Kauaʻi · County seat · East Side
Kauaʻi’s county seat, airport and harbor town. Most visitors land here, pick up a car and head somewhere else. This guide covers the town itself and what lies within about 30 minutes, from Wailua in the north-east to Poʻipū in the south.
The town
Līhuʻe is the seat of Kauaʻi County and the island’s commercial hub. It has the airport, the island’s main deep-water harbor and its largest shopping center, and it is a working town rather than a resort.
Its name is usually translated “cold chill,” for the cool winds across the land. The town grew around the Līhuʻe Plantation sugar mill, established in 1849, and Rice Street, its main thoroughfare, still holds the Kauaʻi Museum and the county’s civic buildings.
Nothing here needs more than a day. The town’s value is position: Wailua and Kapaʻa lie a short drive north, Kōloa and Poʻipū a little farther south-west, and most of the island is an easy day trip.
Sources: Hawaiian Encyclopedia, Līhuʻe · Wikipedia, Līhuʻe · Hawaiʻi Airports, LIH. Route mileage is from the Wikipedia article; the airport distance is from Hawaiʻi Airports.
The hub
Rough driving times from Līhuʻe Airport in light traffic. They are approximate and run longer at rush hour, especially on the Kapaʻa side.
Airport to the downtown core
River, Fern Grotto, ʻOpaekaʻa
Old town and the Tree Tunnel
Beaches, Spouting Horn, Allerton
The start of the north shore
Sources: Hawaii-guide.com, Līhuʻe · Līhuʻe Airport FAQ (unofficial site). Third-party figures; use a routing app for live times.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / John HookDowntown
A short walk along Rice Street takes in the museum, the old county buildings and a few places to eat.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben Ono
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben Ono
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben OnoThe Kauaʻi Museum is at 4428 Rice Street. It opened in 1960 and occupies the Albert Spencer Wilcox Building, a 1924 former library, and the newer Rice Building. Its galleries cover Hawaiian culture and the island’s history, including a royal-legacy theme, and it makes a good orientation to the island before you start driving.
Hours, admission and tour times change, so check the museum’s website before you go.
Rice Street is the town’s main thoroughfare. Kukui Grove Center, on Route 50 just west of downtown, is the island’s largest shopping center, with supermarkets and everyday stores.
The county’s Līhuʻe civic center is here too, which is why the town fills with local business on weekdays and empties out in the evenings.
Sources: Kauaʻi Museum · Hawaiian Encyclopedia, Līhuʻe · Hawaii-guide.com, Līhuʻe.
Photo: Bob Linsdell / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 3.0
02 · The waterfront
The island’s working harbor, a small bay beside it, and the lighthouse on the next point.
Nāwiliwili Bay lies south-east of downtown and holds Kauaʻi’s main deep-water harbor. A long breakwater shelters cargo ships and fishing boats, and the harbor, which opened in 1930, is also the island’s cruise-ship port.
Kalapaki Beach is the small, sheltered beach at the head of the bay, in front of a hotel. It is a pleasant place to sit and watch the harbor. Water conditions vary. If you go in, choose a spot with a lifeguard on duty, read the flags, and stay out of murky water and stream mouths, especially after rain.
Ninini Point is the headland to the north, topped by a 72-foot concrete lighthouse built in 1932 and owned by the U.S. Coast Guard. Older guides describe driving in by a gate beside the runway and a golf course, and public access has varied over the years, so confirm before you go. The lighthouse is also visible from the golf-course grounds nearby, as in the twilight photo at the top of this page.
Sources: Hawaiian Encyclopedia, Līhuʻe · Lighthouse Friends, Nāwiliwili · State Ocean Safety.
Plantation Līhuʻe
Two estates that show what sugar built here.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / John Hook
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben Ono
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Tor Johnson
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Blake AbesA 105-acre estate on Kaumualiʻi Highway, centered on a 1935 mansion built for Gaylord Wilcox. Over the years it has included shops, a restaurant, a rum tasting room, a railway tour and taro fields. Its rail line, lawns and old buildings make it the most polished of the island’s plantation sites.
A rum maker whose Līhuʻe tasting room sits on the Kilohana grounds, in the red-roofed building pictured above. The rum is made from Hawaiian-grown sugarcane.
A preserved sugar-plantation homestead at 4050 Nāwiliwili Road. It has typically been visited on guided tours arranged in advance, so contact them to ask about visiting.
Sources: Kilohana · Grove Farm Museum · Hawaii-guide.com, Līhuʻe. Visiting arrangements change, so check with each site.
Inland from the harbor
A quiet river valley just behind Nāwiliwili, with an ancient fishpond and a ranch below the Hāʻupu ridge.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Daeja Fallas
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben Ono
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / John HookAlakoko is an old walled fishpond on the Hulēʻia River. Legend credits the Menehune with building it in a single night. It is seen from a roadside overlook on Hulemalu Road, where parking is limited, and the pond itself is not a place to visit on foot. The valley is part of the Hulēʻia National Wildlife Refuge, which is not open to the public.
Guided kayak, zipline, tubing and ATV outings have long been based in this valley and on Kipu Ranch land below the Hāʻupu range. These are run by private operators, so check each one directly for availability and to book.
Eating
Līhuʻe is where locals shop and eat, so the food is plain, good value and worth a stop. Hamura Saimin, on Kress Street, is the town’s best-known noodle-soup counter. Saimin is the island-style noodle soup that grew out of Hawaiʻi’s plantation-era mix of cultures.
