Day 67 contin'd: Scariest Place Ever or the Queen's Bath

After Jonathan's surf lesson, we decided to head back to our house for some R&R, but not before we checked out Queen's Bath, which is just a short drive and hike behind where we are staying.  Supposedly, Queen's Bath is a secret swimming area that is formed in the lava rock on the precipice of a cliff.  All the pictures in my guide book show it to be a gorgeous little pool perfect for a relaxing swim.  For example:

See.  Doesn't that look just divine?  Anyway, according to our guide book, once we reach the trail it's only a very short hike, like 1/4 mile, to the pool.  What our guidebook does not make apparent is that during the winter months, when the ocean is fierce, the pool looks nothing like the guide book pic.  It looks more like:

That is an actual picture that we took when we arrived at the pool.  The ocean is not as peaceful in the winter as in the summer.  There are rogue waves that sweep in suddenly and suck innocent tourists out to sea at spots just like this one.  See:

Our guide book did not mention this sign to us, which we found as we approached the "bath." The book also did not mention that the short hike was also very treacherous with plenty of places to fall down cliffs and crevices.  The whole time I felt very unsafe, which should have probably been a sign to turn around, but, you know, I didn't want to wimp out in front of my husband.  I want to be tough and capable not wimpy and scared.

I did a good job for most of the time, until I saw this sign. There's nothing that scares me more than natural disasters.  Three dreams frequently plague me at times of high stress.  They are tornados, tsunamis, and being back in school and remembering that I am signed up for a class that I forgot to attend for the whole semester, usually it's a spanish class.  Anyway,  once I saw this sign I was on high alert, staying as far from the waves as I could and demanding that Jonathan do the same.  That's when it happened.  A chain of giant waves started to form off the coast.  I was sure these were the rogue waves I was warned about on the sign.  I screamed and started climbing straight up the mountain and told Jonathan to "FOLLOW ME!" Jonathan of course, was not scared.  He knew we were far enough away that we waves could not get us, but he was impressed with how quickly and skillfully I scaled the mountain, especially considering how SLOWLY I had been descending it.   Yes, we all know, when given the option, I will flight before I fight any day.  But the waves were big, very big.  And the way they consumed the bath gave Jonathan and me the chills.  Especially, since not 10 minutes before we had talked to a guy who was just swimming in it.

I imagine that the Queen's Bath is really very beautiful, sometimes, but if we make it back to Kauai, we won't be checking it out again.  It's not worth being sucked out to sea.

Here are some pics.

You can see a sea turtle stuck in the bath trying to get out!