Another amazing day in Kauai consisted of visiting a few sights around the Wailua River, just north of the Lihue airport.
Lydgate Playground and Beach Park
We packed a picnic and ate a great lunch at Lydgate Playground, a fantastic place for kids to run around! The playground itself is huge and has plenty to entertain kids of all ages. Our girls especially loved the swings and climbing up the “volcano”.
One word of advice- if you bring food, be prepared to be shooing birds away the entire time you eat! It wasn’t too big of an issue, but we definitely had to keep an eye on our picnic!
In the same parking lot as the playground, is a beautiful sheltered beach. It has a man-made wall of rocks to protect against the waves and currents and is supposed to be a great place for families to swim and snorkel. We didn’t have our swimsuits with us this day, but I’d love to come try it out a different visit!
Wailua Falls Lookout
On the way to Kamokila Village, there’s a parking lot that has a lookout for Wailua Falls, just one of the gorgeous waterfalls you can see on the Garden Island. The lookout is just around the corner from where you park and you can get a really great view of the falls. There’s also an additional lookout across from the parking lot the overlooks the river, but be very careful (especially with little ones) as you must cross a busy road to access it.
Kamokila Hawaiian Village
One of our favorite places in Hawaii is definitely the Polynesian Cultural Center on Oahu, and while this was definitely different (and on a much, much smaller scale), the Kamokila Hawaiian Village was definitely reminiscent of the PCC.
To enter the village, it’s only $5 per adult and $3 per child three and older. It includes a self guided tour that takes you through what a traditional Hawaiian village would have looked like while explaining the purpose of each building and several of the plants.
We really enjoyed walking around and exploring at our own pace. Several of the buildings had interactive items and activities that the girls loved checking out. Their favorite was definitely the room that held instruments used during hula dancing and they had a blast trying each of them out. At the end, there were “spears” that one could attempt to throw, along with a type of horseshoe lawn game. We also bought some delicious fresh banana coconut bread on our way out.
Kamokila also offers canoe rentals and guided canoe tours. We didn’t try it out this time, but next time it could be a really great way to explore Wailua River!
Overall, we loved our afternoon along the Wailua River. It was all very family friendly and a great way to spend time together. I highly recommend bringing the whole family here!
Want to see more of our Kauai adventures? Interested in what other Hawaiian islands we’ve taken our family too? Click here to see more of our Hawaii posts!
Daley Family Travels 
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