English explorer Isabella Bird (1831-1904) spent nearly seven months of 1873 touring the Hawaiian Islands, and published her experiences there two years later in her book “Six Months in the Sandwich Islands.”
Her book ranks with Mark Twain’s “Letters from Hawai‘i” as one of the finest narratives of 19th-century Hawaiian life written by a visitor from a foreign land.
Bird’s narrative of Kaua‘i begins with a description of her miserable 18-hour overnight passage through rolling swells from Honolulu to Koloa Landing aboard the 60-ton inter-island schooner “Jenny” in March 1873.
At Koloa, she stayed at missionary Dr. James W. Smith’s home, located makai of the present Koloa Missionary Church.
She then set off on a three- day, 23-mile horseback ride from Koloa to Makaweli in the company of an unnamed widow of an early missionary teacher.
On the way, they stayed overnight with Scotsman Judge Duncan McBryde and his wife, Elizabeth, at Brydeswood, their home built in 1860 that was situated just west of Kalaheo.
The next morning, the two women proceeded downhill toward Hanapepe.
Later in the day, they turned mauka and rode into the cool uplands above Pakala toward Makaweli House, the residence of Scotswoman Eliza Sinclair and her family at 1,800 feet above sea level.
The highlight of Bird’s sojourn at Makaweli House was her expedition on horseback with Eliza Sinclair and several others to the 326-foot-high Manawaiopuna Falls in Hanapepe Valley.
Before returning to Koloa, Bird also visited Waiawa, the estate of rancher Valdemar Knudsen — then located near the foot of Ho‘ea Valley, about a mile west of Kekaha.
Bird then went to Lihu‘e for a short stay with rancher and future Kaua‘i Gov. William Hyde Rice and his family at Hale Nani.
After admiring the scenery at Hanalei, she returned to Lihu‘e via a 40-mile route she covered on horseback in 7 and 1/2 hours, and in doing so gained the respect of her Hawaiian companions for her outstanding riding skills.
Bird returned to Honolulu in April 1873, and soon sailed off to continue her tour on the Big Island and Maui.
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Hank Soboleski has been a resident of Kauai since the 1960s. Hank’s love of the island and its history has inspired him, in conjunction with The Garden Island Newspaper, to share the island’s history weekly. The collection of these articles can be found here: https://bit.ly/2IfbxL9 and here https://bit.ly/2STw9gi Hank can be reached at hssgms@gmail.com
