Maui: Waihe'e Ridge Trail

Rich red earth in places, lush foilage and light filtered by overcast created rich colors.

Dec 28: I woke early for this hike and when I got up I felt unsteady on my feet -- a little off balance. I took this as a continuation of symptoms of dehydration and made myself a smoothie. And I packed two bottles of water along with the Platypus in my backpack. I also left later than I had planned in order to test my steadiness. I used the time to study the maps and guide book to make sure this was something to try, and headed out, getting to the trail head about 8:30 a.m., later than I had planned.

The photos that follow follow the timeline of the hike, which  more than delivered on promises of spectacular views as well as some interesting subjects. The first photo, for example.

I've never seen a honeybucket so stuffed. Popular spot, I guess.

The trail head gate on the right is not for the corpulent. I had to remove my backpack to pass.

This end-of -hike photo shows the initial ascent and an overflow of visitors, below.

This was my first view of the actual trail.

The tree at left is eucalyptus. There were lots of those, some straight as utility poles.

A grove of Norfolk pine.

On the north slope one waterfall fed a lower falls.

On the south flank of the trail, the slopes were equally steep.

The rim path meandered toward its destination.

At the one-mile mark stood the dramatic tree that opened this post.

Dainty flowers along the path.

My Waterloo--the slippery slope to the top

The photo above marks where I turned back. I was tired on this hike, but believed I could complete all 2.6 miles to the top. But about 1.5 miles in, I encountered this steep, slick path along a narrow ridge with steep fallaways on each side. Even under the best of conditions I don't handle heights well. It was time to recognize that I had done more than I expected, and head home. Back at the trail head I ate my lunch, then ended up napping in the car. It was then that I realized how tired I was and that I needed to focus on preparing for the next day, when I would be flying home late at night.

A view of the sea during my descent

A scene at a bend in the trail

A moss-covered knob overlooking the valley to the north

A curiosity--a fern with branches

Increasing contrast on this photo clarified the dramatic erosion furrows on this mountain's flank.

Statistics for the day:

Distance: 3 miles
Elevation gain: 974 feet 
Conditions: Not bad. Humidity varied; wind chill helped with warm temperture. Overcast with low ceiling over valleys and beaches. Path slick with hardened clay and mud in patches.
Load: Negligible: Cameras and water.

Statistics, year to date:

Distance: 1,512.5 miles

Elevation gain: 65,767 feet; 6,288 feet to fifth Rainier

Altitude Sickness and Wind Farm Hike II

Ocean and Haleakala view from the low high point of my hike

 Thursday, Dec. 20: Only after a visit to a Minit Medical clinic the next day did I realize I made this hike while suffering altitude sickness. Even as I write this at 6 p.m. Dec. 21, two hours before Tracy and Shira touch down in Maui, my lips are again tingling from the effects of hiking Haleakala three days earlier. But at the time I blamed the heat and not enough rest to explain why I was only able to ascend between 350 and 400 feet up the more gentle end of the Lahaina Pali trail in a quest to reach the high point of the hike or at least to get a glimpse of the windmills snaking up the hillside.

I turned on Map My Hike software when I gave up and descended, and it claims my descent was 0.89 miles. But that was only a small portion of the exertion. I took a wrong turn when I started the hike, and followed an old road all the way to the turnout that said I was hiking on private property. That was almost to the point where the road curved westward, and it was more than a mile back to the starting point, if you gauge distances according to the 0.89-mile track on the Map My Hike image below.

Distant satellite view of the area, showing the hike and water on both sides of the peninsula

So I was already spent when I returned to the car, devoured a sandwich, talked to some other hikers, and vowed to try again, this time turning leftward uphill instead of following a steady route south.

The correct route turned right and uphill.

This was the region where the wind mills climbed the southern ridge.

The black figures are the shadows of the mills.

I still plan to make this hike, when I'm recovered. These mills are about 200 feet tall or more and I want to cross their path.

Statistics for the day:

Distance: 4 miles
Elevation gain: 350 feet 
Conditions: Hot, probably at least 80 degrees, under bright sun with uneven, difficult rocky path.
Load: Negligible: Cameras and water.

