Kona Coffee

The best part of visiting Kona, was getting to tour the Mountain Thunder coffee farm. Mountain Thunder is a family run, organic coffee farm in the hills of Kona, Hawaii.



Kona coffee is some of the most expensive coffee in the world and is grown organically. Once you try the coffee and see the extensive process of creating it, you'll understand why it's so expensive. The coffee is absolutely amazing and the best coffee I have ever tried in my life. Normal coffee usually gives an after taste and after a while that after taste does not taste too well. Kona coffee has a refreshing taste that doesn't leave any kind of after taste.



The coffee trees are grown in higher altitude mountains and take longer to mature than normal coffee beans. That is what gives the coffee its different taste. After the cherries are matured and ripe, they turn a nice red color. Then, farmers go through the fields and begin handpicking the ripened cherries from each tree. Some farmers can pick off a few hundred pounds of beans a day! The bean inside the cherry is much stronger in caffeine than the actual coffee when it is brewed. I tried one on our nature walk and was bright eyed and bushy tailed for hours afterwards.



Another type of coffee the farm produces is called Peaberry coffee. The coffee is made from undeveloped coffee beans. When a cherry doesn't develop all of the way, the bean still continues to grow inside the cherry and creates an egg shaped coffee bean. The taste is said to have a very intense flavor and is extremely rare. Less than 4% of the crops that are picked grow peaberries. Like all of their coffee, it is a high quality coffee once produced.



Each product made by Mountain Thunder goes through rigorous quality testing and are tested several times a week internally and externally. Each machine used by the company allows the company to use the highest quality coffee beans that are produced by the farm. There are hardly any imperfect beans used when making and sorting the coffee beans, which you can definitely tell when drinking this delicious coffee.



While I didn't purchase any of the coffee myself, it is well worth the price. The coffee takes more months to mature than regular coffee, it's handpicked, goes through extensive quality sorting and testing and then sealed with care.

Best of Road to Hana in Maui

The Road to Hana and the Napali Coast line on the Green Isle were my favorite parts of Hawaii. Although all of Hawaii is gorgeous, these two topped it all. Next time I visit though, I'll be renting my own car and driving around. So many gorgeous spots were driven passed and missed since it was a tour we booked from the cruise liner. Still, we got to see many gorgeous areas of the island.

Maui is the second largest island in Hawaii and home to a diverse climate region, just as all of Hawaii is, except it's even more apparent when traveling the Road to Hana. From gorgeous white and black sand beaches, breathtaking waterfalls and lush tropical forest to empty, sun dried canyons and dusty, old lava fields. It was incredible to go from one region so full of green and life to the dried up and dead like region.

The first stop on our Road to Hana led us to Hookipa Beach. This beach is most famous for being the perfect area to windsurf and just surf in general due to the location of the reef system. We got a few minutes to take some photos, but unfortunately we didn't get to walk on the beach or participate in the surfing :(.



Kaumahina State Wayside Park is mostly just for a quick pit stop along the Road to Hana but is open to gorgeous views of the coastline and black sand beaches.



By far my favorite stop along the highway was Wai'anapanapa State Park. This state park is home to a calm and uncrowded black sand beach and lush greenery along with some interesting sea caves. The beach is captivating alone, but the caves give the beach a little something extra. The Park also has sea arches, lava tubes and a blow hole. We didn't have time to do all the exploring I would have liked to have done since I was super fascinated with the caves.



The beautiful black sand beach of Wai'anapanapa State Park.



A view from the cave.

The caves hold a dark and sad legend. Its a tale of a Hawaiian Princess named Popoalaea. Princess Popoalaea was tired of her husband's cruelties and fled from him, hiding just inside the caves in Wai'anapanapa. One of Princess Popoalaea's faithful maids ran away with her and stayed with her in hiding. One day her husband, Chief Kakae, went down to drink some water and saw Popoalaea's reflection. So angered at her for running and hiding from him, Chief Kakae killed Princess Popoalaea and her maid. At certain times of the year, the pool fills up with red shrimp and it's said that it is a reminder of how Chief Kakae slayed his wife.



While there are many waterfalls along the Road to Hana, we only stopped at one, Wailua Falls. I have a major obsession with waterfalls, so only stopping at this one was kind of a bummer but Wailua Falls definitely didn't disappoint. Set off to the side of the road, the 80' waterfall plunges into a pool where you can go and take a little dip. We didn't have time to go down that path and try it out, but I heard it is a lot less crowded as most people just pull over for a quick snapshot of the falls.



For lunch, we stopped at St. Joseph Catholic Church, built in 1862. It's a tiny church that seems to be in the middle of nowhere and doesn't have much to look at since we had crossed into the dry side of Maui.



After crossing over that invisible line between lush and dry side, there isn't much to look at except the huge expanse of dry, empty land facing the ocean and the side facing Haleakala.



There is apparently an obvious line in this are where you can see where the old lava flow from a past eruption came down the mountain side. Anyone see any obvious line? Because I don't. Everyone was "oohing" and "ahhing" but I just looked at the "beach" instead.



This dry canyon, Manawainui Valley, is much larger than this picture actually shows and has gorgeous waterfalls and steeps walls of lush foliage (so I've been told). I didn't see any of that the day we went but it was still pretty neat to see after staring at green all day.

The Road to Hana is definitely an activity to partake in when visiting Maui. Although I don't suggest taking it with a tour group, it can be beneficial to do so because they give you a lot of information and tips in the area. You can easily look up all the information of the stops you make and get a rental car. By doing that, you can stop at any of the places you find gorgeous and stay until your heart's content. Next time I go, I will definitely be doing that!

Have you ever been to the Road to Hana? Did you enjoy the sites as much as me or see even more?