This was our earliest morning of the trip. We had a 6am check-in time at Port Allen Harbor, which was about a 40 min drive from our condo. I think I got up around 4:30 that morning. Not so fun.  We were actually on time, go figure.

We used Holo Holo Charters for our boat trip along the Na Pali coast. I would highly recommend them.  We left on time around 6:30am. Their boat is a pretty good sized power cat.  The first like 30 min or so you just cruise along the Kauai coast and get to enjoy the spectacular sunrise.  We saw more humpback whales on this trip, which never got old. They served a nice bread and fruit breakfast. Maybe like 40-45 min in (I'm pretty bad with time though) you start seeing a bit more along the coast. The captain talked over the loud speaker and gave us the history of various parts of the island, which was all very interesting. We cruised along the Na Pali coast for a while. It was amazing to see. Those cliffs are so beautiful and mystical. The captain told us folk stories about various parts. Definitely worth the trip just to see that.

Then after we finished with the Na Pali coast we turned toward the island of Niihau. It's called the forbidden island because it is privately owned and you can only go there if you have permission from the owners. We didn't have permission to land, but this company has gotten permission to go snorkel over near there because of charity work they do to help with the research outpost out there.  We got to see some dolphins over in the channel between Niihau and Lehua Rock, which was also where we ended up snorkeling. Apparently the waters get super rough during the winter, but this happened to be one of the calmest days so we were actually able to snorkel out there. It was pretty cool. We saw some more pretty fish. Didn't see any seals or sharks like they said you sometimes see though.

I think we spend about an hour snorkeling, and then got back on the boat. They had a make your own sandwich station set up with veggies and dip and fruit. It was pretty good.

Then we started on our way back to Kauai.  The parts where we were just out in the ocean were pretty rough, but apparently nothing like how it usually is in winter. It was still rough enough that you couldn't sit up front without getting wet. I wouldn't have minded the wet part, but with the breeze from our speed it ended up being chilly. And we couldn't keep our eyes open because of the wind.  Quite a few people got sick on the way home. That was gross, but the crew handled it excellently (they're obviously used to it).

We got back to the harbor around 2pm. It ended up being a really fun trip. I would definitely recommend it.

That night we just ate our left over pizza and rented the movie Away We Go from Blockbuster. It was nice to have a quiet evening in.