Statistics, year to date:

Distance: 1509.5 miles

Elevation gain: 64,793 feet; 6,912 feet to fifth Rainier

Haleakala 3-year rendezvous

View of the Haleakala crater from the crest

Dec. 18, 2018:  It's been almost three years since I descended into the maw of Haleakala, and I should have taken my altitude meds before I went this day, but I planned to only walk a little ways. I was saving the meds to take before I went all the way to the bottom for the 2,500-foot descent with my son. This was a warm up and I was planning to start the meds later for the big challenge. That, I think, turned out to be a significant miscalculation.

When I started, I intended to talk only a mile, but it was so easy I pushed myself all the way to split rock, the 1.9 mile mark of the 3.9 mile trek to the floor of the volcano. Enroute, I passed old friends, such at "Turkey Rock," a place that reminded me of Thanksgivings past, as the photo below might suggest.

The formation and landmark I call "Turkey Rock"

A formation I wishfully called Split Rock until I came across the real Split Rock

The nature of the path and some of the terrain 

One of many craters created by wind blown particles

A patch of silverswords

The view from Split Rock. I couldn't identify that trail for certain  on any map.

Afternoon clouds began rolling into the crater.

A photographer I chatted with offered to take my photo and suggested the Hawaiian gesture,

And now for a map to clarify

This topo map from Hiking Project answered many questions for me.

This map of Haleakala's Sliding Sands trail comes from a page in the Hiking Project Web Site. It's a topographical map on 32-foot contours, and that little arrow in the center of the image is right where Split Rock lives. A map provided by the National Park Service shows that the distance from the trail head  to the first trail offshoot from sliding sands is 3.9 miles. People I met along the way told me Split Rock was 1.9 miles in from the trail head, and that's just about halfway, which seems to agree with this map. So I now have pretty good evidence that my hike was 3.8 miles round trip.

The elevations on the map show I descended very close to the 8,562-foot level, and that the trail head is at 9,830 feet, so my descent was very close to 1,268 feet. It took me two hours to make the two-mile ascent out of the crater, or about 1 mile per hour at the 8,500-plus foot level, without altitude meds. I'm satisfied with that pace and the conditions, but I wish I hadn't suffered altitude sickness as a result of this test, because that, and accompanying dehydration, threw me off my game, and I likely won't be going back into the crater before I leave Maui Dec. 30. I had hoped to complete my final "Rainier" for the year.

Satistics for the day:

Distance: 4 miles

Elevation gain: 1,268 feet 

Load: Negligible: Cameras and water.

Statistics, year to date:

Distance: 1505.5 miles

Elevation gain: 64,793 feet; 7,262 feet to fifth Rainier

Hot, exhausting, frustrating, but fun, wind farm hike

Winds lash palms near the Malawi wind farm December 15.

Dec 15, Highway 30, Maui: The sun is shining and it is at least 70 degrees, but the red street light across the intersection is shivering from the north wind that is fluttering the fronds on the palms and making it  difficult to open the door on my Ford Focus and equally difficult to keep it from swinging off its hinges once I get it open. It's a good place for the mills of the wind farm, but I can't get to the hiking trail that intersects them because I can't find a safe place to pull off this two-lane road with incessant traffic that is occasionally intermittent. And pulling off is a problem for two reasons: the drop off along many shoulders, and the fee I'm charged if I do any damage to this clunky, 14-year-old rental. There were several moments when I had to resolve to stop using foul language; mine has become very colorful.

Eventually, I give up, head to Costco to get cheap gas (reportedly more than 50 cents less per gallon than where I finally fill up) before I see the length of the line, which is only natural due to the price differential.

On Saturday, Dec. 16, having learned that I didn't drive far enough to find the trailhead (that required passing through the island's only tunnel) I pick up Marian Abbott at 11 a.m. and we start out on an unbelieveably rocky, steep trail. A sign close to the trailhead gives the statistics:

We have to travel 4.8 miles to make the 1,630 elevation gain. The typical grade is 11.9 percent, with 35 percent of the trail being between 13% and 29% grade. The width of the trail is typically 68 inches, but the minimum width is only 10 inches, and that makes it easy to stumble and fall. Boulders are as large as 60 inches, and there are many rocks 20 inches wide.

