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Trip 1

Hanalei Bay Beach Walk

Difficulty: Easy, tennis shoes recommended.

Highlights: Most visitors to Kauai agree that Hanalei Bay—indeed, the entire Hanalei region—is one of the loveliest places in the world. Why not enjoy a stroll on the bay’s sands, from the Hanalei River to Waioli Stream? If the weather is fair, stay a while. If it’s misty, you’re in luck: you’ll probably see spectacular waterfalls inland!

Note that this walk, like any beach walk, can be hazardous on a stormy day with high surf. Also, Hanalei Bay’s waters are polluted by agricultural runoff; consider that as well as the height of the surf when deciding whether to swim here.

Driving instructions: Drive north and west from Lihue on Highway 56, past the Hanalei National Wildlife Refuge Billboard. There’s a wonderful viewpoint here; stop and enjoy it. Now continue toward Hanalei, down a switchback, and across the Hanalei River on a one-lane bridge. The rule for these one-lane bridges is that you yield to any traffic that’s already on the bridge; if there’s none, you may proceed with caution.

In Hanalei town, where Hanalei Center is on the left side of the highway, you turn right onto Aku and follow it a short distance to a beachfront road. Turn right again and follow the beachfront road north to a parking lot by the Hanalei River. Park here, a little more than 34¾ miles from Lihue.

Permit required: None.

Description: The first thing you’ll want to do here is to stroll north very briefly to the riverbank in order to take in the view upstream and inland, where steep cliffs richly clothed in greenery rise skyward. After the rain, the fluted cliffs boast long, sheer waterfalls; be sure to look closely for the tiny ones as well as for the obvious ones. Pause often during this walk to gaze from sea to cliffs and to enjoy the contrast.

Now walk out and turn south, roughly paralleling the water’s edge. You’ll probably want to swing inland around the old pier (“Hanalei Landing” on the topo). The beach is backed by tropical almond and ironwood trees; tree heliotrope with its short stature, broad crown of gray-green leaves, and wonderfully twisted form; and beach naupaka. Streamers of beach morning glory and beach vitex extend down onto your broad, sandy “trail.”

Beach naupaka

Fishermen cast their nets into the nearer waters, while surfers play farther out. People and dogs stroll, splash, and romp along the strand. The beach’s sands may harbor—ah—contributions from the local dogs as well as the occasional shell. Oh, well, a close-up examination is seldom as romantic as a view from a distance! On the quieter, wave-washed sections, you’re likely to spot a scuttling ghost crab (see Trip 13 for more on ghost crabs).

You follow the curve of the bay as it gradually turns west. Some 1⅓ miles from the parking lot, you reach the east bank of the mouth of beautiful Waioli Stream—more about Waioli below. Here, purple water hyacinth blooms a little upstream and snowy-white cattle egrets wade through the limpid water on their stilt-like legs. Of all the scenes immediately along the bay, this one is, I think, the prettiest.

There’s private property on Waioli Stream’s west bank, and it’s posted NO TRESPASSING. So take a splash in the stream, enjoy the scene from the east bank, and then retrace your steps.

On your way back, if the weather is sunny, look for a good spot to settle down for a few restful hours. After all, there’s more to a beach walk than just walking!

Namolokama and Waioli

Waioli Stream begins as a waterfall from Namolokama Mountain, some four miles south of Hanalei Bay. When swollen by recent rains, this waterfall is a spectacular sight from many points along Kauai’s north-east shore.

In his charming book Kauai Tales, a retelling of traditional Kauai stories, Frederick B. Wichman applies the name “Namolokama” to the waterfall. Characters in the stories liken the cascading long hair of a young woman to Namolokama Falls—for example, Na-iwi’s daughter’s hair in the story of Na-keiki-o-na-iwi.

Here’s a story that’s about Waioli Stream and Namolokama, but it has a more serious purpose, according to Mr. Wichman, and illustrates an important way in which oral traditions convey information down the generations. Can you guess that purpose as I try to paraphrase the story?

It’s about the search of a young man for the woman he loves but whom he has never seen. He has heard her from a great distance as she sang to him, calling to him to seek her along Waioli. Starting perhaps from Tahiti, he sails into Hanalei Bay and begins his search where Waioli Stream meets the sea. At several different places along Waioli, he meets women whose appearance and demeanor illustrate that place’s characteristics. For example, at Maha-moku, near the mouth of Waioli’s valley, the story says the stream forms a pond over which a hau tree hangs, its fallen yellow blossoms drifting on the glassy water as they turn a deep red-yellow. The woman there wears a lei of hau flowers. She is resting as the stream rests at Maha-moku after its long journey down mountain and valley.

Each time the young man thinks perhaps he has found the hidden singer, then realizes the woman is not she, and continues to search along Waioli. As he leaves, each woman gives him a sheet of kapa, the bark cloth of Polynesia, of a different color, a color characteristic of that place, for his wife-to-be. For example, the tapa of Maha-moku is the red-yellow of the drifting hau blossoms.