I remember for my 12th birthday, the only thing I wanted to do was get certified to go SCUBA Diving (12 is the minimum age you can be to get certified). It was not too long after when I finished all of the class work and got to go under the water and experience what it was like to "breathe like a fish". For me SCUBA diving was something that after doing once, I was hooked. A few years later when I started working, the first job I ever got was being an assistant to a dive instructor at a company on Maui. After SCUBA diving quite a bit during high school, I kind of fell out of the habit when I started going to college over in the landlocked town of Ashland, Oregon. After I graduated and came back home I have gone diving a few times, but I've been going with nowhere close to the consistency that I once did. This was the first time I have gone SCUBA diving on Kauai, so I was interested to see how it was going to compare.

I checked in early in the morning at the Seasport Divers office in Koloa. Once I got there they fitted me with all the dive gear that I needed. They had very nice BCD's that were equipped with really nice regulators and digital dive computers. Once the group was ready to go, we boarded their van that was waiting outside. From here our instructor took us down to the harbor, where our boat was waiting for us.

There was a slight delay because of a mechanical issue that another boat was having that was blocking the launch ramp. It only took a couple minutes for the other boaters give up, get there boat back on the trailer and then tow it out of the way of our boat and the others that were waiting to use the boat ramp. As soon as the ramp was clear our crew was able to get the boat in the water. When we were all boarded we pulled out of the harbor and began discussing where we should go diving.

It was a small group, and everyone was reasonably experienced so we could go pretty much anywhere we wanted. We decided that we were going to do a wall dive, then a cave dive. I enjoyed them both, but my favorite part was the caves.

After I got out of the water from the first dive, I knew that we were in for a for an adventure on the second dive. The "wall dive" had so many caves that we passed throughout I couldn't imagine what the "cave dive" was going to have. As soon as we dropped down to the bottom of the second dive I had much more of an idea how elaborate the cave structure on Kauai can be, but before I talk about the dive, I feel that we should talk about how the reef of Kauai is different from the other islands (which is the reason why these caves were so cool).

Kauai is the oldest island (except for the small privately owned island of Ni'ihau). The volcano of Kauai stopped erupting over 5 million years ago, and the island has been rapidly eroding ever since. The islands further down the chain all stopped erupting at a later time and have not gotten as far in the erosion process. Kauai has eroded so much, that it has formed a shallow plane that extends a great distance from shore out into the ocean, forming a shelf that circles all the way around the island. This plane of shallow water has been home to a vast network of coral reef that has been growing for millions of years. This kind of massively thick reef forms giant limestone layers that get eroded by the waves and currents to form massive superstructures of limestone that are so porous that they resemble the texture of Swiss cheese. The other islands do not typically have the kind of reef that is growing out of such thick layers of limestone (old reef). Most places I have been to seem to be more like reef that has been more recently rooted into an actual piece of the volcanic bedrock, or to thinner sheets of limestone.

Ok, I feel like I've done my best to explain how the bottom looked different from the other places I've gone in Hawaii. Lets get back to the dive. As soon as we dropped to the bottom, our instructor took us to what started out as a giant trench in the reef. As we made our way down the trench, it got increasingly deeper. The walls began to overhang further and further, until we were eventually going through a massive tunnel. On the sides of the tunnel there were there were other holes that lined the walls and were stuffed with all kinds of sea life. We saw some large Lobsters in one pocket of the cave and all kinds of big eyed nocturnal fish cramming themselves in under the ledges near the floor of the cave. As we rounded a corner in the cave, our guide turned and handed me his flashlight and pointed into a side cave in the wall that was about 4-5 feet in diameter. I crept in with the light in one hand and the camera in the other.

Inside, the cave was literally filled with fish. I sat there hovering in the stillness of the cave, deep under the surface and experienced a moment of sheer awe. There were Menpachi everywhere! Then as I shined the light around I could make out two massive puffer fish swimming through the cloud of Menpachi that were easily greater in size then the length of my elbow to the tip of my fingers.

After we exited the cave we saw some other interesting specimens, all kinds of reef fish, black coral, and we even saw a turtle. After we were done with our tanks we made our way up to the surface where the boat was waiting for us.

As we got back on the boat we began to make our way back to the harbor. I know that the other members of the group had a good time because two out of three of them asked if there was room to do it again the following day! I enjoyed a great first day of diving on Kauai, and am looking forward to going again soon.


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Jake Barefoot
Vice President
Tom Barefoot's Tours

Today I got to take my Mom to see something very special.