It took us four hours to reach the 1 mile mark at Mokumana Glulch and return, a rate of 0.5 miles per hour. This has to be the slowest hike I've performed all year, including just casual meandering hikes with friends.

One example of what the trail is like

Heavily weathered basalt outcrops  display the iron content that has turned the ground red.

Just before this photo was taken, Marian saw a whale breach.

The hike to the wind mills provides a view of the channel which is the winter destination of the 40-foot-long and 40-ton humpback whales that come here in winter months. Their young are born in these waters.

On the descent, we could enjoy the deep blue of the waters. This  appears to be an area of corals and sand beds.

It was hot today and our progress was slow and torturous. We were cautious about drinking all our water and trying to go too far to have the energy to return. That was prudent, because as heat drained our energy I nearly drained my Platypus water system.  The only time we saw a wind mill was from the highway; we didn't get close to the line of mills climbing the mountain. I will carry more water on the next climb.

Satistics for the day:

Distance: 2 miles
Elevation gain: 855 feet -- 10 feet less that indicated by "GPS Status" software on my phone
Conditions: Hot, probably at least 85 degrees, under bright sun with uneven, difficult rocky path.
Load: Negligible: Cameras and water.

Statistics, year to date:

Distance: 1501.5 miles

Elevation gain: 63,525 feet; 8,530 feet to fifth Rainier

Frost, lightning (?) and a witch (?) on Tiger 3

Frost greeted us at the trailhead.

It was cold yesterday morning, when John Anderson and I exited our cars at the parking lot of Tiger 3. The good news was that the bite of the cold that cut through my thin safari trousers would disappear after we had hiked for a few minutes. Just inside the trailhead gate the low brush was still frosted, probably from moisture that settled on the leaves and needles as the air lost its carrying capacity due to the cold.

But just a little way up the trail the air was warmer, and at a curve in the trail, despite the cold air, there was no frost to be found, as indicated in the photo below. Hunch: The cold air descended past this point and on into the lowlands, chilling the air it found there, and precipitating out the moisture.

The overcast filtered the light, giving the forest a somewhat gray tone.

This dead tree trunk was clustered with fungi seeking residual nutrients.

Water that had seeped from the ground was gathered in knots of ice crystals.

This hike marked John's best since we first began hiking together last summer. He reahced Tiger's summit, a 2,000 foot elevation gain and a six-mile round trip hike.  On his last attempt he  fell short by less than a half mile.

John reaches the summit of Tiger 3, at 2,522 feet of elevation, and a 2,000-foot elevation gain.

John eyes the sign at the Tiger 3 summit.

Lightning strike?

On the descent I noticed a curious stump. In the pair of photos below, the top image shows a rotting stump with the heartwood more intact. The lower photo shows that the exterior bark is burnt. None of the nearby trees had scorched bark. My hunch is that this is a lightning strike and that the heartwood was less affected than the wood closer to the exterior of the tree.

My hunch: that this tree was a victim of a lightning strike that was kinder to the heartwood.

The witch

Further along on the descent, John paused and stared out into the trees at a strange item hanging from the branches. My first thought was a hang-glider who had been caught there. John joked that it looked like a witch. This photo from my phone isn't much help.  Farther yet, we ran into a young woman who said she had made the same discovery and called out, thinking it might have been a hang glider who was caught up. The mystery continues. Next time I'll take a camera with a long lens. My hike app, All Trails, made it possible to pinpoint the location on a Tiger 3 topo map, so it won't be hard to find.

The tree "witch"

Satistics for the day:

Distance: 6 miles
Elevation gain: 2,000 feet
Conditions:Chll, about 40 F, clear sky.
Load: 20 pounds of backpack

Statistics, year to date:

Distance: 1499.5 miles

Elevation gain: 62,720 feet; 9,335 to fifth Rainier