In Kauai with the Bordelons

Even better than spending a week in paradise with grandkids is spending two weeks.

The Bordelons arrived just as the Wrights were leaving and shortly we were on another adventure.  The Bordelon kids are two years older than the Wrights, and that two years makes a difference in what activities they can do.  They tolerated driving adventures a little bit better so we took a trip up Waimea Canyon.  It is a pretty spectacular canyon created when one side of a volcano crater collapsed.

The Bordelons also had to pose for a great number of pictures

The grown up adventure on this week was scuba diving for Sarah, Toby and Calvin.

They said it was great fun, but I was happy to stay on land and hang out with the kids at Shipwreck beach.  This beach had fairly rough waves so we had just planned to play in the sand, but that was my plan and not very realistic.  I love this picture because they all look like they are having a great time even if it was long walk to the beach and there was no shade once we got there.

Poipu beach was a big hit

Garrett took this picture of Clare 

I took this picture of Garrett.  He tried all week not to smile for a picture, but I finally caught his smile on the last day.

And there was a lot of  pool time where Clare worked on diving and Garrett worked on underwater swimming

One morning the Bordelons got up early and drove to the other side of the island to visit a dairy farm. We didn't get up early but met them for lunch in Hanalei and spent some time on the beach. Which is really one of the prettiest beaches I have ever seen. Garrett especially loved playing in the waves on this beach.

Sarah and Toby went to dinner one evening at the Hyatt and found out that there was an opportunity to feed the koi in there pond, so we helped create a feeding frenzy.

We made a trip to Spouting Horn where Nick the climber had no trouble getting up for a better view.

And we enjoyed a little shave ice

We crawled through the cave Jay discovered

and dressed in our best hawaiian outfits for dinner and a little time on the beach watching the sun set

In Kauai with the Wrights

Fall break from school is a lovely concept.  It almost makes starting school in mid-August tolerable.  It was not done while our kids were in school, but one of the great joys of being a grandparent is being able to tag along on our grandchildren's vacations.

We spent the last week of September with Rosie and Jay's family in Poipu, Kauai.  Rosie had been there twice, I think, with us but she didn't remember it. Actually it has changed a lot since the first time we visited, but it is still,in my opinion, the most beautiful Hawaiian Island.  It is a lot nicer when it doesn't rain all the time and we had a beautiful sunny week.

We took lots of pictures, but I discovered at the end of the week that our waterproof camera was set on some unusual setting, so a lot of really cute pictures ended up looking somewhat sinister.

I did get a few beach pictures with my phone so you can see the difference.

We spent a lot of time at the beach and pool, but we did take a few outings.  Calvin and Jay kayaked the Napali coast on Monday and then he stayed home with Jimmy and Leah while Rosie, Alice, Calvin and I went tubing.  Waterproof camera..weird pictures.

We went to explore a cool cave Jay found when he was out on a run, but the cave itself was closed when we all went back. Cool location for pictures though.

I make families line up regularly for pictures, mostly because getting five people to all look the same direction at the same time and smile is almost impossible.  But I figure if I take enough pictures I'll get lucky eventually.

Waimea Falls is a "must see" in the guide books, but although the falls itself is impressive what you can see from the lookout isn't much.  You can just see the top of the falls through the grass.

We went to Spouting Horn, which obliged us with some very nice spouts.  It is like Old Faithful except you get a spout with every wave.

One night we went to luau show.  Everyone dressed in their best hawaiian attire

Jimmy wasn't too impressed with the dancing, but he loved the volcano.

Another evening we walked to a restaurant on the beach for dinner and had a little play time in the park.

We also had a shopping and shave ice afternoon in Old Koloa town. Jimmy fell asleep in the car, and Leah can't have shave ice yet, but the rest of us enjoyed it,

And one last beach picture.  They all looked great, but I used the waterproof camera so there is a slight suspicion of shadiness, but it went up on the kitchen wall anyway.

The Wrights flew home on Saturday and the Bordelons arrived on Saturday so we made plans to meet up for lunch with whole gang.  It was a rainy day.  I think Jimmy was a little soggy for the plane.

But the cousins had a great time splashing in the rain.