Vacation Rental in Princeville Kauai

and Kauai Travel Guide

©B.Pruitt 2009

West Side Kauai Beaches

Wahiawa Bay

Location: One mile east of Port Allen

Coordinates: N21° 53.84', W159° 34.48'  

Length: 150 yards

Facilities: None

 

Wahiawa Bay deeply indents the shoreline east of Hanapepe Bay and is lined on both sides with low sea cliffs.  With this excellent protection from prevailing winds and currents, it is a suitable anchorage for small boats.  A straight beach with a level foreshore lines the head of the bay.  Runoff from Wahiawa Stream mixes silt with the sand and water.  There is no development around the bay.  The land behind the beach is owned by the McBryde coffee plantation and is posted with "No Trespassing" signs.  

 

Glass Beach

Location: Port Allen

Coordinates: N21° 53.90', W159° 35.06'

Length: 100 yards

Facilities: None

 

This beach has more value as a curiosity than for recreation.  The land behind the beach was the site of a dump.  Decades of wave action have ground thousands of broken glass bottles into millions of multi-colored grains of glass.  Mixed with the natural sand of the beach the smooth glass beads glint and sparkle in the bright west side sunlight.  Glass Beach is in front of the fuel storage tanks of the electric generating station at Port Allen.  Take the last left before the Port Allen dock and follow it past the four exhaust stacks.  A dirt road leads a few yards down to the beach.  

 

Salt Pond Beach Park

Location:  One half mile west of Hanapepe

Coordinates: N21° 53.99', W159° 36.47'  

Length: 250 yards

Facilities: Picnic shelters, bathrooms, showers, lifeguard, telephone, camping

 

A ridge of rocks connects the two rocky points that mark the ends of Salt Pond Beach.  Inside this barrier of basalt lies the best swimming beach on the south shore.  The calm waters, sandy beach and the large park behind it attract many families for water fun and picnics.

 

Next to the park are the only functioning salt ponds left in Hawaii (see West Side Sights chapter).  The Hawaiians were the only people of the Pacific Islands to make salt crystals from the sea and use it to preserve fish and meat.  Whaling ships took on salt to preserve meat and fur traders from Europe and America used the islands' salt to preserve their animal skins.

 

Salt Pond Beach Park is one half mile south of Highway 50 at Hanapepe.  The turnoff south onto Lele Road, at the western edge of Hanapepe, is marked with a sign.

 

Pākalā Beach

Location: One and a half miles east of Waimea

Coordinates: N21° 56.29', W159° 38.96'  

Length: 0.2 miles

Facilities: None

 

Pakala Beach is home to a surfing break known as Infinities—one of best summer surfing sites in Hawaii.  Infinities was given its name in 1962 by a young surfer who felt that riding the seemingly endless waves was akin to surfing into infinity.  Discharge from a nearby stream muddies the water, which is an attraction to sharks.

 

The public is allowed to use the 150-yard path across private land to reach the beach from Highway 50.  The right-of-way is located near a small bridge just west of Mile Marker 21.  A string of vehicles parked along the road will mark the entrance.

 

Lucy Wright Beach Park

Location: At the mouth of the Waimea River

Coordinates: N21° 57.14', W159° 39.98'  

Length: 1.5 miles

Facilities:  Camping, bathrooms, showers, picnic table, pavilion, barbeques

 

Captain Cook made his first landing in what he soon named the Sandwich Islands at this beach near the mouth of the Waimea River on January 19, 1778.  In spite of this important event happening here, the honor of being the namesake of the beach goes to Lucy Wright, a native Hawaiian schoolteacher who taught for 35 years at Waimea.

 

The beach sand at the park is dark and the waters muddy from soil carried downstream by the river.  While the beach and water are unappealing, the adjoining park is good place for south side travelers to stop, rest and have a picnic lunch under the large shade trees.  A sign immediately west of the bridge spanning the Waimea River points the way to the park one block south of Highway 50.

 

Kekaha Beach Park

Location: At the small town of Kekaha, three miles west of Waimea

Coordinates: N21° 58.09', W159° 43.13'  

Length: 3.7 miles

Facilities:  Bathrooms, shower, picnic tables

 

Hawaii's longest beach starts here at Kekaha and stretches 15 miles to Polihale at the south end of the Na Pali coast.  From the arid and sunny south west coast of Kauai you can see the island of Ni‘ihau, 22 miles to the west.  Breaking the water to the north of Ni‘ihau is the tiny islet of Lehua.  

