Early in our planning for this vacation on Maui, we had talked about walking through the Haleakala crater, and it sort of became the keystone around which the rest of our trip was built. Because the kids arrived the day before on the 2nd, the 3rd had been the date for this hike ever since we booked the flights. So, it was with much anticipation that we packed packed up most of the kids and the grandbabies for the drive…
The kids all came to join us on the 2nd, so, before anyone’s body clock had a chance to adjust to the time zone change, we rustled everyone out of bed at 3am in order to make the sunrise at the top of Haleakala. It was a little less rushed than our first visit the previous week – we got an earlier start and the traffic seemed lighter going up the mountain. Once we parked at the visitor center, Jane led…
One of the stops we had bypassed the previous day on our way east was the Waikomoi Ridge trail, a short nature walk that ascends a low ridge south of the main road to a couple of picnic areas – it was described as offering views over a deep canyon to the east and the lush vegetation we had come to expect from this side of the island. The trailhead is located on the inside edge of a sharp bend…
After checking out of our hotel and leaving Hana behind, we planned to head back west up the Hana road to Kahanu Garden, located off the main highway down Ulaino Road toward the ocean. The garden is near the end of the road and abuts an enormous temple site – we had seen some aerial photos of the gigantic structure that covers more than an acre and thought it alone was worthy of a visit. Also, our hiking guidebook listed…
Day 2 of our Hana Adventure Extraordinaire began with an absolutely glorious sunrise – since our body clocks had yet to fully adjust to Hawaii time, we were up in plenty of time to see it. We decided rather than check out and leave Hana directly, we had time to drive west up the road to Waianapanapa State Beach and hike there, then return to the hotel to clean up before leaving the area for good. There are many Hawaiian…
The long day ended with our return to Hana and a walk up to Fagan’s Cross, a local landmark placed by one of the area’s earliest cattle ranchers atop a prominent hill overlooking the town and serviced by a trailhead that also serves a community walking trail. It looked like we could combine the two paths to form a 5-mile out-and-back hike, so off we went at about 5:30pm. The trailhead abuts a hotel parking lot that was filling up with patrons…
We decided to continue exploring the area around Hana after checking into our hotel and cleaning up. It was early in the evening and our hotel room was a studio condo with a full kitchen – we had brought food to cook for dinner, so we figured we had time for a couple of more hikes before dark. We drove a short distance back south out of town to Koki Beach, on a north-facing cove with an old, wooded cinder cone marking…
Our hiking guidebook noted some oft-overlooked pools located not far from the road back to Hana, so we wanted to pay these a visit after returning from Waimoku Falls – the roadside trailhead was fairly obvious from the 8-10 cars parked against the fenceline along the road (which was also a bit discouraging as we would not at all have the place to ourselves). We had to park a couple hundred yards up the road, which we quickly walked back…
We’ve quickly discovered that Maui has many micro-climates and diverse ecosystems, and this hike was our first foray into a true jungle environment. The Kipahulu area of Haleakala National Park is on the southeast coast of the island, where lava flows from the volcano have been eroded by water into patterns of deep gorges separated by steep ridges. Rainfall is abundant here, and the forests are dense. After returning to the Kipahulu visitor center from the Seven Sacred Pools, we…
We got up early Sunday morning (again – we have even yet to fully adjust to Hawaii time) and hit the Road to Hana – we got a hotel room in Hana for the night, so instead of driving the road and back in one day, our plan was to do it in two. We had read that most people stop several times along the way from west to east, thus reaching Hana and/or the “beyond” sometime in the afternoon. Our…