Lihue is the main town on the island of Hawaii and where most people arrive at because it is where the airport is. Lihue also has most of the islands big stores and is where a lot of the island comes to do their shopping and commercial needs. The population of Lihue is around 6,000 people so it is still a rather small town by a most people’s standards.
Lihue is the commercial center for Kauai so you can find a good verity of stores from Wal-mart to smaller shops with everything from seashells and shirts to car stereos. You can find a good verity of food in Lihue from a verity of restaurant grocery store and really good fish markets with a great verity of fish fresh out of the pacific ocean.
Lihue has a few nice place to see and visit that are right out side of town Nawiliwili bay with Kalapaki beach this a small beach that is rather unspectacular compared to a lot of the other beaches on Kauai but it is close to Lihue and makes for a good place to go when you need to be close to town. To the west of Kalapaki beach is Nawiliwili park here you can find some picnic tables playground and restrooms.
The museum is a must see if you are interested in Kauai’s history and culture. The museum has a very nice collection of ancient Hawaiian artifacts that you will see nowhere else in the world. They also have some nice informative displays on the history of Kauai.
Situated on the southeast coast of Kauai the name “Lihue” means “cold chill” in Hawaiian most stories claim it refers to the cool breeze that blows on shore here. In ancient times the name for this area was “Ka-laʻ-i-a-mea” which meant reddest brown place probably referring to the reddish brown soil that is everywhere around Lihue.
In the 1840s the sugar industry came to Lihue and became a large part of the economy here. Around the western part of the island large sugar cane fields were grown then all the cane was transported to Lihue to be processed in the mill. In the 1990s most of the sugar market moved to Asia where it could be grown and processed for less and in 1996 the large sugar mill in Lihue shut down the building is still there but it is vacant. These days the main economy in Lihue is being the island main commercial center, tourism, the airport and a community collage.
The population of Kauai is fairly diverse when sugar industry was running a lot of Asian labors moved to Lihue to work in the sugar industry then a good number of them stayed and raised families so now the population of Lihue is about 50% Asian about 20% are white and about 6.5% are pacific islanders.
If you are visit Kauai chances are you will go through Lihue this is a nice place to get sulies and prepare for your island adventures and there is also so nice thing to see here and there.