 

Kekaha beach is wide and the deep, small-grained sand is nearly white.  The unprotected beach experiences pounding shorebreak, rip currents and along-shore currents, particularly in the winter.  These conditions are best left to the experienced surfers who ride the waves of Kaua‘i's west side.

 

A beach park is situated across the highway from the beach in the town of Kekaha between Alae Road and Amakihi Road.  Highway 50 runs next to Kekaha beach with parking available at several roadside turnouts.  

 

Pacific Missile Range Facility

Location: Skirting the Mana Plain on Kauai's western shore

Coordinates: N22° 00.56', W159° 46.75' (Major's Beach)

Length: 8.2miles

Facilities: Bathrooms, shower, telephone, four covered picnic tables with barbeques.

 

The U.S. Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility is a large operation designed to detect and track aircraft and vessels over a huge area of the Pacific Ocean.  Just past mile marker 32 of Highway 50 is the entrance road leading to the guarded main gate.  Unless military operations are being conducted, the public is allowed access to the beach.  A recorded message at 335-4229 informs callers when the beach is closed to the public.  Visitors will be asked to present a driver's license and then will be issued a visitor's pass for their vehicle.  Visitors are usually directed to Majors Beach at Recreation Area #3, one and a half miles south of the main gate.  The beach in front of the range is exposed to the open ocean.  During the winter, high surf may generate  pounding shorebreaks, strong backwashes and powerful rip currents.  With calmer conditions, throw-net fishermen, surfers and windsurfers use the beach.  Beachgoers are not allowed to cross behind the beach's vegetation line.

 

Polihale State Park

Location: The last beach before the southern limits of the Na Pali coastline

Coordinates: N22° 05.51', W159° 45.07' (north campground)

Length: 2.6 miles

Facilities:  Shelters, picnic tables, bathrooms, showers , camping

 

The last beach before the south end of the Nâ Pali coastline is an impressively wide, long and deep stretch of sand.  The readers of Hawaii magazine voted Polihale as Hawaii's best hidden beach in a recent poll.  In places Polihale obtains widths of 300 feet and the dunes may reach 100 feet high.  The sand in this dry, sun-baked area is loose and deep.  Just walking on the beach is vigorous exercise.  Be sure to bring water and protection from the sun.

 

Swimming at Polihale is dangerous.  The ocean bottom drops off sharply to overhead depths.  A strong backwash can force swimmers into the rip current that runs along the length of the beach.  An area called Queens Pond is located about midway up the length of Polihale.  It is a shallow, sand-bottomed pool formed by a reef adjoining the beach.  During calm surf conditions, the reef protects swimmers from waves and currents.  When waves from high surf sweep over the reef, however, a rip current flows through a channel in the reef's south limit.

 

At the south end of Polihale Beach is an area of 60-foot-high dunes called Barking Sands.  Like other coastal dunes in Hawaii, these grew rapidly during the ice ages when the low sea level exposed reefs and offshore sediment to the wind.  Supposedly, if conditions are right, stepping on the sand or sliding down a dune will cause it to emit a barking noise.  Mr. W. R. Frink of Honolulu described the barking phenomenon as far back as 1875 in a letter to the California Academy of Sciences.  Don't be surprised if you are unable to duplicate Mr. Frink's success.

 

The Hawaiians, of course, have a legend to explain the beach sand that barks.  One variation of it tells of an old fisherman who lived near the beach with his nine dogs.  When he went fishing, the man would stake his dogs in the sand, three to a stake.  After returning from an exhausting fishing trip where he was caught in a bad storm, the fisherman forgot to untie the dogs.  When he awoke the next morning, the dogs were gone.  In their place were three mounds of sand.  Walking over the mounds produced a low bark.  Believing the dogs to be buried because of the storm, the fisherman began to dig.  But the digging was futile with each shovelful just producing more sand.  Finally, the fisherman gave up and every day after that he could hear the low barking of dogs when he crossed the beach.  

 

To reach Polihale, follow Highway 50 to its end and follow the signs.  A wide and bumpy road cuts through sugar cane fields for five miles to the parking areas and campgrounds of the park.  Queens Pond is located before the campgrounds.  Two large monkeypod trees mark a fork in the access road to Queens Pond.  Turn left at the trees and follow a smaller road to the dunes.  Watch for drifting sand that can trap rental cars.

 

TOP