This happened a while ago but it felt overwhelming to blog about everything since the trip was a week long so here I am catching up. Brian’s parents were supposed to come out for a weekend in Oahu then take his sister and I to big island for a bike trip with Backroads. They ended up getting COVID two days before they were set to leave… so Brian’s sister came out and we went on the trip together.
Night one we stayed at the King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel. When we arrived on Big island, there was some festival going on and we walked a street market. We left early the next morning to head to Volcanoes national park. We started our day hiking the Kilauea Iki Trail, you can see more pictures from my first go around on this trail from this post. The Ohia Lehua’s were in bloom this time and made a fun pop of color against the dark gray lava.
We got to hear more about the lava with a volunteer tour guide.
And can’t miss the lava tube!
We stayed at the quaint Kilauea Lodge. It has only like ten or twelve rooms and is a ten minute car ride from the park. I thought I had more pictures but I don’t.
Makiki Valley Loop Trail is in the middle of Tantalus, a protected forested area of Oahu. After all the hiking I’ve been doing, I thought this would be a walk in the park, but it was actually deceptively a bit harder. I didn’t realize it was rated moderate, it was 1000 ft gain but I didn’t look at the map hard enough to realize it’s all in the first mile or so, phew! This is the maze of roots we navigated working our way up. There were beautiful views of the valley on both sides.
The two other spouses who went happened to be sub spouses, it was great bonding!
There’s a secret extension to a waterfall and I was happy we found it and came across it. It was so beautiful.
It ended up taking us a little over two hours with time built in just to enjoy the moment, 4 miles, and 946ft elevation gain. There was a decently big parking lot, maybe enough for 25 cars, but it’s a really popular area and I think it was filled by the time we left. I’m glad we got there early. Still suffering from a low-ish turnout on hikes. But it’s better than the zero I had over the winter!
My family of golfing fanatics will be impressed that I played in a golf tournament. It was my first time ever playing 18 holes and it was LONG and HOT.
It was for the Captain’s cup on Marine Corps base at the beautiful course. We had to get a picture on the ocean facing hole. This is also where I lost my first ball, sadly.
We think some guy yelled at us for cheering too loudly. Whoops.
We came in last, which at least means we won golf lessons. Still debating about buying myself a set of clubs. We’re running out of outdoor hobby storage. I was exhausted after this… even with using a cart! But I rallied and went and took an hour of tennis lessons, which I’ve been doing as well. I’m still exhausted, this was two days ago.
The other ladies I played with were awesome and very encouraging and fun. I got a wicked tan line from that day, and applied sunscreen twice.
I love water parks. Typhoon Lagoon was one of my favorite things to do going to Disney. Oahu has a Wet ‘n Wild which is not something I’d convince Brian to go to, but I did find a milspouse family (Deana) to adopt me for the day.
The park, much like anywhere these days, is suffering from a huge lack of staff. They only have half the rides open at a time, and you kinda have to guess which one… and then it makes for really long lines at the ones that are open.
Despite all this, we had a good day getting wet and having fun down the rides we could get on!
My favorite is the O’hana Highway, which has a bigger tube and can fit a couple people in, although if you get stuck going backwards it’s not as fun.
Pu’u Ohulehule is a hike a bit up the coast from where I live. It’s also known by a geographical feature called “Pride Rock” for the same reasons you can assume. Unfortunately, there was a 40ft stretch of 50% to near 50% grade trail that was very loose gravel. I climbed about halfway up and decided to freak out about trying to get back down. Slowly but surely and thanks to some footing help from my friend I made it.
I didn’t get to Pride Rock, but I did get a couple great peak-a-boo views along the way.
You might recognize the island to the right – it’s Mokoli’i, Chinaman’s hat, the same one we paddled to recently. This next pic is looking back toward where I live.
I think I could do it if I had put my spikes on, but by the time I was down no part of me wanted to put my spikes on to try again.
This marks my fourth DNF hike. Ka’au crater, Koko head stairs, Chinaman’s hat the other three. I’ve never not finished hikes before, unless you counted the one from Yosemite which I didn’t finish due to health concerns.
The new friend that came with me, Lisa, was incredibly understanding and didn’t make me feel bad at all. It was our first time hiking together, so I felt like I let her down, but promised we could go and do one I’ve been successful at.
After, we hit up this roadside Thai place and I had DELCIOUS Pad Thai. It was only $13 and I split it into three meals the portion was so huge.
My goal for the next year is to try to be more spontaneous and stop and places like this. They are everywhere in Hawaii.
Anyway, continuing to be frustrated that my did not finish list is growing… but oh well.
We’re gonna take real soon We’re waxing down our surfboards We can’t wait for June We’ll all be gone for the summer We’re on surfari to stay Tell the teacher we’re surfin’ Surfin’ U.S.A.
Haggerty’s and Swami’s
Pacific Palisades San Onofre and Sunset Redondo Beach L.A. All over La Jolla
At Waimea Bay
Surfin’ USA Beach Boys
We didn’t go surfing, but my friend Jess swam 2.3 miles! The picture above is all the swimmers lined up at the start. Here they go!
While she was swimming another friend, Raquel, and I hung back at the beach. I read “Oona out of Order” and sunbathed.
And she made it! It was really hard to identify her, all swimmers look the same. But we got her. The last stretch you have to get your land legs back and run up this sandy hill.
