a small industrial area locally known as Glass Beach to look for seaglass and found some old blobs of brown, some polished white glass and a few kernels of blue, but it is a popular hunters' beach, so you have to be patient and get there at optimum tide.  We spent about half an hour, maybe an hour, in the afternoon sun and warm water, picking through the beach made of glass beads, ground over decades, looking for special pieces.

Our appetites were in full roar by then.  We got lucky and spotted a sign for Monday night pizza buffet at Brick Oven Pizza in Kalaheo for $14.95 each, all you can eat salad, pizza, pasta and clam chowder - fresh and good.  Then, we headed east once again to see Spouting Horn at Poipu resort area at sunset.  This is a wide shelf of old lava rock that has two or three blowholes that the surf shoots up through when the tide is right.  One of them makes a loud blowing sound that is haunting in nature, a lot like a whale blowing when it reaches the surface.

It was a day of sightseeing, thinking about 4 million years of island formation and the changes the little round island has seen in all its days.  It feels like it has personality, wisdom or character, maybe all that, but it is a special place.  My friend who said I'd be bored in a week was so wrong I can't even say.  I keep finding more I want to do and learn.  Of course, as is true on all journeys, the place is changing me the way it changes most visitors, slowing things down and asking for patience and a closer look.  It seems to be an easy thing to do, no problem at all.