Hawaii - Kauai Island

w34e5rOur second island to be visited in the state of Hawaii was Kauai. It is called the 'Garden Island' as it is especially lush and green and also offers grand beaches, incredible landscapes and lots of Hollywood movie sets.

Waimea Canyon in the heart of the island is also called the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific" and it is a really stunning and spectacular sight. You do have to be lucky that it is not raining though (which it did a lot during our visit). And we did get lucky when cruising around with our rental car to catch these views.

There are also magnificient waterfalls to be found around the island like below Wailua Falls:

Funnily, there is a huge free roaming and actually really "free" chicken population on the island. They are practically everywhere. Two hurricanes helped to free them from the farms and mainly also the cock fighting aremas and now they've spread like rabbits. Most hotels provide ear plugs for a good night's sleep as the roosters are not always sure when it's the correct time for their morning doodle.

One of the highlights was a 1 hour helicopter flight around the island. More than 70% of Kauai can not be accessed by car. Therefore this was a great way to experience the less travelled parts. The pilot also gave us a tour of the many Hollywood sets; Jurassic Park 4 had just been filmed a few weeks ago we got told, we also flew over the thick tree canopies where lots of the shooting for Avatar was done.

Well, and you might remember where this set was used.. Right, many of the scenes of 

"Pirates of the Carribean" were filmed on Kauai.

The Napali Coast can really only be seen either by boat (or very popular these days are kayaks as well) or from the air which makes great pictures:

So impressive.

There are so many pictures that would be worth showing but then you guys wouldn't be as thrilled during our 2 day presentation in Lembach's "Alfons-Dorfer Halle" when we return (Community hall in Marlene's home town where the "explorers" of the world stage travel presentations). (Comment from Marlene: I dont think so.)

Our hotel on the East coast was a real paradise. We enjoyed the stay a lot in a little condo with kitchen, ocean and pool view (and the palm trees add the rest of atmosphere of course). Amazing.

Two days on the island we used for scuba diving. The first two dives on the shores of Kauai introduced us to the Hawaiian reef life and the very interesting underwater lava landscape. We dived through lava caverns and tubes which was really astounding for us. The second day we took a long day trip out to another island, Ni'ihau. It's is also called the "Forbidden Island" as it is privately owned and no one except for the about 200 people living there are allowed to set foot on the island. 

However, that doesn't mean you can't cruise there by boat and jump into the water. We had a new encounter in our scuba dive career which left us with great memories. We were fortunate enough to dive with the endangered Hawaiian Monk Seal. The seals were really interested in us and seemed to enjoy our visit as much as we did. As a bonus we had Sandbar Sharks checking out the scene at the same time so we have footage of us with the seals and the big shark circling us (to be sent to our parents in Austria by the dive shop). It was amazing.

Between the dives the crew put the fishing lines out and we had a free deep sea fishing cruise as well with them where we also caught a nice big fish; also very interesting to experience.

Hawaii - Oahu Island

After our great Australian trip we have spent a little more than one week in Perth. Meeting a lot of our friends, sorting out some things and preparing for the big trip ahead. This one week really passed by very quickly but we were already excited to start our trip abroad. Yes, Australia has become our home, so we find it quite hard to answer the question "Where are you guys from". We generally start off with staring at each other and figuring out what the easiest answer will be, quite funny actually. In the end it is something like "Originally we are from Austria but we have been living in Australia for the last six years".

On Friday 20th June we took off from Perth Airport to Auckland, New Zealand and on to Honolulu - all with Air New Zealand. Loved their safety briefing, this time with the cast of the "Sports Illustrated" Swim Suit Calendar staged in Tonga, how good can it get? (Comment from Marlene: Obviously Stefan is writing this post ;) )

On Oahu Island, we stayed at Waikiki Beach, a suburb of Honolulu. Great expectations are linked to that beach and we were not disappointed. The first impression of Hawaii lived up to what one expects from the tropical paradise you can see on TV. Tropical weather, an awesome beach, holiday feeling, a very relaxed atmosphere. In general I believe that the US state of Hawaii compares to Western Australia and Perth in terms of the "chillax factor". Waikiki definitely has a lot more going on and the beach is "used" much better than in Perth though. 

However, most people come to Oahu for a different reason than us. With only a six hour flight from California for USD 500 return this is the "Ibiza" for the Americans. A beach holiday with nice food and nightlife. We are very different, not too much interested in beaches unless there is great snorkelling, nightlife is expensive and let's face it, we are old.. ;-( Nice food, that's for us, but on a moderate budget, travelling around the world is expensive. Therefore we had only planned three days on this island which turned out perfectly fine for us.

On Day 1 we checked out Waikiki and climbed the Diamond Head Crater, our first volcano. The second day we went to Downtown Honolulu with the only Royal Palace in the US and did a little walking tour around the sights. We even skipped Pearl Harbour because we were not interested in lining up for 2 hours or more to get into the memorial. 

On day 3 we hired a car and went around the island. First we stopped at Haunama Bay, the snorkelling paradise on Oahu. It was very touristy and you even have to line up to see an introductory video before they let you go down to the beach. The snorkelling however was really nice and definitely worth it.

We also visited the "Polynesian Cultural Village" which is a huge open air museum with cultural shows (dance and music performances), historical information on the Polynesian islands and lessons to learn how to hula dance or throw a spear Tonga style, very interesting.

For those of you who are interested what "Polynesia" is actually made up of:

Other highlights on the island included the food. We are sushi and seafood lovers and straight away found out that the Hawaiian islands are going to be a great spot for us, yummie. Well, the Happy Hour cocktails looking out on Waikiki Beach were also the perfect start to our holiday. As Marlene and her sister have always put it: "Happy Hour, Happy Hauer" :-), so true.

