There is a crater on the Marine Corps base called Ulupa’u crater. It faces out toward the ocean, and inside is a setup for various training exercises. To use the hike there are a few logistics involved, including getting a key and radio and signing waivers. I tasked my friend Jess to coordinate this because I thought there was a chance I wouldn’t be able to. She did great!
We did it for sunrise. We set off in the dark.
We thought it might be tough to get everyone up in time, but we did! There was a bit of scrambling and a few steep parts. But you can see all of base and over to Lanikai.
There’s the golf course we played with my parents, and pyramid rock beach and North Beach.
We got to take our husbands.
You can kinda tell how steep it is here. There are ropes the whole way.
I would not want to do this when it was slippery! Thankfully we had perfect weather for it and it’s been dry.
It was certainly challenging and Brian and I were the last to get up, but we did! I unfortunately don’t have a selfie of just us, but he was there and I was thankful he went slowly with me. There were a TON of gnats through some of the higher elevation wooded parts… the noise was deafening trying to walk through them. We covered our mouths with shirts and ducked low, it helped…
I don’t know if I’d do this again. We’ll see. I’m glad to have gone at least once!