Kukui Grove Center has the main supermarkets and everyday stores, and a bakery. For fresh produce, Kauaʻi’s county farmers markets rotate around the island through the week, including Līhuʻe, Kapaʻa and Poʻipū; the county publishes the current schedule.
Restaurants and markets change their days and hours, so check before you go.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Mark KushimiSources: County of Kauaʻi · Hawaii-guide.com, Līhuʻe. The farmers-market photo is labeled Kapaʻa by HTA.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Daeja Fallas
06 · Next door to the north
Wailua is the closest real landscape to Līhuʻe: a wide river, a fern-hung grotto and two waterfalls. Kapaʻa is the next town up the highway.
The Wailua River is reached about 15 minutes north of the airport, off Route 56. Kayakers paddle upstream, and riverboat tours run to the Fern Grotto, a wet rock wall under hanging ferns. Wailua River State Park is managed by the state, and the landing and trails at the grotto have rules of their own, so read the park’s notices before you plan on it.
ʻOpaekaʻa Falls is seen from a roadside lookout on Kuamoʻo Road (Route 580), a short drive inland from the highway. The lookout and the river are part of the same state park, so check DLNR for fees and access before you go.
Stay out of the river mouth, and out of the water after heavy rain. Rivers here can rise fast and carry strong currents.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Daeja Fallas
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Tor JohnsonSources: Wailua River State Park, DLNR · State Parks notices.
Inland from Līhuʻe
Wailua Falls is a twin-stranded waterfall on the Wailua River. You reach it from Kūhiō Highway at Kapaia by following Māʻalo Road (Route 583) to its end, about 4 miles. The last stretch is narrow. The view is from a lookout above the falls, with a small parking area nearby.
Don’t try to climb down to the pool: the slopes are steep and slippery, and the river can rise quickly. The falls are fullest after rain, when the approach road is also at its wettest.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Kenji Abe
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Kirk Lee AederSources: Hawaii Highways, Kauaʻi route log · Wailua River State Park, DLNR. Route mileage is from the route log.
The next town
About 7 miles up Route 56, Kapaʻa is the east side’s main town: old storefronts, a coastal path and the road to the north shore.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Heather Goodman / @hbgoodieKapaʻa is where Route 56 turns toward Kīlauea, Hanalei and Hāʻena, and a signpost like this one shows how many of the island’s places are within reach.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA)A coastal path for walking and cycling that follows the shore in and around Kapaʻa, past beaches and small parks.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA)Small shops, cafés and painted walls line Kapaʻa’s main street, which is best explored on foot once you’ve parked.
Sources: County of Kauaʻi · Hawaii Highways, Kauaʻi route log.
South · the sunny side
Take Route 50, then Maluhia Road, for the island’s old sugar town and its resort coast, about half an hour from the airport. The south shore is usually the drier, sunnier side of the island.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Tor Johnson
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Tor Johnson
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / Ben OnoA mile of Maluhia Road (Route 520) lined with more than 500 eucalyptus trees planted around 1911. Kauaʻi County has recognized it as an exceptional tree resource since 1976.
Site of Hawaiʻi’s first successful sugar mill. Its old plantation buildings now hold small shops and restaurants, and a monument honors the workers who came from many countries.
The south shore’s best-known beach, a county park with lifeguard towers. Surf and currents vary from day to day, so check the flags and ask the lifeguard before you swim.
Spouting Horn is a lava-rock blowhole on the coast near Poʻipū. Allerton Garden, part of the National Tropical Botanical Garden’s Lāwaʻi valley gardens, is visited by guided tour.
Sources: Historic Hawaiʻi Foundation, Tree Tunnel · NTBG, Allerton Garden · State lifeguarded beaches · County of Kauaʻi beaches. The monument photo shows the old Kōloa sugar-mill chimney behind it.
Getting around
You arrive at Līhuʻe Airport, and most people need a car from there.
Photo: Hawaii Tourism Authority (HTA) / John HookLīhuʻe Airport (LIH) is Kauaʻi’s main commercial airport, about 1.5 miles east of town. You reach it by Ahukini Road from Kapule Highway. Ground transport listed by the airport includes shuttles, tours and the county bus, which stops in the median in front of the terminal.
Rental cars are the usual way to get around, since distances are long and public transport is limited. Book ahead, especially in busy seasons.
The roads. Kaumualiʻi Highway (Route 50) runs west from Līhuʻe to Kekaha. Kūhiō Highway (Route 56, then 560) runs north through Wailua and Kapaʻa to the north shore, and it ends at Hāʻena. Maluhia Road (Route 520) branches off Route 50 for Kōloa. There is no road all the way around the island.
Sources: Hawaiʻi Airports, LIH · LIH ground transportation · LIH, Kauaʻi Bus · Kauaʻi Bus · HDOT Kauaʻi roadwork · Hawaii Highways, Kauaʻi route log.
Before you go
Hours, fees, tours and access at parks, museums and businesses change. Check current conditions and opening times on the official sites linked below before you set out.
Kauaʻi’s weather varies widely from one side of the island to the other. Heavy rain can close roads and parks and make rivers dangerous. Check the National Weather Service before you drive.
Conditions vary by beach and by day. Swim only where there is a lifeguard, read the flags, and keep out of river and stream mouths and brown or murky water.
The airport is only minutes from town, but the highways can back up. Allow extra time to return your car and check in.
Stay out of closed areas and off private land, and obey posted signs. Some sites mentioned here are on private or protected land.
Bring a light rain jacket, sun protection and sturdy shoes. Red dirt stains clothing, and trails and lookouts can be slick when wet.
Sources: NWS Honolulu · State Ocean Safety · County of Kauaʻi beaches.
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