Night #3 Kahana State Park

This morning's sunrise.

Night #3 brought me to Kahana State Park on the Windward side. Matt and Nick from the bike shop came with me. Matt and I decided to hammock camp, even though flat ground was availble. On the ridges like Wiliwilinui, flat ground is a rare commodity, and guava are abundant, so hammocking is ideal. Kahana State Park's campground is on a sliver of sand and ironwoods between Kam Hwy and the beach. Not exactly pristine, but its nice enough.

We successfully roasted brats and marshmallows on our little Smokey Joe grill. This is the first time in close to 2 years that we got the grill to stay lit. It must be the Manoa dampness that makes it go out when we're at home. I was surprised how many stars we could see, even with the highway street lights just 100 meters away. I guess the light pollution from town can't reach that far.

Just after we went to bed, the winds picked up, which meant some hammock/tarp readjustments. I finally found a configuration that would keep me dry and was quiet enough to sleep (no tarp flapping in the breeze). Tarp inside of my bugnet. Yup, I made myself a little Maria burrito with my sleeping bag, thermarest and hammock inside, wrapped up in my tarp, all secured with my bugnet.

Regretfully, I don't have a close-up photo of this curiosity. It kept me dry, toasty, and I managed to sleep most of the night. I'm thinking this might be a usual windy-night set up. I slept well enough that a medium sized branch fell from the tree above, hit the foot-end of my hammock, and I never noticed. A little scary if you ask me.

Matt's night was less successful. It went something like this:
1. Attempt to sleep with regular setup- hammock under tarp (too noisy).
2. Ditch tarp and hammock, sleep on beach. Successful for a little while
3. Realize the tide is coming in, and relocate to stay dry. Back to hammock, no tarp. Also successful for a while.
4. Rain starts. Must rehang tarp. Tarp still flaps in the wind. No more sleep.
Matt estimated he got 3 hours of sleep. Based on his brain functioning and demeanor, I think he was right.

I "slept-in" until 5:50am, and then proceeded to roam around, make coffee, and take photos. Here are some photos:

Morning coffee- learning how to make my "automatic" camera more manual by increasing the exposure time.


Camp: Matt's last sleeping attempt on the left, the Maria burrito in the middle, and Nick's 1-man tent on the right. Although our bikes are here, we drove the jeep. After camping, we continued up the windward side for a bike race near Laie.


Camp from another view, facing the bay.


Lush green mountains.



Time to pack up.

3 nights down, 27 more to go.

Night #2 Wiliwilinui Trail

This might become my friday thing: escaping to the wilderness for 14 hours.

On Friday morning, camping seemed like a fun idea, but I hadn't made any plans. I began to reconsider my camping idea around 5:00pm when I was still working and had made no effort to pack/plan/etc. I briefly thought about Sand Island as an easy after dark option. The hazards of getting there are no worse at night than they are during the day. However, the thought of sitting under the 747 flight line was less than appealing. After this week of work, I really wanted peace and quiet. Then Laukahi St popped into my head. The ridge is only 30 min from our house. The climb is tough, but do-able, and although I hadn't camped there before, I knew there was lots of hammock potential. I decided to eat dinner at home, so I didn't have to bring dinner items with me. I opted for the new Esbit stove, since I only needed to boil water for coffee. I squirreled out about which bike to ride for a while- handle bar bag or not, knobbies would be nice, but probably not necessary because its dry. I settled on my CX race bike since is has a crazy 2x10 set up with mountain bike gearing. This would be good for climbing.

My initial departure was at 7:15. Fortunately as I rode through campus, I remembered that I never saw tent stakes with my tarp. I made a quick return home for stakes and was back on the road at 7:30. The ride to Laukahi St was phenomenally fast: 23 minutes! On my road bike without a pack, its usually a 20 min ride. That was when all of the fastness ended. The climb up the ridge starts with ~ 2.5 miles through a neighborhood with ~ 1100 ft elevation gain. Towards the top, the neighborhood becomes a private, gated community. I wish I had a photo of the security guard's face as I rolled through the gate at 8:15pm. I gave him a wave and was completely prepared to show him my camping permit. He gave me this look of total confusion and disbelief and then a slow nod. Guess they don't see much night-time camping traffic on bike. When I got to the trail (access road), my legs were pretty spent, so I elected to walk my bike up the hills to my camping spot.

My camping spot was ~ 1 mile in on the access road (1600 ft) in a stand of mature guava. Guava are a funny tree. They are really sturdy despite their small branch diameter, so they are pretty good hammocking trees. However, you have to contend with guavas dropping all night, sometimes hitting the tarp, thud.

I set up camp in about 10 minutes, changed into dry clothes, and hiked up to a spot with a view to enjoy a brew.


I'm looking a little wiley here.

I slept fairly well- 8 hours, but not solid. There were a lot of chirpy critters in the forest last night. The wind was nearly calm, so I was toasty warm. Actually a little too toasty at one point. Definitely didn't need to sleep in my hat! In the morning, I pushed my bike to the end of the access road where the hiking trail starts, and hiked to the radio tower for coffee, breakfast, and sunrise.


Pre sunrise


Sunrise in the clouds

The morning was perfect except that I couldn't get the Esbit stove to light. After an hour of trying, I finally gave up. Even without coffee, the views were worth it. I like the long shadows at dawn.



Looking Ewa. You can just barely see the reef runway.




The windward side- K-bay and Kailua.




Straight down the ridge, looking in to Diamond Head crater. You can see the telephone poles on the ridge, the trail and access road follows the poles.




Ohia Lehua in bloom, something you don't see all the time on Oahu.





Almost time to head back to camp and return to civilization.



Camp.

My ride home only took 40 minutes. I was relieved to get some coffee into my system. I was unpacked and showered by 9:45am. Not a bad way to start the day!

2 down, 28 more nights to go!

New Years Resolution 2012

I resolve to spend 30 nights camping this year.

Camped New Years Eve, which technically counted towards this year's resolution because I didn't go to bed until 2012 (after the fireworks at midnight).

29 nights to go.


Sideburnz admiring the view, 2011


Manoa in the morning, 2012