Haleakala Volcanic Crater

I'm back! Hello all! Time to talk about Maui.

About a week ago I went to Maui with a coworker to visit Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge. We weren't even there for two full days, so we didn't see much of Maui, but on Thursday we were given a vehicle and drove up to Haleakala.

It took us quite a while to get up there, because it was a very twisty road, with lots of swung out turns. I'm glad Trish was driving and not me (plus then I got to take a bazillion pictures). Luckily, we also had some folks looking out for us:

Always good to have a cattle guard keeping watch... Actually, the sign indicates a metal pop up gate like the ones in secure parking lots in case some of the open range cattle that graze on the mountain decide to make a run for it.

About halfway up there's a visitors' center where we stopped to use the bathroom and they have some funky plants. I think the species is really old... See if you can actually read the sign.



Now for the best part: the crater. It is unbelievably gorgeous and awe inspiring, and neither my words nor my pictures can do it justice, but I'll let my pictures try.






Trish and I didn't expect to be allowed to leave the refuge and go sightseeing, so I had been thinking I'd come back to Maui just for the day to drive around the island and see Haleakala. It absolutely would have been worth it.

After we stopped at the crater, we went up a few hundred more feet to the absolute summit, and this is what the crater looked like from there, all filled with clouds.


Another very cool thing is that you can see the Big Island from the summit:


Don't these clouds look like snow? I just loved that!


On our drive back down we had some incredible views of the west side of Maui and the Pacific, but it was hard to get good pictures from the car on that twisty road. Here's my best shot.


So our visit to Haleakala made up for the previous day's weed pulling. I'll post about that too, when I put up the pictures from Kealia Pond. If you ever get the chance, Haleakala is one of those must sees in life -- plus, you get to think about how it could actually blow while you're standing there. It's just dormant, not extinct...

Sorry for the delay

Several things have conspired against me doing a Maui post - the main ones are Safeway's apparent lack of caring that their wireless has been down for several days and my forgetful brain. If I could remember to put my Maui pictures on my flash drive I could bring them to work and post from here. Anyone want to remind me?

In the meantime, my adventures here in Honolulu have been somewhat damper than usual. The weather the last couple of days has basically been hot and humid with intermittent downpours that last 5-10 minutes. So I've been sweaty and wet... as most of you know, I hate the rain. I especially hate it when it wakes me up in the wee hours of the morning because it's coming down so hard. The dips in our street were flooded this morning. Oh well, the crappy weather makes it easier to avoid the many beaches experiencing jellyfish warnings right now. It's a strange week in the islands. Oh well, I'll just remember that there are places like this waiting for me this weekend. Worth braving the bursts of rain, don't you agree?
Beach on the North Shore of Oahu

I'm Back!

I just spent two days in Maui, and there will be blog posts to follow - expect lots of dirt, some grumpiness, and some unbelievably beautiful volcano pictures.

In the meantime, here's the picture of the cattle egret my mom was wondering about:



The horses are on the beach behind James Campbell NWR. As my mom said, "Unfortunately the cattle egrets like to eat endangered birds' eggs and chicks." You can see why people brought the egrets to Hawaii though - they also really enjoy hanging out with livestock.

Hmm...

Ok, apparently if I write a post and save it before it's published, it puts itself in the order it was written. I just put up a post titled "Baywatch" that is actually under my mom's post from yesterday. Please read =)

We have a guest blogger!

Yup, it's true. I feel like an official blog now =) So without further ado, take it away Mom!

Greetings from Colleen’s guest blogger, Mom.

Her father and I had a fabulous visit with Colleen and were so happy she was able to take most of the week off work. Of course it went too fast and I didn’t take nearly enough pictures. But I am getting better.

We had a nice room at the Hyatt Waikiki with a gorgeous view but I think next time I’d like to rent a condo so we can have our own kitchen. $9 mai tais in a plastic Dixie cup is just too much! Plus I think I ate my weight in breakfast every morning at the buffet, moo!

Thanks to Biologist extraordinaire, Mike S. who gave us celebrity treatment on our tour of the James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge near Kahuku on Oahu’s north shore. This particular refuge is primarily devoted to four Hawaiian waterbirds on the endangered species list: the stilt, moorhen, coot and Hawaiian duck or koloa. We were lucky enough to see all 4. The bird on the horse’s back is a cattle egret which unfortunately likes to eat the babies of the endangered birds. Mike shared loads of information with us and we thoroughly enjoyed every bit. Thanks to you too Colleen!


This was our 4th trip to Hawaii and I am still overwhelmed by its beauty.

But this was my favorite view: (Mom's view from the sand)


BTW next time any of you complain about the cost of groceries think about $6 spinach and loaves of bread!


Aloha!

Baywatch

After lunch on the North Shore, we drove over to see Alii Beach, a beach I'd never been to before. What makes this particular stretch of Hawaii special is that Baywatch was taped here. Woohoo!


Pretty, yes? Can you see them running?


According to Mike S., one of our biologists, this building sweetened the deal for whatever company was producing Baywatch. The city/state/town (not sure which) built it in order to bring the fabulous acting of luminaries like Pam Anderson, Nicole Eggert, and the incomparable David Hasselhoff to the beaches of Haleiwa. Now the building is a rec center.




The North Shore is just so gorgeous. And, I want you to remember when looking at these pictures, it was a beautiful day out and the beaches were nearly empty! This was true of almost all of the beaches we stopped at while my parents were here, with the exception of Waikiki. Unbelievable.

Oh! I almost forgot! One last Baywatch type touch. The rescue surfboard! I love it.

