Kauai Preview

Erin and I decided, with some helpful encouragement from friends, to take a short trip to Hawaii before she starts her new job. We absolutely loved the trip, and I've been putting off writing about it, because I didn't know where to start, and I didn't want to write a never-ending post that goes into mind-numbing detail about the color of the paint in our hotel room.

My solution is to try and break up the trip into multiple posts because:
a) if I don't write this in little chunks, I'll never write it at all;
b) if I don't write this in little chunks, no one will bother reading the entire post;
c) if I don't write this in little chunks, I won’t be able to satisfy those readers who check this blog daily for updates (and we know who both of you are).

With that as an introduction, here is post numero uno:

After several weeks of discussion and vigorous internet research, we concluded that we would entrust Joseph to the care of his loving extended family and run away as a couple for 4 nights on the island of Kauai.

Joseph

Leaving Joseph behind was a difficult decision. We'd never even left him overnight with anyone, and we didn't know how he’d handle not having either of us around for so many days in a row. Plus, we really like being around him, and it would be the longest amount of time either of us had spent away from him.

Joseph helping us pack (no audio)

We ultimately determined that having extended family come stay at our house would be the best solution for his (and our) peace of mind. We figured that if he was going to be in the care of non-parents for consecutive days, at least he could be surrounded by familiar things, play with his own toys, sleep in his own bed, splash in his own toilet bowl, etc…

Without the support of his Aunt Lauren, Grandpa, Nana, and Uncle Brent this trip never would have happened. We knew that Joseph was in good hands, and that enabled us to relax and enjoy time together as a couple.

While we were away, Joseph decided that his Grandpa was his best buddy, and by the time we came back home Joseph still hadn’t finished showing him each of his toys.

As far as we can tell, Joseph didn't really notice that we were gone, but still loved us when we came back. We couldn’t have asked for anything better.

As far as our trip went, we also couldn’t have asked for a better vacation.

Kauai

Kauai, whose name comes from the Hawaiian for either "over-priced" or "really expensive" (depending on the translation), is absolutely stunning.

To give you a taste of how beautiful the island is, here are a couple pictures we took from the Na Pali Coast. During our first couple of days we explored this part of the island through an airplane tour, a boat tour, and by hiking around.

--from Land--

--from Sea--

--from Above--

Seeing the island from multiple vantage points helped us to appreciate just how incredible Kauai is. While on a tour, we were told that the Na Pali Coast is often referred to as "the eighth wonder of the world" (Todd is still busy trying to figure out how exactly he got bumped to the number nine spot).

Not surprisingly, quite a few movies have been filmed here, and we've decided that our cheap date nights for the immediate future will consist of renting movies with scenes filmed on Kauai.



In fact, we already rented Jurassic Park, which neither of us had seen in a long time. I only mention this because I'm about done with this post, AND it provides an introduction for tomorrow's post, "How my son is like the velociraptors in Jurassic Park."