LUSH KAUAI CULTIVATES FINE GARDENS.

Byline: Carol Fowler Knight-Ridder Tribune News Wire

Kauai is known as Hawaii's Garden Island, and it has certainly earned its title.

Near its south coast, Waimea Canyon cuts through the thick volcanic earth's surface on the same scale as Arizona's Grand Canyon. But shrubs and trees cover Kauai - the geologically oldest island - and the effect is like a Chia pet.

The Kona coast on the Big Island may be famed for its coffee production, but Kauai is the java champ, growing more in its rich red dirt than any other island. The Na Pali coast curves around the north side of Kauai like an impenetrable emerald palisade. Even the island's roadsides form a green corridor from the sheer abundance of growing things.

So it's also no surprise that Kauai has some of the state's most famed gardens. Two of them, Allerton and Limahuli, are National Tropical Botanical Gardens, run by a nonprofit organization chartered by Congress in 1964. The gardens are open to the public, but botanists also carry on extensive research programs and work to restore endangered plant species.

When we toured Allerton, a Hilo sampan - a drop-dead classy 1941 Dodge touring car - met us at the Spouting Horn parking lot on Kauai's south shore for the short drive to the garden. It was a clue to Allerton's veneer of civilization.

Once the summer home of Queen Emma, wife of King Kamehameha IV, the 150-acre grounds was bought by Chicago stockyard heir Robert Allerton in 1938. He and his adopted son planned and fashioned the gardens based on a series of outdoor ``rooms.'' Statues, fountains and benches for meditation and quiet conversation are situated in some of these green oases. The jungle forms the walls for these outdoor rooms.

We walked along a cliff-side road, where purple bougainvillea planted by Queen Emma still cascades down a cliff, past breadfruit and coconut trees - the diet staples of the Polynesians - and red ginger that glowed like a torch and heliconias, a kind of floral centipede.

The cultivated gardens are at the bottom of the cliff. A statue of the goddess Diana gazes serenely over a reflecting pool in one garden and, in another, the mermaid fountain is a masterpiece of hydraulic planning. The undulating 126-foot channel causes the water to form waves as it flows between the curved low cement walls. ``If you sit here and listen to it, you soon get relaxed because your heartbeat steadies to the pulse of the water,'' said Wayne Mehl, who led the tour.

But the jungle cannot be kept at bay. The Moreton Bay fig trees that grow along Lawai Stream were the setting for the discovery of the broken dinosaur egg shells in ``Jurassic Park.'' Several outdoor scenes for the movie were filmed on Kauai.

Limahuli is near the end of the road on Kauai's north shore, a place of ancient, wild character. Makana, the mountain that towers over Limahuli, was one of the few sites where Hawaiians held a flame-throwing ceremony. Today the mountain is known as Bali Hai, because ``South Pacific'' was filmed here.

Hawaiians have lived here for 1,000, maybe 1,500 years, said docent Gil Casrigahi. This was one of the first valleys settled by Polynesians when they arrived centuries ago. The ancients grew taro, which they called kalo, on terraces near the valley entrance. But people settled the valley far inland, where it narrows to a slot between mountains.

Taro needs running water to grow, so the old settlers diverted Limahuli Stream in the valley for this ancient hydroponic garden.

A magic garden has its stories and Limahuli has several of them. One is about Nou, the boy who threw his flame farther than any of the older, stronger throwers. They killed him in a jealous rage, but his body was rescued and protected by one of the menehune, one of the little people of Hawaiian myth. Look up. The rock that sits up on a ledge of Makana's flank is the menehune guarding Nou.

Kauai's garden treasures don't stop with these two large gardens. Olu Pua Gardens and Plantation shows how grandly people lived in the golden age of the plantation era. This was once the home of the Alexander family, which, like descendants of many other mainland settlers, consists of wealthy planter children and grandchildren of missionaries. The Alexanders founded Kauai's largest pineapple plantation. Olu Pua is a place of expansive lawns that roll down from the main house with borders studded with orchids, bromeliads, anthuriums and palms.

But Kauai's gardens don't exist to simply show off exotic blooming things. Stacy Sproat is a young woman with a vision. She is trying to encourage many Hawaiian residents of the north shore to return to some of the old ways. She manages the Waipa Project, a taro-growing endeavor not far from Hanalei Valley, the largest taro-growing area in Hawaii. The project covers a valley, an area known as an ahupua'a, an ancient Hawaiian land division large enough to sustain a community.

At the Waipa Project, people come in to pound taro root into poi once a week. It's available every Thursday, when people pick up their plastic bags of the grayish-purple paste. The project sells taro for $2 a pound; if you buy it at the grocery store, it costs at least $3.50 a pound.

``Our goal is to get poi back on the table of the people,'' Sproat said.

Kauai's garden riches don't end here. When you drive through miles of the green corridor near Hanapepe, you are passing the Island Coffee plantation. Once the domain of the McBryde sugar mills, this 4,000-acre estate has been converted to coffee-growing. Most of it makes its way to the mainland, anonymously mixed in various coffee blends, including some for Hills Bros. But stop awhile at the plantation store, Hawaiian Coffee Traders, and have a cup of Kauai coffee and some macadamia nut cookies. You will see the old sugar mill, with its tall smokestacks, now converted to a coffee mill.

On the north shore, near Kilauea lighthouse where the frigate birds soar and the red-footed boobies nest on cliffs, Guava Kai Plantation produces about 14 million tons of guava each year. That makes a lot of guava juice and jam. You can sample the juice for free, or buy pale pink guava ice cream and jam.

The last word in gardens may be the Green Garden Cafe in Hanapepe, a funky restaurant with so many potted plants and cut flower bouquets that it's like eating in a greenhouse.

On Location

Allerton Garden is located along Lawai Bay and Stream on the south part of Kauai, and adjacent to Lawai Garden, an educational and research facility. Pickups for Allerton tours are at 9 and 10 a.m. and 1 and 2 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday in Spouting Horn parking lot on Lawai Road near Poipu beach and must be arranged in advance. Cost is $25. Information: [phone].

Limahuli Garden and Preserve is on Kauai's north shore near the end of Highway 560 in Haena. Hours are 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and Sunday. Self-guided visits are $10. Guided tours are $15 and reservations must be made in advance. Information: [phone].

Olu Pua Botanical Gardens and Plantation is one mile west of Kalaheo on Highway 50 on the island's south shore. Guided walking tours depart from the visitor's center hourly from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. daily. Cost is $12 for adults, $6 ages 5 to 12. Information: [phone].

Guava Kai Plantation is off Highway 56 on the north side of the island near Kilauea. Hours are 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. daily. Information: [phone].

Hawaiian Coffee Traders is off Highway 50 on 540, a loop off the south part of the island's main highway. Turn onto the small dirt road and head toward the sugar mill buildings. Information: [phone].

More information: Hawaii Visitors Bureau on Kauai, [phone].

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Photo, Box

Photo: The lush garden isle of Kauai boasts waterfalls in the wild, as well as formal gardens open to the public.

Susanne Hopkins/Daily News

Box: On Location (See text)