The Na Pali Coast Adventure
My Son and I Will Never Forget

A father-and-son paddle that became a lesson in the ocean, equipment, judgment, and knowing when conditions have changed.

Cole and me at Kalalau after the kayaking portion of the trip had come to an unexpected end.

The Trip I Had Wanted to Do for Years

Two summers ago, my son Cole and I set out on an adventure along Kauaʻi’s Na Pali Coast that I am certain neither of us will ever forget.

I had wanted for years to paddle the coast without a guide. I had done the trip once before with a guide and had loved it. The Na Pali Coast is roughly a 20-mile stretch of spectacular cliffs, valleys and isolated beaches, with Kalalau Valley near the heart of it. There are only a handful of places along the coast where you can realistically get ashore, which is part of what makes the trip so extraordinary—and what makes good planning and equipment so important.

I went into the trip with a lot of confidence in my ability on the water. Over the years I had done perhaps a dozen 15-mile paddles in a 21-foot Sea Eagle racing kayak. I had spent ten years as a lifeguard, surfed regularly for decades, and accumulated more than 10,000 miles of ocean sailing. I was very comfortable in open water and around surf.

Cole was not nearly as comfortable in the ocean as I was. That difference would become much more important as the day went on.

The First Mistake: The Kayak

I had tried to rent a proper expedition kayak for the trip but was unable to get one. Friends had a two-person Pelican-style recreational kayak available, and because I had so much experience paddling from beach to beach, I convinced myself it would be adequate.

In hindsight, that was the fundamental mistake of the trip.

The boat was small for the combined weight of Cole, me and our camping gear, and it was never intended to be an expedition boat for an exposed coastline like Na Pali. Still, we had our camping permit and a plan: work our way down the coast, camp at the designated locations, and ultimately reach Polihale Beach on the third day.

We launched in the morning from the Tunnels area. Even getting ourselves and the gear into the kayak through the water was awkward because the boat was heavily loaded, but once we were underway the first three or four miles were excellent.

The kayak on Kalalau Beach after the ocean portion of the trip was over.

The Ocean Starts to Change

There was some swell running when we started, perhaps around three feet, with an easterly wind around 10 knots. After about an hour we pulled into a small cove and floated for a few minutes to check the conditions.

It was still early—somewhere around 8:30 or 9:00 in the morning—but I could feel the wind beginning to build. I wanted to keep moving before it became stronger.

We continued down the coast, at one point roughly a mile offshore. Dolphins appeared nearby, which was one of those perfect Hawaii moments: clear water, the Na Pali cliffs beside us and dolphins moving through the ocean.

But the swell continued to build.

Before long we were dealing with four- to five-foot seas, and water began coming over the kayak. After another 40 minutes or so, the boat felt increasingly sluggish. By about 10:30 I realized we had accumulated roughly an inch of water inside the hull or cockpit area. That might not sound like much, but in a small, overloaded kayak it dramatically changed the handling.

The wind continued to rise. Soon it was blowing around 20 knots, whitecaps were scattered across the water, and some of the swells were approaching seven feet. We occasionally saw tourist boats farther offshore moving along the coast.

We kept paddling.

About half an hour later, with the wind perhaps 25 knots and the sea increasingly rough, I decided we needed to get closer to shore. The kayak was becoming difficult to control, and it was obvious that we needed to get out, empty the water and reassess.

A Shore That Wasn't a Beach

From offshore, the shoreline looked as though it was covered with small rocks. As we approached, the scale became clear: they were enormous boulders, some roughly four feet across, with surf breaking directly onto them.

We were just around the coast from Kalalau Beach, although at the time we did not appreciate how close a much better landing was.

By then the kayak was so full of water that getting ashore had become necessary rather than optional. We managed to land against the rocks. One of the paddles broke while I was using it for leverage to keep us from being pushed around by the surf.

My initial thought was that the kayak itself was light, so we could simply manhandle it up the rocks. What I had not adequately accounted for was the enormous amount of water now inside it. A light recreational kayak with perhaps 150, 200 or even several hundred pounds of water in it is no longer a light kayak.