In the 1400+ years that the Hawaiian Islands have been inhabited by humans, an amazingly rich culture has developed here. Throughout different migrations, people landed on these shores and contributed new and different things from their homelands. These migrations eventually merged together and developed a culture that is unique to any other on the planet. Massive farms, construction projects and armadas of advanced sea faring vessels have been common on these islands since ancient times. At various points in history, there were far more people residing on the islands that make up the state of Hawaii then there is currently today. However, even though the people of Hawaii had a great amount of natural resources available to them, there was a point in time where the entire Hawaiian population was in great danger of total annihilation.

When the European explorers, traders and missionaries first came to the Hawaiian Islands they brought with them deadly diseases that the immune systems of the Hawaiian People had trouble fighting. This resulted in plagues of an unimaginable scale. Disease killed off an enormous percentage of the native population. Unfortunately, because of a lack of written language, many of the ancient customs and culture that had been orally passed down through the generations was dieing off as well.

The Hawaiian culture possessed an absolute mastery of many incredible things. They mastered crossing the seas in well organized armadas of canoes navigating by the stars, winds, ocean currents and wildlife to find the relatively small islands of Hawaii. These voyages were done on a consistent enough basis to establish major trade routes to other far off areas of the Pacific. With no metals available the Hawaiians used the various materials that were available to make creations that in many cases were superior to their European counterparts. The coconut rope that was made in Hawaii was far stronger to the hemp rope that was common on European ships and was one of the first commodities that was traded. All of this knowledge and tradition was endanger of being completely lost.

In these times the majority of the land was owned by the Hawaiian Monarchy. In some cases the monarchy gifted large parcels of land to individual European settlers. One of these parcels that included the entire island of Ni'ihau as well as most of the West side of Kauai was purchased in 1863 by Elizabeth Sinclair for $10,000. Elizabeth Sinclair purchased the land directly from King Kamehameha IV and her direct descendants own it to this day.

During the years the the family (whose name has since changed to Robinson) has resided on this parcel they have made some incredible sacrifices to help preserve Hawaiian culture. Perhaps the single largest contribution to Hawaiians that has been made by any family on earth, the Robinson have set aside the entire island as a sort of living cultural preserve.

The Robinsons initially created the preserve of Ni'ihau to act as a quarantine zone to protect the Hawaiian bloodlines from Polio and Small Pox. They had strict policies of who could come and go from the island. To this day the amount of disease that is found on Ni'ihau is practically non existent....and the culture is flourishing.


The populations of this island still live in traditional ways. Hunting, fishing and farming for most of their food (the rest being shipped in by the Robinson family). This small population has been able act as a cultural time capsule. This small community is responsible for much of what is presently known about ancient Hawaiian culture to this day.

Today we went on a trip with Holo Holo Charters to the Napali coastline of Kauai. We took in the spectacle of these over 3000 foot tall sea cliffs before we made our way across the 17 mile wide channel to the island of Ni'ihau. Off the North shore of the island there is a large volcanic caldera that is known as "Lehua Rock". Lehua is a bird sanctuary. The island is surrounded by incredibly clear, tropical water.

We snorkeled here at a place that was called "Vertical Awareness". The reason it got this name is because of the shape of the bottom. There is a flat reef that is about 20 feet deep that drops off in a massive undersea cliff to well over a hundred feet down.

This area had an incredible amount of sea life that could be easily observed through the crystal clear water. What I really liked about this dive area is that there was a huge variety to what we saw. There were the typical reef fish that are common along the bright reefs of Hawaii's shallow coastal waters. Then, in addition to the little reef fish there were also some much larger, deep water pelagic species of fish that were buzzing around through our dive site. The captain told me that it is not uncommon to see Mahi Mahi, Ono or even Ahi cruising in out of the shallows from deep water.

After we were done snorkeling we come back aboard the boat just in time for lunch. The crew set out a large buffet of breads, meats, vegetables and cheeses for a sandwich buffet. In addition to sandwiches there was also a green, fruit and pasta salad selection.

After lunch we made our way back across the channel to Port Allen Harbor. The immense "Holo Holo" did a great job flattening out seas on the way home. This channel can get quite rough and all though we did get the boat rocking quite a bit it was much smoother then it would've been on a smaller vessel.

At the end of the trip both my Mom and I agreed that it was all well worth the early wake up and the rough seas. Seeing the cliffs of Napali, and the visiting the island of Ni'ihau with my Mom are memories I will never forget.

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Jake Barefoot
Vice President
Tom Barefoot's Tours

This year my girlfriend Simone and I decided that we were going to celebrate Valentines days a little bit differently then we have in the past. We decided that we were going to go up to the North Shore of Kauai and try out the zipline at the Princeville Ranch.

When we arrived at the Princeville Ranch Adventures headquarters our very friendly guides greeted us and outfitted us with our harnesses. After we were all geared up, we boarded their 6 wheeled military transport vehicle. The guides got in and started up the motor and we began our journey across the ranch to the beginning of the zip line course.

