Day 7: Kauai - Koloa

22 years ago, when Steve and I were in our honeymoon, we went on this kayaking/hiking/swimming tour to the Secret Falls of Kauai. This trip has left an almost mythical impression on my mind that the river we kayaked on has been my “happy place” for over 20 years! Many years ago I experienced a severe case of insomnia that I had to see a psychiatrist for it. He told me to close my eyes, go to the most peaceful and happy place in my mind. So I came here, on this river in Kauai. Early morning mist hovering the water, red flowers falling on the surface, so quiet that the only sound I heard was our paddles. With the psychiatrist’s guidance, I fell into slumber for the first time for a long time.

When we were deciding which islands to visit, I insisted coming to Kauai, because I wanted to visit this river again.

So this morning, that’s what we did. We went on the exact same tour as before. Kayaking/hiking/swimming to the Secret Falls. Except the falls are no longer a secret. By the time we got into our kayak, there were many people already on the river. It was hard to re-live my memory, so I was a bit disappointed. Knowing my desire, Steve paddled hard so we were ahead of our group. At one turn, we didn’t see anyone ahead, and we were far enough from others. For a brief moment, we were alone on a stretch of quiet river, with only red flowers on the water around us.

Something has changed from before. A board walk has been added to the hiking section of the trip; there were way more people all around. Something has not changed, the turkey sandwich the tour company provided was exactly same as I remembered; the trip was still amazing and the falls was still magnificent.

Having Evan with us this time also made the tour special. This is still my “happy place”!

Dinner today was at a restaurant called Merriman. They had specialized Hawaii regional cuisine for many decades. Happy to say everything we had here was fantastic!

After dinner, we played some games at the courtyard. Steve and Evan engaged fierce battles of Connect Four with them each winning one game. Steve however lost the game of Jenga. A stroll by the ocean one more time allowed us to say goodbye to Kauai.

We are heading to the Big Island of Hawaii tomorrow.Read more