We. Love. To travel. When I (Tay) was in college, I traveled abroad a few times a year and took road trips whenever possible. My entire college experience revolved around buying plane tickets and taking my camera, along with my backpack, to see the world. From Italy to France, London to Patagonia, Chile, Iceland to New Zealand, my heart has always been a jet-setting one. When Mike and I met, I was elated to find out that he too had a huge passion for traveling. One of our first and earliest trips was a cross country drive to West Virginia so he could meet me family. Since then, we’ve spent the last five years trying to do as many road trip and see as many states together as possible. Undeniably, the two hardest states to get to are Alaska (which we visited last year in 2016) and Hawaii. I figured going to Hawaii was a long shot, at least for another 5 years, but when we found a couple cheap tickets while the snow was coming down in Colorado, we quickly booked our trip and secured some heat and a little R&R.
As a couple, this was our first warm and relaxing vacation we had been on. All of our other trips (New Zealand, Iceland, and Alaska to name a few) revolved around road tripping to see as much as we could, and we always nailed a cold, rainy month. Don’t get me wrong, these places were so unique, beautiful, and amazing in their own ways…we were just ready for a little sunshine. Needless to say, some 80º temperatures, misty rain on our faces during some epic hikes, and relaxing by the ocean sounded incredible for this vacation! Some of our favorite places we visited and things we did were:
• Exploring the Nāpali Coast State Wilderness Park for amazing hiking and views (and where we’ll one day go back to finish the hikes we couldn’t this time around)
• Cafe hopping and finding Java Kai in Kapaa
• Hitting up endless farmers markets on the daily
• Enjoying the best hot dog we’ve ever had in our lives at Puka Dog
• Hiking at Waimea Canyon State Park
• Again, cafe hopping, and enjoying my first kombucha and some tea at Ha Cafe
• And enjoying the incredible hospitality from the folks at Kauai Shores
We are honestly already planning our next trip back to Kauai!
Love,
Mike and Tay
