We went to the beach at ‘Anini. (It used to be Wanini, but the “W” on the sign fell off years ago, and people just started calling Anini instead. Funny, huh?) We climbed in a big tree and looked at the water for a few minutes, then we were back in the car.

Our next destination was Queen’s Bath near Princeville. You get there by taking a short hike down to the volcanic rock ledge. Before we left the car, I asked, “Do you think we’ll want our swim suits?” and everyone said no. Then we got down to where the waves wash over the rocks into a pool, we all wanted to get in. We considered skinny dipping, since there weren’t any other people out there, but Brad and I trekked back to the car to get the bag with our swim stuff in it. Once we got our suits on, we had a great time swimming and playing there. We also had the only rain of our whole trip — a very fine and airy sprinkle that felt quite refreshing.

We went to the next beach at Wai’oli and at some more PB&J’s for lunch. Then we laid out and boogy-boarded some more. The sand at that beach was perfect, with no sticks or shells or rocks to hurt my feet. The waves were really good too — they had gone down since their peak of 50 feet earlier in the week, but they were really good for surfing and boogy-boarding. As we were leaving the beach, I stepped on a bee that stung me. Even after I rinsed it off on the water, the stinger was still in my foot and Sarah had to dig it out. It hurt like heck for several minutes, but eventually it felt better. Still, we all thought that this was our favorite beach of the whole trip.

We saw a couple of cool caves near Ha’ena and Ke’e, then changed back into our regular clothes and headed back home. After a soak in the hot tub, we headed to dinner at the highly-recommended Duke’s restaurant. It was over-priced but tasty, and we left feeling very full.

We hit Walmart for some food and found a Hawaiian shirt for me there too. After that we came home for some lunch and a nap. We rented a tandem bike and the Welches rode it up to the beach and we all spent the afternoon boogy-boarding on a beach just north of us. We rode the bike home and Sarah went to the Farmers’ Market and got some fruit and bought a nice fruit-and-veggie smoothie. Doesn’t seem like much of a day — pretty low-key, but we had a good time today.

After that, we rented a couple of double kayaks and went up the Waimea River. Going upstream for two miles took longer than we thought it would, and the hike to Secret Falls was nice, but longer than we thought. It reminded me of all those scenes on Lost where they’re hiking through the jungles. I was the only one who was wearing decent footwear — everyone else just had flip-flops. Brad even got a nasty-looking cut on his foot.

We got to the falls and ate our PB&J lunch (Sarah had a couple of McDonald’s salads instead), then went for a dip in the pool below the waterfall. It was refreshing but not too cold, and the water was just pounding on us. Sarah said it felt like a hurricane. We had a good time, and it wasn’t until after we got out that we heard a tour guide tell his group not to go directly under the main flow of the waterfall, because a rock or log or fish could fall on your head.

We got a little lost on the hike back to the kayaks, but eventually we found our way back down the river. We met a Hawaiian guy on a surfboard who was paddling downstream with us, and we asked him about the best places to go out to dinner. He also let me and Brad each take a spin on his board when we got back down to the dock.

We didn’t take his advice when it came to dinner, but I wish we had. Instead, we walked up to a place called Olympic Cafe that was recommended by some people we met in the hot tub. (A long soak was absolutely necessary after our hike and paddle.) The food wasn’t great, and the prices weren’t either, but it was close enough to walk. After the food, we walked over to the ABC Store across the street to look for souvenirs. We were checking out calendars when Brad turned over one called “Women of Hawaii.” It turned out to be topless women, quite a sight for Brad and Debbie, which led to this quotable line from our walk on the way home.

Brad: Remember when we saw 24 boobs?

On that note, I’m going to bed.

After lunch, we hit another beach called Shipwreck Beach near the Hyatt resort. The waves were pretty rough — not good for swimming or snorkeling, but we got out our rented boogy boards and had a blast riding the waves into the shore for the next hour. Debbie kept getting knocked over by the waves, but we all had fun. We came back to the condo and soaked in the hot tub for a while, but my neck is still stiff from our first round of beach fun.

Last night, we went to a luau at the Smith Family farm. It was a great meal and a pretty good show for a really high price, but we were really tired. We were ready to come home halfway through the show, but then we would have missed a pretty cool fire-knife demonstration. We collapsed into bed, dead tired and full of sun.

Today, we had an early morning — we had to leave our condo in Kapaa by 6:00 to be at the marina in Port Allen for a boat tour. Captain Andy’s was supposed to take us up to the Na Pali coast on the northwest side of the island, but Kauai is having extremely high surf right now, including 40- to 50-foot swells. That meant that we couldn’t go north, we had to go east past some of the places that we’d already visited in person.

We spotted a big group of dolphins that were breaching and even saw a couple of them jump. They had us get out into the water (in better snorkel gear) and we saw neat fish and a turtle. I was able to touch the turtle on the back. They fed us a pretty good breakfast and lunch, but we thought that we should have gotten a discount because we weren’t drinking their beers like everyone else was. Overall, it was a good tour with a good crew — but I wish that we could have seen the 4000-foot cliffs of Na Pali.

After our tour, we drove up the Waimea Canyon. It was just a nice drive up to see a pretty lookout over a really big canyon. Afterward, we got shave ice at the best-rated place on the island, called JoJo’s. We considered it a birthday present for Debbie, since she turned 30 today.

We went to a Christmas craft fair this morning near the Spouting Horn blowhole near Poipu, which was further away than we thought it would be. Sarah got some earrings and Debbie found some trinkets, and we were less than impressed with the blowhole.

We got back to our condo and over to the church (right across the street from the Pono Kai) in time for the first testimonies in Fast and Testimony Meeting, but not in time for the sacrament. The testimonies were very impressive — much less irrelevant crap than you’d hear in a testimony in our ward, and more meaningful expressions of love for the gospel and for family.

We were glad that we went to church, but we didn’t stay for the other two hours. Instead, we came home and had a nap. (We were really tired after a 23-hour day yesterday.) This afternoon, we finalized our plans for the week and played shuffleboard. The Gibbys beat the Welches — 103 to 98.