They had their operation set up so it was as safe as possible. One of the guides would clip you into the zipline at the top. After you were fully attached, you would ride down and then be unclipped by the other guide. Most of the ziplines on the course were single zips, except for the final zipline. The final line was called “King Kong”, and consisted of two zips that ran parallel to each other. This design allowed the riders to race each other on the way down.


As Simone and I made our way up the stairs to the beginning of “King Kong” I remember thinking about how I should almost give her a head start because I weigh so much more then she does. Then, when the guide was clipping me in she said:

“You’re pretty tall, that’s gonna make for a lot of wind resistance so you better tuck into a little ball.”

For some reason I totally discarded her advice. While Simone made her body into the smallest cannon ball she could, I tried to lean back and make my body as pointed as I could (like an arrow). My theory was a total failure because right as we started Simone sped off in front of me with her little cannonball and left me in the dust making my stupid arrow. I figure it was what I deserved for not listening to the professional zipliners advice.

At the end of the day we were a little more tired then I thought we would be. I think it had more to do with just being in the sun for most of the afternoon then from any sort of workout got from walking between the lines. The trip ended in the middle of the afternoon and we were left with plenty of time to be able to enjoy the sunset from Hanalei before we went to dinner.



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Jake Barefoot
Vice President
Tom Barefoot's Tours

Throughout my life I have had many opportunities to experience helicopter flights around Hawaii. I have been on helicopters on all of the major islands, so I feel that I can legitimately say that the flights on Kauai pack more into them then they do anywhere else in Hawaii. Throughout the entire flight we were constantly seeing new things around each and every corner. The excitement never stopped (or was even subdued) throughout the whole flight. The girl next to me had a look of awe on her face the whole time, and the couple that sat in the front seat was also had a great time (check out their testimonial at the end of the video). I think that the excitement levels were not only elevated by what we saw, but they were also elevated by the fact that there were no doors on the helicopter and there was nothing between us and the ground besides thousands of feet of air!

The helicopter that we flew in was Interisland Helicopters flagship MD 500. This design is also commonly referred to as the Hughes 500. This type of helicopter was originally designed in the Vietnam War era and has since been retrofitted for many different uses in the military, well as in many different civilian industries. The aircraft that we flew in was painted green camouflage and the were doors removed. The outside as well as the inside were impeccably clean. The spartan interior was simple, but comfortable.

You would think that having hundred plus mile an hour winds rushing by you would make for an uncomfortable ride. I was pleased to find out the MD 500 helicopter was really quite comfortable to ride in. I think the best way to simulate the winds and the ride of the helicopter would be to go for a ride in the back of a pickup truck with your back seated against the cab facing the rear bumper of the truck. You can feel the wind going by, but you're sheltered from the full force of the wind by the cab of the truck. In the helicopter the wind did come in the sides a little bit but it was mostly blocked by the wall that separated the first row and the second row of seating in the helicopters' passenger cabin.

The sights that we saw were absolutely incredible. We saw the 5 sisters waterfalls, the Waimea Canyon (the Grand Canyon of the Pacific), the Napali Sea Cliffs (over 3000ft tall), Kalalau Beach, the Hanalei Bay... and we even managed to sneek into the "Keyhole" of the island where we could view the wettest place on earth. Throughout the flight we saw some amazing things and I was able to take some amazing pictures.

Some advice on photography on open air helicopters: I brought along a Canon DSLR with a very wide 18-250 Sigma zoom lens on it. This is a long telescoping kind of lens. During the flight I extended the lens when zooming, and the tip of it went into the hard wind near the door of the helicopter. I only tried to zoom in on a couple of things and because of the extending nature of the lens and I think that it might have got slightly damaged from the wind. Upon landing, I could definitely feel a sticky spot in the zoom ring when extending or retracting the lens that could have easily happened because of the high wind environment the lens was exposed to on the edge of the cabin. I think next time I will bring either a fixed lens or a zoom that has purely internal motion with no extending action. I will also focus more on keeping the camera further inside the cabin. For the most part the majority of the shots that I took were at a pretty wide angle and if I had the range I would've gone even wider then my 18mm on the Canon cropped sensor would allow me to go. Unless your going with a two camera set up, I think you might prefer to use a wide angle lens throughout the flight. Changing between lenses mid flight is something that I would not recommend trying. I think that the smaller size factor of a point and shoot camera is something that makes the point and shoot option worth considering as well. Regardless of what you bring, just make sure it has a strap because inter island helicopters requires one on all passengers cameras.


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Jake Barefoot
Vice President
Tom Barefoot's Tours