Pining for the Fjords

Want to read more?  Past blog posts:   Day 1 ,  Day 2, Part 1 ,  Day 2 Part 2 ,  Day 3 Part 1 ,  Day 3 Part 2 ,  Day 4 , Day 5 Part 1 As mentioned in the previous blog post, for our final big activity of our trip to Kaua’i, we attended the Luau Kalamaku at the Kilohana Plantation, an old sugar plantation on the island.  While Chris has attended a luau in the past (when his high school water polo team played a tournament in Hawaii), in my one previous trip to the islands, it wasn’t something we could fit in financially.  This time, we wanted to make it a priority, and since the Kalamaku Luau ran on Tuesday nights, we figured it was a fitting closure to our time on Kaua’i.  Since we picked the luau package that included a train ride around the plantation (because history.  Plus: trains!), we were due to check in right at 5pm.  Wanting to give ourselves extra time for unexpected traffic delays, we ended up there early, around 4:15; we also knew the Koloa Rum Company’s tasting room

Want to read more?  Past blog posts:   Day 1 ,  Day 2, Part 1 ,  Day 2 Part 2 ,  Day 3 Part 1 ,  Day 3 Part 2 , Day 4 After our scrumptious sushi dinner at the Dolphin, we slept in a bit the next day, choosing to once again have breakfast at the Nanea restaurant at our hotel in exchange for not having the room cleaned up by the onsite staff.  Before we headed to breakfast, we took a quick jaunt down to the beach access near the entrance to our resort.  Although the Westin was fantastic in a lot of ways, one drawback is that it sits on a bluff overlooking the shoreline; thus, it doesn’t lead down to its own beach.  However, it has a path to public beach access literally right outside its entrance sign, so we decided to take a morning stroll. Outside the sign for the hotel The path down to the beach was short (.25 miles or so) but pretty steep, and since it was rainy the day before (and we were wearing flip flops), we skidded around a bit, me losing my footing entirely at

Want to read more?  Past blog posts:  Day 1 , Day 2, Part 1 , Day 2 Part 2 , Day 3 Part 1 , Day 3 Part 2 After our big outing the day before, we slept in a bit the next day as we needed some extra R and R.  Although we planned to participate in the sunrise yoga class on the same golf course where we did the sunset tour a few days prior, events conspired to make us miss the adventure.  In the middle of the night, I awoke due to some stomach troubles and ended up ejecting most of my dinner into the appropriate bathroom receptacle.  We initially blamed this on a small bout of food poisoning (particularly as we not charitably included toward our meal of the night before at Keoki’s), but events over the next few days made us reconsider this a bit (ooh, foreshadowing!  It’s like I’m a real writer). Anywhoo, we eventually dragged ourselves out of bed and ate breakfast at our hotel’s restaurant, Nanea.  One of the cool options at the Westin was their program called, “You Tidy, We Trea