Kauai 2009 Travel Planner - (Page 15) ‘ALEKOKO (MENEHUNE) FISHPONd. dAVId BOYNTON A unique place to shop and dine is Kilohana Plantation, an early 1900s Tudor-style plantation estate. In this wonderful building, small boutiques fill every nook, and a restaurant spills from dining room to la nai, all the ¯ while maintaining the grace of bygone days. Guests are invited to board the Kaua‘i Plantation Railway for a train ride through the plantation’s 36-acre grounds. To see a fine example of a plantation home without the commercial trimmings, reserve a tour of quiet Grove Farm Homestead, sequestered behind broad green lawns and sheltered by giant trees. The house was once the centerpiece of a thriving sugar plantation. Its walls and staircase are crafted of handsome native koa wood, and its beautiful furnishings are all of the period. Behind the columns of its striking Greek Revival façade, more treasures of the past are preserved at the Kaua‘i Museum. Here, the history of the island is told through its collection of interesting artifacts. A most persistent legend of the Lı hu‘e area revolves around the ¯ Menehune, a leprechaun-like people, blamed for every mischief and credited with wonders of construction. Before they left mysteriously in prehistoric times it is said that the Menehune built the ‘Alekoko Fishpond, a massive aquaculture facility, in one moonlit night. The wall of the pond is 900 feet long. ‘Alekoko, popularly called Menehune Fishpond after its creators, is just up the hill from mountain-framed Na wiliwili Harbor. The Harbor sits at ¯ the mouth of the Hule‘ia River featured ¯ in the film, Raiders of the Lost Ark. Grove Farm Homestead, sequestered behind broad green lawns and sheltered by giant trees. KILOHANA PLANTATION. dAVId BOYNTON KAUA‘I Hawai‘i’s Island of Discovery™ 15
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