Eventually we got it high enough to sit beneath a small cliff and rest. For the first time that day, we had a moment to look at each other and think: What exactly have we gotten ourselves into?

Back Into the Water

After about half an hour, we emptied as much water as we could and decided to launch again. We had only one intact paddle. I took the broken half of the other paddle and tried to use it from the back.

We made it perhaps 100 yards offshore.

Then the kayak sank.

Oddly enough, I still wasn't particularly frightened. I could see the beach. We were perhaps 150 yards offshore, the water was crystal clear and maybe 15 feet deep, and I was very comfortable swimming in the ocean. I put on a swim fin and gave another fin to Cole. My thought was essentially: Fine. We'll swim in.

What I wasn't fully appreciating was that Cole was experiencing the same situation from a very different perspective. He had already been getting seasick earlier in the day. Now he was in rough water, with the wind around 25 knots, next to a swamped kayak.

A tourist catamaran came by and someone called out, asking if we were okay.

I signaled back that we were fine.

Cole, meanwhile, was waving both arms and signaling: Help us!

That was the moment I looked at him and realized that my comfort level in the ocean was not his comfort level. What seemed manageable to me was genuinely frightening to him.

The Rescue That Wasn't Quite a Rescue

The catamaran came alongside and took us aboard. They attempted to tow the kayak, but the way the towline was rigged caused the kayak to flip end over end and fill completely with water.

They brought us close to Kalalau Beach and offered either to take us with them or put us ashore with the kayak. I chose the beach. My thinking was that we could empty the boat, recover our equipment and continue once things were sorted out.

Instead, I spent roughly two and a half hours wrestling the kayak through the shore break and up the steep sand. Every wave added more water and sand. Our critical equipment—including our satellite communicator and phones—was buried inside the kayak.

That produced one of the biggest lessons of the entire trip: emergency communications should be attached to you, not buried somewhere inside your boat.

Because of the kayak's design, getting our equipment out was almost comical. We would lift the entire roughly 14-foot kayak, let the contents shift or fall toward an opening, and then try to fish individual items out.

Eventually I found the inReach satellite communicator and our phones.

I can still remember jumping up and down on the beach yelling, “Woohoo!” People on the beach—and even some people on boats offshore—could see how excited we were. At that moment, recovering that little satellite device felt like winning the lottery.

Kalalau Beach—where the day finally shifted from an ocean problem to a land problem.

Two Nights at Kalalau

The people on the tour boat told us they would come back around 11:00 the next morning to pick us up.

The next day we waited for them. When the boat appeared offshore, we waved and yelled, but we didn't understand how difficult it would be for them to identify us among everyone else on the beach. They continued on.

So we stayed.

We ultimately spent two nights on the beach. We had a tent and some food, but no blankets and not much in the way of comfort. Even so, compared with the events on the water, we were perfectly happy to be safely ashore.

By then the kayak portion of the expedition was clearly over. The only practical way out was on foot.

Our unexpected campsite beneath the cliffs, with the kayak finally high and dry.

Safe on the beach after a day that had gone very differently than planned.

A waterfall near Kalalau—a reminder that once ashore, we were stranded in an extraordinary place.

Sunset from Kalalau during one of our two unexpected nights on the beach.

Night on the beach, with only the glow on the horizon and a sliver of moon above the Pacific.

The Long Walk Out

On the final day, we started the hike out on the Kalalau Trail.

The hike was about 11 to 12 miles and, after everything that had happened, it felt extremely long and grueling. The section around Crawler's Ledge was especially stressful.

I had grown up rock climbing and was accustomed to exposure, so I could manage the narrow trail and the steep drop without becoming overwhelmed. Cole was much less comfortable with it. At the most exposed section, I took his backpack and carried it for him so he could concentrate entirely on his footing.

It was a fitting final chapter to the adventure. We had started with the idea of paddling the Na Pali Coast and ended up hiking one of Hawaii's most demanding trails after two nights unexpectedly stranded at Kalalau.

We finally reached the trailhead at around six in the evening, where Robyn picked us up. We went to Calypso for Nachos! It had been a 12 hour hike out starting at 5:00 am.