Kauai with Kids (on a Semi-Budget)
Happy New Year’s Eve!
It’s been a drama-filled few months which I’ll share more at some point, but I wanted to write a long overdue blog post on travel, one of my family’s favorite happiness boosters.
My husband and I both have a tendency to work too much so when we have time off, we travel to get away from our inboxes and to-do lists.
We live on the West Coast so Hawaii is our favorite destination within a 5-hour flight. (We love New Zealand as well but it is soooo far, especially with young kids.)
Kauai is our top choice Hawaiian island because it’s slightly cheaper and much less developed than Maui, our former favorite pick.
We visited Kauai earlier this year, using a Costco package for 10 days and 9 nights. We chose a long trip because the flight length is no joke with young kids, and it’s less expensive to fly on a Tuesday and a Thursday.
(Note: I don’t recommend such a long trip if you’ve got young kids and are renting a hotel room with no kitchen like we did. We spent a lot of time every day looking for food. If I had a do-over, I’d choose a place with a kitchen for at least part of the time. The downside of that strategy is I don't think you can book a package through Costco for the entire length of your trip and switch accommodations partway through.)
The Flight
We flew direct on Hawaiian Airlines. The flight attendants were super friendly, especially to our children. And we were excited because they advertised themselves as the only airline to provide a free meal. Unfortunately, on both the outbound and return flight, lunch / dinner was basically a huge bun with tiny bits of cheese and meat. If you want something more than bread, bring your own food. Hawaiian Airlines did not have more substantial meals for sale and their snacks for purchase were also quite small. Fortunately, they had good snacks and desserts, like chips, cookies and chocolate covered macadamia nuts.
Hotel
We stayed at the Sheraton Kauai Coconut Beach Resort which we discovered during our last trip to Kauai in March 2020. At that point it was a DoubleTree that was just bought by Sheraton so for the location (beachfront), amenities (several onsite restaurants, infinity pool and kid’s pool, affordable kids’ menu) and price, it was good value. It’s gotten more expensive post-Covid, but compared to other options on the island, it was still well priced.
Our top-flour room was quite clean, had an ocean view (free upgrade thanks to Costco) and a vaulted ceiling which made it feel very spacious. It was a nice surprise to see the vaulted ceiling because our 2020 trip had a ground floor room with no vaulted ceiling, looked onto a green fence about 15 feet away and felt quite small/enclosed.
Food
Our whole family loves food so I’ll spare you the hours of Yelp research and share highlights:
Best Farmer’s Market If you like exotic fruit at a decent price, you must visit The Coconut Place Farmer’s Market. It’s a bit smaller than the farmer’s market in Princeville, but it offers much of the same fare at a slightly lower price. We visited this farmer’s market every time it was open and stocked up on island grown papaya, ice cream bean, cream apple, dragon fruit, chirimoya, star fruit, guava, pineapple, sopate, apple bananas, banana bread and white pineapple ice cream. We ate so much fruit that I haven’t been able to even look at another papaya or star fruit these past few months since our trip.
Overall Best Value Island Country Markets. When you have kids who are picky eaters, this store has diverse options at an affordable price point. It’s more expensive than the grocery store but the food is better. Island Gourmet is basically a souped up ABC store, the ubiquitous convenience store which sells everything from sunblock to island wear. The Island Country Markets have a hot bar where they will cook you breakfast, lunch and dinner to order (beware, it closes by 5p.) They also have a mini grocery section and decent acai and pitaya bowls.
Best Vietnamese near Kapaa Pho Kapaa After a long week of eating out, we appreciated this restaurant for vermicelli / rice dishes featuring grilled meat and raw veggies. We always like Vietnamese for lighter fare, and getting the dried noodles / rice based dishes allow you to add your own sauce to the veggies and starch, so you can control the amount of sodium you consume. I always get the bun (vermicelli) bowl with pork, shrimp and eggroll, while the kids always get the rice dish with grilled pork chop.
Best Acai Bowl There are excellent açaí bowls on various parts to the island. We started with the one from Island Gourmet which seemed pretty affordable and consisted of a scoop of açaí sorbet, dappled with honey, granola and berries. Then we found an even better - and less expensive if you compare volume - one at Kukuiula Market on the South Side of the island. The portion sizes were huge. We tried Funky Monkey and it was delicious. One of our last days we went to Princeville and found Nourish Hanalei. It’s in the middle of nowhere but there was no line and had an excellent view. The açaí bowl was the most expensive, but the ingredients tasted the highest quality, and even had a sprinkling of bee pollen. Plus the view of a valley, beach and mountains provided a million dollar experience at a $17 investment.
Activities
My family is kind of homebody so on vacation they like to read, watch TV and play video games (c’mon people, can’t you do that at home?) When I can drag them out, our favorite activities in Kauai are swimming and exploring the North Shore.
Beaches If you have young children, you must check out Lydgate. It’s a beach that’s completely enclosed by a seawall of massive boulders, so you can still see fish but you don’t have to worry about being swept into the open ocean. There’s a kiddie section that is very shallow and gentle, and a section for more advanced swimmers that’s substantially larger and deeper. When we went years ago there were many more fish, but this most recent trip we barely saw any. Still, it’s a chance to experience the ocean in a relatively safe way with young kids.
Our other favorite beach was Poipu Beach Park. Although this beach is not completely walled in like Lydgate, there’s a seawall blocking off part of the beach, creating a very gentle, shallow section for young children. Plus, with direct access to the open ocean you get a lot more fish. We’ve seen massive turtles every time we visit, either in the water or on the beach.
The North Shore The drive up to the North Shore has unbelievable scenery so we always try to visit a couple of times each vacation. There’s an incredible Hanalei Valley lookout onto taro fields and Namolokama mountain. We make a pit stop for lunch at the food trucks in Hanalei and stop at random beaches on the way up to the Maniniholo Dry Cave to explore at the end of the road. One thing we didn’t realize is you want to get past the Dry Cave and hike in Hāʻena State Park, you now need to make reservations far in advance. We did that hike 15 years ago and the views are phenomenal.
Favorite Memories
If you’re looking for rainbows almost every day, massive sea turtles, wild chickens, waterfalls, and a relatively uncrowded tropical paradise, Kauai is for you. For best pricing and fewest crowds, go off peak. There’s no bad time of the year to go to Kauai. Enjoy!
What are some of your favorite destinations? And what are you best tips for traveling with children or on a budget?
