Pu’u Poa Beach

Great for snorkeling. Small and crowded but plenty of facilities. Not much shade so bring your own. Usually a monk seal or two will stop by to say hi.

Pu’u Poa Beach is a fantastic and very pretty beach located at the very end of Ka Haku Road in the Princeville Resort, directly behind the St. Regis hotel. In fact, it looks as if Pu’u Poa might *be* St. Regis’ private beach, but it is, in fact, public. The access path is off the left before you reach the hotel entrance and descends nearly 200 steps (husband counted) to the beach below.
The beach itself is quite lovely, with a nice expanse of very course orangey sand, a ton of lava rock scattered about, and coral as far as the eye can see. The reef comes up the shore and protrudes above the water — signs at the beach warn visitors of the living creature that is the reef and ask that you not stand on it. Despite this, we saw tons of people *walking all over* the coral near shore, bending down to look for treasure in the tide pools. Heart-​breaking and nerve-​grating.
The reef offers wonderful swimming and snorkeling which is well-​rewarded by tons of colorful, oddly-​shaped, interesting tropical fish. Turtles often swim further out as well. Apparently the surfing near this beach (at neighboring Hanalei Bay) is top-​notch, so watching surfers here is totally entertaining as well. If you walk up the beach (away from the hotel), you’ll reach the mouth of the Hanalei River and the entrance to Hanalei Bay as well. The scenery here is just gorgeous, with spectacular views of the rocky coast and mountains.
Oh, and you just may spot a celeb or two here at Pu’u Poa, since many of them stay at the St. Regis when on Kaua’i. Each afternoon we came down, we saw the same paparazzo crouched behind trees with his ginormous camera. He said he was waiting on famous folk to come swim and and play on the beach, and that he and his cronies take shifts on Pu’u Poa in order to catch them all in their natural habitats.
The major drawback to Pu’u Poa is the St. Regis itself. It dominates the horizon behind the beach, and because of its close proximity, many guests spend the day at Pu’u Poa. Still, it’s not nearly as crowded as easier-​to-​get-​to/​better known beaches like Ke’e.