The Kimberleys & The Ningaloo Reef

Slowly, slowly our Australian adventure is coming to an end... After leaving Katherine we headed West to the West Australian border and Kununurra - only a little bit over 500km away ;) We spent our last night in the NT Outback at the Keep River National Park, trying to finish all our fresh fruit and vegetables before entering WA and also making sure we're not taking any cane toads over the border. In case you haven't heard, cane toads are a major problem in Australia. They've introduced these frogs from Hawaii in 1935 to control the cane beetle who was eating Australia's sugar cane crops. Basically a good idea but they didn't think far enough, the toads have no native predators in Australia and have spread really quickly becoming a proper pest. They're now found on the entire East Coast of Australia, as well as the NT and unfortunately also the North of WA. But enough about frogs now; not a big fan of them, yuk yuk :/

Kununurra is pretty much the Eastern gateway to the Kimberly region. We started off with a wonderful sunset cruise on Lake Argyle, Australia's largest artificial lake. Due to a lack of a 4WD vehicle we also booked a scenic flight over the Purnululu National Park (the Bungle Bungles). Absolutely magnificent!

Sunset swim and beers in Lake Argyle

Bungle Bungles

Lake Argyle

Infinity pool overlooking Lake Argyle at our campground

We furthermore did some more gorges, Emma Gorge (on the Gibb River Road) and Geikie Gorge in Fitzroy Crossing. Again, as Wookie's not really made for any offroad driving we took the not so pretty Great Northern Highway instead of the famous Gibb River Road - but at least this gives us a very good reason to come back at some stage :)

Emma Gorge

Geikie Gorge

One of the highlights of our trip was an overnight stay at the Horizontal Waterfalls located at the Buccaneer Archipelago (https://goo.gl/maps/CNn5x) - so pretty much in the middle of nowhere. Massive tidal movements create a waterfall effect as water banks up against one side of the narrow cliff passage, to be repeated again on the turning tide - if that makes sense :) 

Horizontal Falls from above

 There are two passages, the first one wide enough to be able to drive through with the boat, the second one only 7m wide. When we had a look at them, the 'fall' was about 3m high, according to our boat captain 'way too deadly to drive through'.

Horizontal Falls - Narrow passage

We flew there with a seaplane (new for us), switched to a speed boat to cruise through the waterfalls and stayed the night on a houseboat close to the falls with more speed boat rides the next morning and a scenic flight back to Derby.

Sunset over the Buccaneer Archipelago

We then drove on to Broome where we looked for Dinosaur Footprints at Gantheaume point (unfortunately the tide was too high and we didn't see any) and enjoyed a beautiful sunset at Cable Beach. We also booked a Hover Craft tour (again another new means of transport for us) to more Dinosaur prints along Broome's coastline. Pretty awesome!

Gantheaume Point in Broome

Camel train at Cable beach at sunset

Dinosaur footprints

Leaving Broome we made our way further West to tick the last item off our Australian bucket list, swimming with whale sharks in Exmouth. Via WA's mining towns, Port Hedland, Karratha and Dampier (and checking out what Stefan was working on over the last 6 years) we reached Exmouth only to find that the wind and swell were too strong and our Friday tour got cancelled. We still made our way to the reef which is just meters off the beach to snorkel. Although snorkelling is usually always a bit boring for us being used to seeing a lot more while scuba diving we did find it pretty amazing. We even found a green turtle (by now we know where to look!) and had a bit of a swim with her. And coming back to our campground we also had the confirmation that the whale shark tour would go ahead the next day - yay!!!

And it did beat all our expectations! We went on a short snorkel beforehand to 'get into the zone'. Again, pretty good snorkelling with 3 bull rays and lots and lots of tropical fish. We then headed further South on the coast to find a whale shark. And we didn't just find one, there were so many!!! At some stage we were circelled by two sharks which made it pretty difficult to decide which direction to look at.

Whale Shark :)

It all starts out pretty hectic with people being divided into two groups of ten, being ready to jump into the water as soon as a whale shark was spotted. "Go go go!!!'' was the sign for everybody to get into the water as fast as possible and to keep your head down and then suddenly out of the blue this huuuuuge fish emerges with a mouth about a meter in width. After getting over the first 'shock' of how amazing this creature is, we tried to swim alongside him checking out the beautiful pattern of his skin. This first one was about 4meters long, a juvenile one, so a little bit smaller than the average whale shark they see at Ningaloo but really, really inquisitive, circelling us and swimming after our bubbles. After a few minutes we stopped to follow him (swimming along is pretty exhausting) only to find out he turned around and came back to us almost to check where we were. The second time we got into the water we had a huge 8 meter long whale shark and a second smaller one joining in as well. And this is how we spent the rest of the day, in and out of the water, swimming, swimming, gazing in awe at those amazing creature.

The tour guides tell you to stay 3 meters away from the fish but it was pretty much impossible with them coming up to us so close.

This has definitely been one of the highlights of our trip so far and we encourage everyone in Perth to make the trip up to Exmouth; it's not cheap but so worth it, a real out of the world experience, very very special!! Whale sharks have been known to visit Belize and Mexico's coast as well, so we'll make sure to catch them there again later this year.

We're still in Exmouth waiting to see if we're able to dive the Navy Pier tomorrow. We're not very hopeful though as the weather's been pretty shitty with strong winds and rain today and with the same forecasted for tomorrow. So, we'll probably head down to Perth where the weather will be as bad - boo :(

So where to go from here? On Monday 16th, we finally have our citizenship test (fingers crossed all goes well with this one). And for Friday the 20th we've booked our flight to Honolulu. From there it's going to be 3 weeks Hawaii, 6 weeks USA, 8 weeks Central America, 8 weeks South America and then on December 20th back to Austria for Christmas, followed by NZ in February/March.