The Oystermoon, pt. 2: A day in Hanapepe

Our other favorite day in Kaua'i was our visit to Hanapepe. It turned out to be a long day, but we loved it.

Mr. Oyster is really into coffee. It's like his personal hobby or something! He even roasts his own coffee beans, and hand-grinds them every morning and has his own fresh-roasted cup of coffee. So of course, we went to the Kaua'i Coffee Museum. It's a nice place; a small museum inside, a coffee shop (of course!), a gift shop, and then you can take a self-guided walking tour of the grounds.

 

The coffee fields, with rainclouds looming overhead (there are always rainclouds looming in Kaua'i):







What's a trip to Hawaii without a photo of a frangipani? I couldn't resist this pretty flower in the sunlight:




Baby coffee beans:



If you just want to spend some time walking around, and have some pretty good coffee, I highly recommend this place. My mom likes coffee, too, so I bought her a bag of coffee beans and the gift shop shipped it for me!

If there's an independent bookstore anywhere, Mr. Oyster, despite being, um.... directionally challenged, will find it. We found ourselves at the Talk Story Bookstore. We both love to read and we spent some time here. I was not reading, though (I'd brought my own electronic books and did not want to carry anything else on the plane!).

Instead I was walking around the empty bookstore and trying to silently jump out from behind shelves, or trying to make Mr. Oyster blush with some honeymoon-themed type of book (it never worked). The bookstore also has four cute little cats that like to hang out there.




We also loved Salt Pond beach. I think this is the best beach for swimming. The water is clear and there's not too many rocks to step on. I also have a little bit of fear about the ocean (I have no idea where this comes from), so I liked that there's a big huge reef protecting it. It's a great beach for kids and families, of which we saw many.

While I was stand/swimming in the water, I spoke to a wonderful woman who was there doing her physical therapy after a stroke. On another day, I met a mom and her grown daughter on vacation, from my hometown! Small world. And of course, Mr. Oyster and I swam together lots.

Here I am doing my stand/swim:



We left around sunset.



The man at the bookstore let us know about the Arts Walk that was happening that evening, so we decided to go back and check it out.

We were so glad we stumbled upon this; it happens every Friday night in July. There was a lot of good live music, the art galleries are open, and there are a few restaurants and a local baker brought lots of pies for sampling.




An artisan works in her shop:




This curious little girl listens to the live band on the other side of the fence:




Mr. Oyster checks out one of the art galleries. The lady in here quickly caught on that Mr. Oyster knows what he's talking about when it comes to art, and she gave us the super-hard sell! We practically had to sneak out of there to get away.



I almost forgot to mention our favorite restaurant, Red Salt in Poipu. It's part of the beautiful Koa Kea resort. We loved our meal here, and went back again for our last night in Hawaii.

This is a salad. It wasn't quite what I expected!



This is the cheese that goes with the salad.



I'll finish up next time by showing you our beautiful condo, highlights of iPad honeymoon travel, and our unbelievably crazy, neverending trip home!

The Oystermoon, Pt. 1

I've been married for several weeks now. According to the government, the bank, and my job, I'm Mrs. [New Name]. But I still have my old email address, and I sign my old name when I buy something because I don't have my new ID yet. I've gotten a few pieces of mail with my new name on it. It's so weird, I feel like I'm "in-between." I'm sure the adjustment will become clearer in a week or so, when I start the new school year with my students and get to be called "Mrs. [New Name]" a few hundred times a day.

Anyway, while I adjust to marriage and wait for our professional photos, I'll share with you some of my favorite images of our Hawaiian honeymoon.

It was wonderful to "escape" everything and run off to Kaua'i after we were married. The wedding and its accompanying celebrations were intense (in a good way), and some time to decompress was exactly what we needed. Mr. Oyster and I are kind of quiet by nature and I think we were looking for a beautiful place we could rest and relax, without feeling like it was so once-in-a-lifetime that we had to see everything (ie., Europe, Brazil or any of the other "dream places" we want to go someday).

Upon arrival in Kaua'i, we picked up our car and headed to our rented condo, located on the north shore (in the suburb of Princeville). I was happy that we remembered our little friend...



...who worked remarkably well during our trip and which we couldn't have done without. Plus, if you have your own and you bring it, you can save $15/day off the rental of one! How crazy. Rental car companies are nearly as bad as the airlines.

Our drive there was accompanied by a beautiful sunset.



We were exhausted from flying 6,000 miles through through 4 cities (thanks, United Airlines!)... so that's all I remember of our arrival!

I think our first day in Kaua'i was my favorite. I'm not sure why, but it was a very slow, very nice day. We were incredibly tired. We started out by visiting the beautiful and serene Anini beach in the morning. We were camped out right at this spot under a tree, and we walked along the beach and listened to the waves, both of us too tired and happy to say much.

There is a big parking lot where everyone goes, but if you drive just a half mile past that, you can park on the street and have what is basically, if you're early enough, your own private beach.




Mr. Oyster shows me a shell, and his new wedding band.




This beach, being so close to where we stayed, was our go-to spot. We usually came here in the mornings when we were not interested in driving a long way and wanted some quiet. We also went snorkeling here later on.

We also visited the town of Hanalei, which is small and has lots of eating/shopping opportunities in Ching Young Village. This picture is notable because we'd just found a nice little place to have our lunch outside, when this not-so-great live singer started. He sang the entire time we ate. The music was awkward and terrible, so bad it was funny. Luckily he was in a totally separate area, and could not see us. We still laugh about it. This is Mr. Oyster listening to this guy.



To conclude our nice first day, we had dinner at the Westin Princeville. The restaurant and the grounds are beautiful, and the food was excellent! We went back a couple of times. I didn't take any photos while we were there, but here's one:




Up next: A beautiful day in Hanapepe.

*Photo of the Westin from to-hawaii.com

The One Month Marrieds

It took me about two weeks to come out of the "wedding fog" we experienced after the wedding, and the parties, and the honeymoon. So much joy packed into a few short weeks can take quite a toll!

The full set of professional pictures won't be in for another few weeks, but in the meantime I hope to share some images from our honeymoon, tell you about the last few weeks of wedding planning (including a project or two) and some other things.

As I began writing this post I got an email from our photographer, letting me know that he has a few images up for us to preview! How exciting, and how perfect that I received this on our one month-aversary (when we were already reminiscing anyway).

I keep staring at these images and cannot wait to see the rest of them! It's like... the wedding, all over again.

Photos by David Wittig Photography.