Road to Hanalei an experience in itself

By Wanda A. Adams
Advertiser Travel Editor

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Kaua'i North Shore by the numbers The drive from Hanalei town to the end of the road is particularly interesting. Here's what I saw along the way on a Saturday in March: Number of beaches or beach access points: 8 Number of one-lane bridges: 7 Number of streams to drive through: 1 (on a good day) Number of vacation rental signs: 5 Number of homemade "slow down" signs on road: 3 Number of "for sale" signs: 8 Number of pig hunters with dogs and rifles: 3

For this reason, driving is either breezy (most of the time) or very, very bad (during morning and evening rush hour or when there's a lane-blocking accident).

South Shore folks talk as though the drive to the North Shore requires survival gear. Heed them not. Outside of rush hour, Hanalei, 30 miles from Lihue, is just under an hour from the airport, even with a nice stop for a break at Duane's Ono Charburger (outrageous burgers in many varieties, picnic tables under the trees and tame cats and chickens for company, near Mile 13 on Kuhio Highway).

To get to the North Shore, turn right onto Highway 51 as you leave the airport, and take Kuhio Highway (Highway 56) in a leisurely fashion past Wailua, Kapa'a, Anahola, Kiluaea and Princeville — after which the highway ends and becomes the much narrower and more folksy Highway 560. Highway 560 turns and dips steeply down into Hanalei Valley and hugs the curving shore for 10 miles out to Ha'ena and the end of the road.

It's a lovely drive: fields and beaches and nurseries and a lei stand or two, horses nibbling grass in pasturelands, deep gulches and sudden views of Kaua'i's steeply carved mountains. Keep your eyes on the road, however; it's tempting to fly along at 50 miles per hour, but there are frequent curves and people stopping to make left-hand turns.

And a word about bridges: If you don't want to get the locals all huhu, when you get to the one-lane bridges on Highway 560, take your turn as part of a group, not singly. Smile, wave.