I am from British Columbia, which is supposed to be cold (it was until about five years ago when Al Gore visited and brought global warming with him). Coming to Hawaii is a real treat, because even when it is pouring rain and windy, it’s warm. I love it here. This is the reason that this morning, when I visited the NOAA’s website, I was disgusted to find that Mauna Kea, at a mere 13,796 and being the largest mountain on earth, was engulfed in a massive snow and ice storm. And we were supposed to visit it today to look out over the clouds. Two inches of ice on the roads. Temperatures with wind chill of minus 40 (celsius or fahrenheit, your call. I think they’re the same, aren’t they? Anyways, I was peeved, because that might keep up all week and that is NOT good cricket, Hawaii.
Instead, we went to do something we hadn’t done before on the Big Island (oh god forbid we try something new): hike along the uninhabited shoreline in a beautiful and rugged area. This proved to be amazing and some of the photos, still to follow. I got thoroughly soaked by one absolutely massive rogue wave, well in excess of 15 feet, hitting the cliffs. I counted 10 sea arches and over 15 blowholes (I feel ripped off, Andrew Doughty promised 12 sea arches. Well, to court we go!). Altogether an amazing hike. I highly recommend it, as long as you have a waterproof camera (I own two). Speaking of which, a GoPro makes an excellent camera to hold in over a blowhole, I don’t think my $900 Canon would get the same results (and survive).
For the drive to the hike, I attached my GoPro to the hood of our GMC Uglyasfuck. WOW did the footage look cool - I’ll be uploading it to YouTube tonight (search “Painted Church Road GoPro”).
I believe Agent Smith works as a security guard at the resort. HE even has the facial expression. SIngular. So now we have the other half of a day to waste away, and I have no bloody clue what we can do. I really want to go tell the clouds to screw off and let the 23 degrees become an ocean-sports permitting 28 degrees like it usually is here in Kona at this time of year.
Finally the clouds opened up in the late evening and gave me some of the most spectacular sunset I have ever seen or photographed in my life. A random guy walked by while I was barbecuing dinner and said that I should also photographed the spiders. I hadn’t noticed but there are spiders here that are more beautiful than the sunsets.
To conclude, I truly wish we had risked our insurance policy and driven as high up Mauna Kea as possible to experience the sort-of rare occurrence of snow in Hawaii.
