Beach closed - time to go home

 No swimming and BEACH CLOSED

 Still quite a lovely view, I'm not complaining

No snorkeling either - the rip tides were ripping

The water safety people are quite serious about not wanting people to be in the water, although we did see a couple locals, two surfers ripping it off shore and a kite surfer dude who said "he just needed to get wet" made a session of it for an hour or so and then said "back to work".  They obviously knew about how to handle the currents, something I've learned alot about during this trip.

There has been 14 drowning deaths on Kaua'i' since the beginning of 2013.  Two have happened while we've been here.  The ocean and natural environment on Kaua'i' is as dangerous as mountains and moving snow and the risk management is very similar.  A lot of unknowing people spending a lot of money on their vacation memories to find the "perfect wave" or "perfect line."  And public safety professionals spend a lot of time trying to educate and promote safety but sometimes it just doesn't work out.

I was happy to find out that the lifeguards have the ability to have people arrested if they don't obey the "no swimming/beach closed" times.  Just like some ski patrollers can do back in the pacific northwest.  I hope the guy (I'm making an assumption a boy) who violated the closure at Crystal got arrested - he apparently skied right on top of a explosive that had just been thrown with a 90 second fuse.

We were still very psyched about our beach time, staring wistfully at the waves, and waiting to watch the setting sun in hopes of the green flash because of course I wanted to capture a green flash photo.  

Now time to go home back to the warm Hawaiian rain falling.  

THE Pineapple express.