I’m glad I had this free day to join and support her and now I feel like I can finally say I’ve “experienced” Waimea Bay. It was very calm today, but it’s certainly not usually like this, I think it gets wavier over the winter.
We saw a honu (turtle) “crossing” the finish line! It was cute. Here’s the bay from a walking path back to the car.
I found myself with a free Sunday so I asked a friend if she wanted to get outside with me for a low key hike nearby. Maunawili Ditch trail is your basic walk through the woods and was just what I needed today. It was shaded and made for a great midday jaunt. It’s a multi-use trail, we found horses at the end, we encountered a mountain biker and other hikers. The hike starts at the same place as another hike I did recently. I didn’t take many pics on the trail, just enjoyed the company and movement. But here are a couple to give you an idea!
Brian was supposed to leave “next week” for the last six weeks… so he wasn’t going to be home for his birthday. I had anticipated meeting a friend at the Haleiwa arts festival on his birthday and I really wanted to go… so I convinced him to come along. The festival was huge and eventually I had to feed him shave ice to stave off grumpiness, but we made it!
I didn’t buy anything, still haven’t found anything that fits what I really want. I also didn’t take many pictures, but finally captured a peacock crossing the road and that’s really prime North Shore Hawaii right there.
The next day, we did manage a re-do dinner at Gaslamp (our first was nixed because Brian got COVID on our anniversary). Gaslamp is a “speakeasy” hidden in the back of a town pub. They text you a passcode before going in, it was relatively long so I read the text to the hostess, ha. The cocktails were AH-MAZING and so was my steak.
Sorry, I can’t easily figure out how to rotate this.
After an appetizer, two drinks a piece, meals, and dessert our bill came out to $400!! But for a combo anniversary/birthday dinner it was worth it. I begged Brian to allow me to do it while he’s gone (not that he has much of a say in the matter but it’s nice to make him think so. JKJK!) Truly we indulged and could’ve cut costs significantly.
This experience definitely isn’t for everyone, but I LOVED it.
This is a hike with no victory story at the end, no grand climax, no “I pushed through and conquered”. It’s a very, very, difficult hike and I knew that going in, but I didn’t realize HOW taxing it would be. I’m going to open with a picture of the one, of many, technical challenges we faced along the way. We had to get through this jungle gym of a fallen tree.
This hike, when accomplished, has it all – waterfalls, views, and a hidden volcanic crater – by journeying in a loop. However, it’s also very difficult, and my goal this time was just to do an out and back to the first waterfall. Well, we got about 2.5 miles in, and I had tripped over myself more times than I could count (this is irregular for me, it was a combo of my defective spikes and PMSing). I didn’t want to keep chancing it. It felt like every 10ft there was some technical part, and we finally got to a spot where there was very little actual path, and I couldn’t do one more thing. I wish I took a picture, but essentially we follow this pipe up, and at one point that path that is well defined here, essentially narrows to next to nothing.
Some day I’ll go the opposite direction and hope I make it to the crater – I am ok with missing out on a couple waterfalls, but I really want to see the hidden crater.
Maunawili Falls is a waterfall that is so popular among tourists, one hiking access route was closed shortly after we arrived in Hawaii in order for trail restoration to occur. This leaves a couple other, much longer, options to get to the waterfall- the one we took was a 6.5 mile total hike. A couple friends had been eager to go on it, so I asked them to choose a date so we could plan to go together with KOSC. Well, they both ended up needing to bail due to life circumstances, and in fact only 3/14 registrants ended up committing. It’s a pretty typical problem with my hikes. Nonetheless, we trekked and had a great time!
The parking for it is on the “hairpin” turn on Pali highway- it is a really small parking lot and there were threats of both tickets and broken glass. When we arrived, there was a ton of broken glass on the ground. Thankfully, even though we were out on the hike for four hours, my car was safe and sound.
The trail starts pretty ominously with this non descript warning… these signs are around Hawaii due to unexploded bombs I believe. Strange they wouldn’t take care of it but here we are.
Essentially you start with hiking the inside of this mountain range and have some amazing peak a boo views in the beginning. Eventually, we take a left and head down into this lower forested area to get to the waterfall…about 2.75 miles in.
The trail is a mix of about everything, from board walk to rock to streams to lengthy mud puddles. So many natural flowers along the way.
I took a chance on a puddle and unfortunately I sunk right in. Some are pretty dense and you stay on top.
This is where we took a left to get to the falls.
We made our way down some stairs cautiously and found the stream, we’re getting close!
Finally, the falls!
The path was blocked by a fallen tree, so we definitely needed to walk up the stream. This part was tricky, and one of my boots ended up filled with water. Thankfully Kaylynn was there to push us all the way because I had about had it with the stream and slippery rocks. I would DEFINITELY take my water shoes next time and changed quickly. Would’ve made a world of difference for this last section.
Now we turn around and climb our way back out. It was helpful to have beautiful views along the way.
Thankful for these ladies to have joined me. I would do this hike again if I gave it some time to dry out. I will also confess that this was a stressful day – Brian left the morning of this hike. His boat was departing later that afternoon and I wanted to go home, shower, and make it to pearl to see. So I was eager to go quickly. I think I’d like to go back under better conditions, with better shoes, and at a slower pace.
