This morning we woke up early and had a nice home cooked breakfast with the family in the comfort of our own room. We made sure to fuel up before our long hike up Sleeping Giant Mountain. Sleeping Giant Mountain gets its name because if you see the mountain range from the eastern coast, it looks like a giant sleeping human lying on its back. It had rained the night before, so the trail was pretty muddy and slippery, making the hike a bit more difficult than usual, but we all faired pretty well.
We took a break about halfway up the mountain to take in the beautiful views and even get a birds eye view of the mountain we’d been climbing! We made it about three quarters up the trail when it began to pour! The rain here is pretty unpredictable (as with most islands), and it made the trail even more difficult, so back down we went! By the time we got back down to our car, we were all pretty muddy and in much need of a shower.
After cleaning ourselves up, we drove around the downtown Kapa’a area in search of some lunch. This little town is pretty awesome and full on inventive/trendy food trucks. It was pretty tough to decide amongst all the options, but we settled on El Rey Del Mar for some Mexican food. Along this road, there were plenty of other food trucks around, but we’ve heard great things about El Rey Del Mar and we were glad we chose it!
The Kapa’a area has some really cool little local shops, so we made some time to poke around and found some pretty awesome locally made stuff to bring back with us to remember our travels. We ended our shopping with a refreshing Wailua Shave Ice (notice “shave” and not “shaved”).
Our morning hike up the Sleeping Giant trail truly kicked our butt, so we decided to head back to the hotel to rest and relax by the pool. Our resort has been great for R&R, and even comes equipped with grills and fire pits for everyone to enjoy, which is exactly what we did with some s’mores to cap off the night!
Tomorrow, we’ll be making our way west to traverse the beautiful Waimea Canyon Drive. This provides an absolutely awe-inspiring view of the Grand Canyon of the Pacific, so make sure to stay posted!