Day 2 In Kauai - Okolehao Trail Hike

After an exhausting day of traveling to get here, we both crashed super early and consequently woke up real early this morning. We decided to try a decently challenging hike in the north shore area. Our guidebook indicated the trail would be fairly tough and mostly uphill, but only 2 miles long. We thought it would be a fine way to start our honeymoon...

Well it turned out the trail is basically straight uphill for most of the ascent. Along the way we got to see some really gorgeous flora.

The trail was relatively well marked for the first 3/4 or so, then it started to get real overgrown and we were constantly scraping our legs on the plants. We almost turned back a few times, but the views were so compelling that we kept on truckin. Here is one on the way up:

After an hour and 45 minutes of strenuous, uphill hiking, we reached the top and were greeted by a small plateau dotted with Ti plants, the roots of which are used to make a local liquor called Okolehao, which the trail is named after. Apparently, during prohibition, bootleggers used to grow their crop up here to evade authorities. After hiking the trail, I can't blame the cops for letting them be.

The view from the end of the trail was truly amazing and well worth the arduous hike. We could see lots of helicopters giving people tours, and the view from up there let us turn around in place and see about 20% of the entire island from that one point. If someone in a helicopter saw us up there, they must have thought we were crazy because the trail was so dense with vegetation, it would not have been visible at all from the air.

The way back down only took about an hour, and was a little dicey, as it had rained last night and this morning. Overall, we were really tired, very muddy, and super hungry... So it was a good hike :) Not a bad way to spend our first morning out.