Eating Pig on the North Shore

So right now my posts are all out of chronological order, but that's ok - I'm doing it this way because I'm just writing the things that are easiest for me to do at work. Then, you get to be entertained by all of the most fascinating happenings in my life and I have something to do at work and don't have to sit in a grocery store for hours on end.

One of the dishes Hawaii is famous for is kalua pig. You can click on that link to read a Wikipedia article about the yumminess. At least I hope so. Let me know if it doesn't work. Basically kalua pig is a slow cooked pig that's been wrapped in ti leaves. Those are ti leaves. Mom mentioned that she definitely wanted to have some while she and Dad were in town, and me loving all versions of slow cooked pork, I knew just the place to take them.


I don't know if Kono's has the best kalua pig on the North Shore or Oahu, but I know I love it. And I knew it would be the perfect place for lunch after our tour of the refuge. The sandwiches come with grilled onions and barbeque sauce. Clearly I ordered mine without the onions, but I think Mom had the right idea going sauceless. The pork is juicy, with occasional crispy bits, and the sauce takes a little bit away from the porkiness. Here's my sandwich: Yum!

We also had some lunch company at the picnic tables where we ate:


They didn't bother us much. Much like Kaua'i, the North Shore has chickens and roosters roaming everywhere. Keep the country country!

Quick Tip

Apparently if you click the pictures in the blog they'll get bigger. This would be particularly useful in looking at the stairs of death in the Diamond Head post. Thanks Mom!

Fun on Mopeds

It's the moment you've all been waiting for: pictures of me on a moped! And, as an added bonus you get pictures of my mom on a moped! Because if I'm going to look stupid I don't want to look stupid alone.


That was me coming back into the compound - you see, we are let out once in a while.



And I think this look on my face is, "Ok Dad, you've taken enough pictures. Can I get off this thing now?"

Now for my favorite:



Look at my mom go! Woohoo!

It was a fun little way to cap off the trip. Tears came a little bit later.

P.S. I know I'm posting about the trip all out of order, but just deal with it.

Climbing Up Diamond Head

On Wednesday morning Mom, Dad, and I planned to climb up Diamondhead, a big famous volcanic crater on the east side of Waikiki. The hike/climb wasn't supposed to be too bad, but I was bitter because I had rescheduled my workout with Laura for early that morning. And then I'm supposed to climb up a mountain?? Just call me Sporty Spice. (For the record, for the brief moment I contemplated which Spice Girl I would want to be, I wanted to be Ginger...Anyone remember when she was Sexy Spice? Anyone?)

Mom and Dad picked me up in their giant, cherry red Cadillac (no, I'm not kidding) and we drove to Diamond Head. It was definitely smart to go when we did, because at 9am it wasn't terribly hot, but everything is so dry and open up there that it would have been if we had waited until the afternoon.



The hike up was surprisingly easy. It's pretty well terraced with little places to step of to the side if you need to rest and nothing is too steep.



Well, nothing except the evil staircase. Now, I don't think I'm alone when I say that stairs are unusually hard. I'm in way better shape than I was three months ago, and stairs can still kick my butt. The worst part of these stairs was the fact that they're not really wide enough for simultaneous up and down travel, so as you're trying to haul yourself up you have people at the top staring at you. Mostly they're nice and offer encouragement, but still - they're staring at you huffing and puffing. But, having those people there also forces you to actually get all the way up the stairs...



Then you get up there and realize there's a spiral staircase waiting for you. The problem with this one is that you can't see how far up it goes, so I took a little break and then ventured up. It was mercifully short. Once you're up those stairs, they expect you to shimmy your way through a bunker hole or something - I have no idea what you would call it. It's a hole that you have to find your way to fit through while fellow tourists wait their turn and watch you. Can you tell I'm still self-conscious about people witnessing my attempts at physical activity?



Unbelievable. The views from the top of Diamond Head are positively stunning. It's also remarkable for the fact that it allows you to see some of the many micro-climates just on Oahu. And then I stand there and think: I live here! I've been so lucky to live in places that are awe-inspiring (albeit it in very different ways.







Minor note: back at the bottom of the trail my dad noticed a sign indicating the "First Amendment Area" and asked me to explain it to him. He then proceeded to tell the confused tourists near us that I was a lawyer and would explain it to them. I still don't think they knew what was going on...Good times.

Blast From the Past

I know you've all missed me terribly, but I had a real lack of internetting time while my parents were here for the past week. Hi Mom! But, yesterday morning the three of us went to Safeway to do a little surfing of the web (after eating some delicious malasadas at Leonard's - couldn't let them leave without it!)and I had a random, yet delightful meeting.

A young man sat down at one of the chairs near us (My mom's thought: "What a nice looking young man") and I leaned over to Mom and said, "That guy really looks like Fred's little brother." Now, I don't actually know anyone named Fred, but if I used the real name then it would spoil the surprise for all one of you who reads this who also knew me in high school (Hi Sarah!). I kept trying to sneak stares at this kid so I could decide whether or not I actually knew him when I had a brilliant idea - check Facebook! Lo and behold, the recent pictures looked just like him and there was a brief Hawaii mention somewhere on the page.

So, I said, "Nick?" He looked at me for a moment and then it dawned on him who I was and said that he thought I looked familiar but didn't think he could possibly know me. Well, he did. Nick Whitenack lives like three blocks away from me! For those of you to whom this means nothing, Nick is an awesome fella I knew back in high school when I was in band (yup) and good friends with his big brother, Benji. (Also turns out that Benji will be visiting soon, so we can have a mini RB reunion.)

Look how cute and not at all awkward we look in this picture my mom made us pose for after we spent some time catching up.