Kauai vacation
April 26th - Hike to Top of Sleeping Giant
and Visit to Wailua Falls
Click on any photo to see a larger image
The Sleeping Giant is a rock formation that is suppose to resemble a giant lying on his back. We didn't see the resemble - what we thought was the Sleeping Giant turned out to be the Makaleha Mountains. The Sleeping Giant was actually right near our hotel. You just drive through some residential streets to a small parking lot which is the trailhead. The hike is not nearly as rigorous as it sounded in the book. Here is a picture of the giant head as seen near the start. The giant's forehead is to the left of the picture. The bump sticking up is his chin (not his nose!), then there is the slight dip of his neck, and then you see the folded hands. The trail takes you right up to the top of the forehead.
Here is a view looking straight on at the chin of the giant. We have hiked about halfway up the trail at this point. I seem to recall that the one way distance was only a couple of miles.
Here we are at the top already! That is Melanie in an action photo, scrambling up the trail alongside the chin so she can walk on the face of the giant. I wonder if that will wake him up...
Here is a victory photo of me at the top of the Sleeping Giant. Behind me is west, the interior of the island; I am standing facing north east.
Here are two photos of Melanie on top of the giant's forehead. Behind Melanie in the second photo you can distantly see the Makaleha Mountains, which is the formation I erroneously thought was the Sleeping Giant. Doesn't that sorta look giant-like? The forehead is to the right, and the pointy rock is his folded hands...
The next four photos are sort of taken at facing each point of the compass, so you get a panoramic view. First photo is facing north toward Makaleha Mountains (or, as I like to call them, the Other Sleeping Giant). Second view is looking east, at the mouth of the Wailua River. Our resort is just to the south (to the right) of the river mouth. Third photo is looking south toward Lihue, the largest city on the island. That is where the airport is. Isn't it nice that Kauai still has so much open, undeveloped terrain? The fourth picture is northeast, the picture is really focused on the Sleeping Giant in the foreground. That is looking down on the chin and body of the Sleeping Giant.
Here I have climbed up onto the chin of the giant.
Melanie is standing on the narrow nose of the giant. There is actually a relatively steep drop off just behind her.
After we climbed down from the Sleeping Giant, we drove toward the airport where we were scheduled for an island helicopter ride. However, we had plenty of time remaining, so we stopped off at the Wailua Falls. I believe these falls were used in the opening credits of Fantasy Island TV show. They are spectacularly beautiful. Look at all the water pouring over the top! How come the Wailua River was so shallow we couldn't kayak up to these falls? You can't get any closer to the falls than this one viewpoint by the side of the road. I took the pictures shooting over a chain link fence, which they have erected to prevent people from plummeting into the water. The falls are 173 feet high.
