Day 2 Kauai

Day 2.

The night was tough. Isla is sicker than we thought, and coughed and cried through the night. It stopped around 3, when we gave her some Motrin – but still, we woke up around 530, due to jet lag and light from the balcony overlooking the ocean. The ocean is beautiful sleeping music, by the way. We woke up with some papaya and banana with our coffee, hung around the hotel room for awhile, then went to this cafe in Kapa'a that was supposed to have really good coffee and breakfast bagels – it was true – mine had sundried tomatoes, fresh basil, melted provolone, and pesto. Everything has its price, however, upon grabbing the coffee and attempting to garnish it with half and half, in itself a complicated dance between two people and their drinks, Isla grabbed the pile of napkins, which in turn caused Tegan to jostle her full to the brim with boiling hot coffee cup, and thus spilling said hot coffee onto the crook of my arm, where it pooled, cooking the sensitive flesh with aromatic liquid. This entire exchange was completely silent, save for a slight, sudden intake of air coming from my mouth. Ouch.


We walked across to the beach, after I sloughed off the burned skin from my inner elbow, and watched Isla play with the chickens (which are everywhere on this island – it is rumored that they were let loose from coops during a hurricane in the early nineties, and have flourished where there are no natural predators). At some point while sitting on this beach, drinking coffee and watching Isla, at 6 in the morning with shorts and flip flops, we both came to the conclusion that we have to live here on Kauai at some point. There is a Kaiser Hospital and plenty of schools. Shit, it just might happen. Seriously.


After this burning excursion complete with life altering revelations, we returned to the hotel to force Isla into a nap. This was successful on the seventh try of alternating between daddy and mommy as the sleep procurers. Mommy was the victor in this battle. Finally she slept, and I got to read a few more chapters of “Let the Right One In” because when I'm not baby herding, I like to catch up on my pre-teen vampires (no – not like Twilight jerkface, like Swedish horror – done really well). It's all beside the point, however, as Isla woke up all smiles and bubbles again, so we decided to go out to that most famous of Kauai landmarks, renown for its beauty and sheer encapsulation of what it is to be Hawaii: Wal-Mart.

The Wal Mart in Lehui is pretty much like a Wal Mart anywhere, minus the chickens in the parking lot. We needed a cheap stroller – so we got that and some grown folk snacks too. I was thwarted in my attempt to buy the Back to the Future trilogy for 10 dollars by a disapproving Tegan, who told me like it was: no movies Aaron. Whatever – I chose wasabi potato chips and she doesn't even like wasabi – so ha. Somehow I still don't feel like I won in that situation. Oh well.

It was now time for lunch, and since Isla's mood swings have made dining in a sit-down place virtually impossible – our options have been severely limited. I turned to a recommendation from a co-worker who has family here in Kauai and own a restaurant called the Barbecue Inn. So – we went down a street we hadn't gone before – and lo and behold there was the Inn itself, with nary a parking place, it was so popular. In we go, as the crowd began to thin, and ordered from the diner menu. I got a mahi mahi burger, Tegan had a teryaki chicken sandwich – both were awesome! Served with french fries, rice, coffee, salad, soup, and desert all for 20 bucks for the two of us. Even Isla was impressed with the fish – so all in all, a pretty outstanding lunch.

1:30 and it was beach time. We surveyed our trusty Kauai guidebook for good baby beaches, and found that the Lydgate Park beach was surrounded by boulders, and thus had no waves... sounds perfect – it was, almost. When we first arrived, the clouds had rolled in and the wind was blowing mercilessly. I was tempted to say “hey, it's cold” until I realized that we were in Hawaii, and would probably be beaten with pineapples. However, soon after the sun appeared again, and we were frolicking in the waveless pool like pros. Isla especially enjoyed drinking ocean water for the first time and shortly thereafter, vomiting ocean water for the first time. It was a thoroughly enjoyable 30 minutes or so in the water... but then, as they say – shit happens. Literally. As I was swimming to attack Isla “Jaws” style as she was playing in her mom's arms, Tegan pointed out something that was rapidly approaching my mock-roaring jaws. “I think that's poop.” She said nonchalantly, as if this foreign feces making a beeline for my mouth was not something to panic about. It was, and I did panic... apparently the downside of a beach for babies, is the tootsie roll surprises that find themselves moving with the tides. Needless to say – we left the beach and went to the playground nearby.

The playground was a majestic dark wood structure built by the community who thought that the kids deserved a obstacle course. I was pretty impressed. Isla was not. She spent about 4 minutes looking at the tire swing, and touching some of the wood – then was off across the field to chase the rooster (which she now makes a high pitched crowing sound whenever she sees them). I think rooster chasing is her new favorite thing of all time, besides defying her mother and father's wishes. In any case – we chased those roosters until her thirst for the hunt was quenched. Then back to the hotel, dunked in the pool – and dressed for dinner.

Isla's chosen dress was slightly inappropriate. It was too big for her, and the straps fell down more often than not, so she walked around like a hussy with her bosom showing most of the night. We need to raise our standards for her. We chose a vegetarian/seafood restaurant nearby – based on some reviews in the guide book again, although after the poop incident I was admittedly a little dubious. The restaurant was beautiful, to my relief – we ate outside surrounded by flowers and passionfruit, and the food was pretty good too – the vegetarian stuff was great, tofu pot stickers and silver noodle salad with peanut sauce, but the fish was kinda wack – a little overcooked and tough for ahi. Isla ate her noodles like a champ, and that was a welcome change from her finicky ways lately. After dinner, we went for shave ice and ice cream number 2 of 7, this time the flavors being lychee, mango and strawberry – Why they don't have this stuff in california is beyond me. It is so stupidly good. In a span of about ten seconds while eating this concoction with Isla, my shorts went from being clean and unsullied to extremely sullied after I was bombarded by one of the black birds with yellow beaks that are everywhere here – and who, judging by the look and consistency of it's missile, eat mostly hummus and black licorice (anyone guess what the theme of this post is?). Ah well, poop and all, I still have to admit that today was a good day. May tomorrow bring more. We'll see when I'm sure we all greet the dawn thanks to our new rooster loving daughter.