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Skip Kauai Kayak’s tour of Wailua River and Waterfall


Wxweenie
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Why skip Kauai Kayak’s tour of Wailua River and Waterfall?

 

· River was crowded with speed boats; it smelled like sewage

· Our Guide “only doing this for 3 weeks” lacked the insights, knowledge, and experience to make up for this dull adventure

· Hike consisted of a nose-to-tail walk on a trampled path to Secret Falls. The path featured rotting mangos and swarming fruit flies.

· “Secret Falls” was neither - more like an old shopping-mall fountain with crowds looking for a deal.

· An oily slick of sun tan lotion and bug spray covered the pool at the falls

View a picture at: SecretFalls

· Guide was “Eco-Brown” – after lunch he threw the lunch food scraps to the hoards of chickens - the only birds you’ll see

· Lunch on the chicken-poo covered rocks next to the ”falls”

· Our final reward, upon returning to the launch site, was to carry and load the kayaks onto the trailer.

 

Spend your $85 doing something else. Kauai is beautiful. We enjoyed other more scenic and pristine sites by ourselves (Secret Beach and Lava Pools, Waimea Canyon).

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I'm sorry that you had to experience this. I can't believe the difference between the brochure and the actual photo of the falls. There are so many beautiful places to see that I would hate to waste the time on something that isn't worth it.( not to mention the money!)

We have this excursion booked thru NCL but I think I will do some more research to find something better. Thanks for sharing!

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We too are looking at booking the Discover Jungle Falls by Kayak, Was that the name of this excursion??

 

I'm think it must be a different excursion as the Jungle Falls by Kayak is on the Huleia River and after the Kayak you hike to two waterfalls; Bamboo Falls & Jungle Falls, stay at Jungle Falls for swimming and relaxing and then a picnic lunch on a bluff overlooking the Hule'ia Valley. I've posted a thread looking for feedback on this tour, but so far no one has replied.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I know this was posted over a week ago, but I wanted to clear things up. For your reference, I live on Kauai.

 

--River was crowded with speed boats

True, I wish speed boats would be made illegal

 

--It smelled like sewage

Not sure what you smelled, but it wasn't sewage. Parts of the river can get stagnant, this is just a feature of nature

 

--Our Guide “only doing this for 3 weeks” lacked the insights, knowledge, and experience to make up for this dull adventure

Sounds like the cruise line is using a crappy tour company, but you can do this tour easily yourself by renting a kayak near the boat launch. Did this today in fact- $70/5 hrs for a 2 man kayak.

 

--Hike consisted of a nose-to-tail walk on a trampled path to Secret Falls.

Again, better to do it yourself to avoid being herded like cattle as is typical in cruise line tours

 

The path featured rotting mangos and swarming fruit flies.

--Very likely it was guava. Kauai is a tropical paradise, fruit grows on trees here in the wild. When it drops, the locals don't go sweeping up the woods

 

“Secret Falls” was neither - more like an old shopping-mall fountain with crowds looking for a deal

--Secret Falls is awesome- just about every time but now. We're in the middle of a drought right now. The local paper has been covering the problems at places like Secret Falls. The cruise line won't tell you this though. Secret Falls usually looks every bit as good as the photos you posted.

 

--An oily slick of sun tan lotion and bug spray covered the pool at the falls

With no water flowing, a lot of stuff forms on stagnant water in nature. Ever see a stagnant pond? Probably wasn't sun tan lotion.

 

--Guide was “Eco-Brown” – after lunch he threw the lunch food scraps to the hoards of chickens - the only birds you’ll see

Again, sounds like the cruise line is using a crappy tour company. You'll see lots of birds on the river though if you're looking and not being herded like cattle.

 

So anyway, Secret Falls is usually GREAT- most of the tour companies are usually BAD. But either way, things aren't always perfect in mother nature and you can bet your $$$ that the cruise ship isn't going to let you know that conditions are less than perfect. The best thing to do is research the tours you take before leaving.

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Thanks for the post - it makes sense and explains a lot. We are in drought conditions now and we really notice it when we go kayaking here at home. Much relief to know the described problems are temporary instead of destruction done to beautiful

tropical areas.

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  • 10 years later...
Which outfit not associated with cruise line do you recommend. Not experienced so do need guided

 

You may have trouble getting information from the people who wrote in at that time because this thread is over ten years old. You might be best to start your own thread stating just what you are looking for in today's tour market.

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