Need some pictures to warm you up? A little taste of Hawaii...LOTS of pics!

[Squid]

Over the past two weeks, myself and Miss Squid along with her family took a trip to the island of Kauai...the most northwestern island in the Hawaii chain. With all the winter weather around the north and such, I thought I'd post some pictures from the trip to warm some of you guys up. For the entire two weeks we were there, the night temperatures were around 70 with a daytime high of 80. Most days were absolutely perfect with very little wind and very scattered sprinkles (rain is VERY common for this island).

Here is the view from outside our condo....sure did suck to wake up to the sun beaming over the ocean every morning outside the windows!









Over the two weeks we took in many of the activities that the island had to offer. We started out with a little snorkeling at Lydgate State Park.





Even 5000 miles away...I couldn't escape the wrath of a damn Lizardfish!! This guy was close to our famous Wilmington Lizards in size...



That evening we enjoyed a Luau on the island. Seabiscuit was begging me to stuff one of the coconut clad ladies in my suitcase and bring them back to the island .....Miss Squid soon shot that idea down.













The next day was Miss Squid's birthday and for the sake of getting slapped, I won't tell how old she was! Most girls would want to go to the spa and get pampered for their birthday....not Andrea! She wanted to "Do Something Dirty"! On the southside of the island, there is a company called Kauai ATV who do guided trails on "mud bug" ATV's. I was looking forward to this all week long and it turned out to be an absolute BLAST!! A 22 mile round trip journey into the forest took us to some natural waterfalls and through a LOT of mud!!

Before....





During....





After....



The following day myself and Andrea's two brothers, Jared and Aaron joined Zoe of Fathom Five Scuba Diving for a little underwater time. This would be my first official scuba dive and am now ruined for life.....like I need another hobby.

An orange mouth lizard fish...and you though NC lizards were gnarly



An assortment of reef fish...









A peacock grouper and a trumpet fish...



Towards the end of the trip we decided to get a little adventurous and called up Kauai Backcountry for a little ziplining over the treetops.





Miss Squid soaring high...



And a little dip in a mountain runoff stream...



After ziplining we came back to the condo and found the beach roped off. Upon further inspection, we came across this cool guy....a HIGHLY endangered Hawaiian monk seal. There are only 33 of these guys on the island and less than 1,000 in the world.







And then of course we did clean up several nights for some nice dinners....Miss Squid cleans up a LOT better than I do!







And what would one of my posts be without a great facial picture?!?! There were also LOTS of these critters around the condo...







And "Frogman"...



After those 2 weeks, it was shell shock to come back to 38 degree weather when we stepped off the plane, but it is good to be back home.

[Capt_John]

Looks like you guys had fun. I wish I would've known you were going to Kauai. I could've hokked you up with some of my buddies there and gotten you the "real" tour of Kauai. I miss that place. My stay there was way too short. I guees you couldn't get out fishing on your trip. I talked to my buddy there and he said it's been blowing for 3 weeks straight. Oh well, glad you two had a ball.

[gottaflylee]

Hum...I didn't think either of you were comming back... Well as you know, you missed a great party, but seems like the two of you had a great party of your own... Great pictures by the way...

[tunatamer4]

Great shots! Thanks for sharing your vacation with us.

[WAHOONBOX]

ONE OF THE COOLEST VACATION PICTORIALS I HAVE EVER SEEN!!! FIRST CLASS PICS DUDE! I MEAN SHIT...I LOVE THE SNAIL CLOSE UPS ! I CRAPPED IN MY SHORTS ON THE ROPE THING AND GOT MUD IN MY EYE ON THE TRAIL RIDE!

YOU BOTH ARE DAREDEVILS WITH A CAUSE!

I JUST WANT TO SAY YOU BOTH LOOK VERY HAPPY TOGETHER.....


THAT MY FRIEND IS WHAT I GET OUT OF THIS ADVENTURE OF YOURS.....AS ROD STEWART ONCE SANG: "EVERY PICTURE TELLS A STORY DON'T IT!"

THE MOST PRECIOUS THING YOU HAVE....IS EACH OTHER.... MAKE IT LAST.

[weekender]

awesome trip, looks like you guys had a great time with a wide vairity of activities. Congrtas to all.

[Robja]

Pretty work there Squid. I wish I had carried an underwater camera when I went to Hawaii. Judging by Miss Squids grin she looked to be a little worried about your driving in the ATV.

[Tunaman40]

Cool pics. Thanks for sharing . I definately have to try that zip line deal

[clt_capt]

Great post and report. Looks like a great trip.

[KEY-LIME-PIE]

WOW! Great pics! Congrats on your new life, wish you the best.

Capt Tom