Kayaking on the Wailua River

Aloha! Today we went on a long journey on the Wailua River to get to a waterfall called Secret Falls. The Wailua River is located in the Wailua River State Park, on the East Coast of Kauai. The river is 20 miles long, and the only river in the state of Hawaii that can be passed through by motorized boat. The river is fed by two main waterfalls and also by rain from Mount Waialeale, the wettest place in the world. Mount Waialeale gets 480 inches of rain per year! The river is surrounded by a lush green rainforest.

First, we rented 2 kayaks, which held one adult with two children.  Everyone had to paddle except my younger brother and sister. At first, I thought paddling was going to be fun but after we started it was very hard.When we got on the boat the wind was blowing us forward so we didn’t have to paddle as much.  It was a two mile kayak trip.  When we got there, our hands were very tired so we sat down on the rock, rested, and ate lunch before starting our one mile hike to the waterfall. 

                                                                                  

Crossing the river

The hike was not very strenuous and mostly following the river. We had to look down so we didn’t trip on the many roots that stuck out of the ground. After walking for about 20 minutes, the trail ended right at the river and we can see that it restarted at the other side. That meant that we had to cross.  We all had tennis shoes on, instead of water shoes. We had to take off our shoes and walk in the water. The rocks were very slippery and also hurt our feet. When we got across, we noticed we made a big mistake. We should have kept our shoes on because by the time we crossed, we were all wet anyway.  Then we started up hill and walked more.  After we walked about, another mile, we still didn’t see the water fall and didn’t see anyone else on the trail, all we saw were some toads near the trail. We were lost! We continued a little further and then the trail ended. We had to start walking back until we found the right trail. Once we turned onto the right trail the waterfall was only a couple of minutes away. The secret falls was a huge waterfall, and the water was really cold and refreshing. We all went swimming in the waterfall and swam all the way to the falls. When we went near the falls, the water was falling so hard that it hurt and we swam away.

Hiking through the rainforest

Cane toad

Our trip back to our kayak went very smoothly. We didn’t get lost and crossed the river with our shoes on so it didn’t hurt our fee. When we got to our kayak, we were all tired, but we still had to paddle back to the dock where we left our car. In the afternoon the wind started to pick up and we had to paddle the kayak against the wind. We were paddling as fast as we could, but the wind was blowing so hard that we were going backwards and being pushed up against the bushes that grow alongside the river. The bushes were prickly so it hurt a little. We just couldn’t paddle any more. Luckily, we saw there was a dock, and we decided to stop and rest.  The owner of the dock let us rest and had a great idea. He told us to ask someone with a motor boat to take us back to the dock and then we can drive and pick up the kayaks. My mom went to get our van while we stayed behind. While we were waiting for her, we saw a man weaving baskets, hats, fish, and birds from coconut tree leaves. We asked him how he makes them and he showed us. It looked very hard. He said that he has to climb the trees to get the coconut leaves.   After that, he gave all of us a fish on a fishing pole that he wove right in front of us. Finally our mom arrived and we loaded up the kayaks and went to a a restaurant to eat dinner. When we finally got home, we were all very exhausted and went swimming in the pool to cool off. We had a very exciting and adventurous day.

What interesting place have you hiked?