Wacky Weather

We are on the island of Kauai and the place that we are staying is located on the north side. From the airport it is about an hour and half - two hour drive.  There is only one road that gets you there - Highway 51 (or maybe it was 56 - I'm bad with directions - ask anyone!)  Hawaii Highway 51 is a little different than an Illinois highway.  Parts of it look similar, but the last part of it is full of twists and turns, one lane bridges and drop off the side of the mountain cliffs.  There were at least five bridges between Hanalei (the closest decent sized town) and our place.  We arrived on Thursday.  The whole week prior the island had received 36 inches of rain - very abnormal.  Many streams feed into the ocean and thus a lot of bridges that go over the streams.  At least one bridge was closed the three days prior to our arrival, but Thursday morning they were all open and stayed open all day.  Time for all of us arrive!  My parent's had been there that morning to drop off their luggage and groceries.  My mom drove us home from the airport and my dad drove my brother and his wife later that evening.  By eight o'clock that night we are all together.  Time for vacation to start!  The kids were worn out and fell asleep in grandma and grandpa's arms and we were all pretty tuckered out too!  We all turned in and that's when it started...more rain accompanied with a thunderstorm.  Here is a run down of our weather:

Thursday - We arrive to partly cloudy skies, but it is warm.  Thunderstorm that night.

Friday - Bridges are closed (again!).  It rained all day.  Dad and Sara and I ventured out just to see if anything was open. Red Hot Mamas convenient store was open, but not much to offer.  We were after ice and milk.  She had neither!  Well, technically there were two bags of ice, but they were in the ice cream freezer helping it stay cold!  The Red Hot Mama told us that she doesn't get milk deliveries because the bridges can't support the weight of a milk truck.  Interesting! We sit in the hot tub and get natural rain water facials and we are sure this is wonderful for our skin because it is Hawaiian Water! Maybe I have read one too many Fancy Nancy books!  During that night and into the next morning it stormed again, even harder.  It was kind of thunder that wakes you from a dead sleep because your bed is shaking.  Hawaii knows how to do a thunderstorm! 

Saturday - 5:30 am the power goes out.  Dad reads online that Kauai has been declared a State of Disaster.  We now accept that we are part of a natural disaster and my brother recommends rationing food and penalties for sneaking food!  I wasn't really worried, remember all that food I packed for the plane?! We break out the cards and dice!  It never stopped raining for more than 15-20 minutes.  The power returned just as the sun was starting to set.  No storms tonight.

Sunday - Today we had scheduled a boat tour of the Na'Pali Coast - we had to reschedule.  David and Sara venture out and find the bridges to be open, but shortly after they return there are reports that they are again closed!  It rained all morning, afternoon and evening...

(It sounds doom and gloom, but our spirits were high.  After all, we were all together and it really became rather comical!)

Monday - We woke up to sun!! The bridges are open! We played at the beach down the road, watch tree trimmers on the side of the mountain and kite surfers in our backyard. 

Tuesday - Forecast was not great, but it turned out to be a good day.  It was a mix of sun and clouds and few passing showers, but not bad.  We had our fingers crossed for good weather because some of us were doing a helicopter tour.

Wednesday - Apparently, we avoided a tidal wave that lost momentum in the ocean due to an earthquake overnight in Japan.  Geesh!! Since the tidal wave warning was called off the Na'Pali Coast boat tour was on and we had a great day for it.  It was a little cool, but we had sun most of the day and sunburns to prove it! While we were gone a tree fell and blocked this infamous Highway 51 for over four hours!! While cutting it into pieces to remove it they hit a bee hive and the bees swarmed like crazy!  Glad we weren't waiting in our car for that special event! 

Thursday - Perfect day!  This was the first day that I actually got hot and even wore my swimsuit to the beach!  We had sun and a breeze (not wind!) and most of all NO RAIN!! We had just finished dinner and thinking what a wonderful day it had been and the POWER GOES OUT AGAIN!!  We had a candlelight atmosphere for a bit and did some awesome star gazing, but then everyone headed to bed.  Luckily, the power came back withing a few hours while we were sleeping. 

Friday - Our last day was a great one to end on.  We enjoyed the beach and the sun all morning and early afternoon.  Grant and I caught a nap in the hammock.  Brandon snorkeled right outside our door and we went to a Lu-Au that evening. 

Saturday - We didn't get to enjoy much of this beautiful day as we were packing up to leave :(