Hiking and Hitchhiking

The last few days have been blissful. A recap:

Thursday: Only three kids showed up for Radnight, so after eating our dinner (Subway—Shikinah got me my favorite sub again!) we cruised around Kilauea. We got drinks at the Kilauea Bakery (caramel latte for me) and then played soccer (in the dark) on the soccer field behind the gymnasium. (I like parentheses.)

Friday: This day was a combination of working and relaxing. I watched some How I Met Your Mother, made tacos for dinner, and snapped a couple pictures. The first is a gecko hanging out in my office window, the second is a shot I took of the bay around 10:00 pm, but it’s illuminated by the light of the (almost) full moon.

Saturday: I spent the day hiking the Powerline Trail with Sam and Mikayla. The hike closely follows a powerline running from Princeville to Wailua, covering 9 to 13 miles (depending on who you ask or what sources you read), and ascending over 1,500 feet. I picked up Mikayla and Sam in Princeville and we left my car at the trailhead, shouldered our backpacks, and began the hike. The weather couldn’t have been better for a day hike—cloud coverage prevented the sun from exhausting us, but there was no rain except for a brief five-minute drench in the afternoon.

The hike itself was filled with a variety of sceneries and landscapes, ranging from swampy to jungle-y to rocky. The first few miles of the trail were boggy and wet. Sam had waterproof hiking boots, but Mikayla and I had tennis shoes. It was the first time I had worn mine ($12, from Walmart), and I wish I would have taken a picture of them before we started hiking to accurately document their transformation from fluorescent whiteness to brown filthiness. At the end of the hike we took off our shoes and socks to find our feet pale and shriveled from the water.

Anyway, the first few miles were boggy and wet. At first Mikayla and I tried to dodge the muddy trenches and swampy water, but after a few missteps, we gave up and plowed through. But the water was oddly refreshing, and mud is squashy and fun. So we hiked for quite a while through marshy, swampy fields and hopped off the trail once to see the view from a lookout point. Pictures:

We stopped to eat lunch about halfway through the hike at some sort of old radio tower (or something?), which resembled a Dharma station (“Lost” fans, please appreciate this.) We hopped the barbed wire fence surrounding it and climbed the ladder to the top of the tower where we ate lunch, which consisted (for me) of a peanut butter sandwich, strawberry Nutrigrain bar, and chocolate/caramel power bar. We lingered on top of the tower for a bit, admiring the view and stretching our legs. Here are a few pictures of the view (you can see the path of the powerline), my and Mikayla’s muddy shoes (they got much worse; also, our ankles aren't tan--they're covered in a film of dirt), and the tower we climbed. It’s hard to gauge size, but the barbed wire fence at the base was about 7 feet high.

After lunch, we hiked the last half of the trail, which was mostly downhill and (deceptively) seemed to go a lot faster than the first half. The landscape was breathtaking. We hiked down a redrock trench with turquoise soil patches, through large-leaf forests with curtains of vines, and along ridges overlooking the distant mountains. The trail was deserted; we only passed one other pair of hikers. There was something equally exhilarating and calming about being out in the middle of nowhere with no one around. We talked most of the hike and at one point defied our logical sides by eating mysterious wild berries that resembled raspberries but were bigger, a little firmer, and had smaller segments. Sam accurately described them as tasting medicinal, but they were good. Oh, and I know this is mind-blowing, but we discovered a dinosaur footprint.

When we finally came out at the end of the trail, we were at the end of Kuamoo road (same road as Opaeka’a Falls) in a park area. We then did another shorter hike (a walk, really, though all uphill) that began in the park and was a mile each way. The picnic area clearing at the top provided beautiful views of valleys and mountains. It would have been a gorgeous place to watch the sunset, but we were a bit early for that. So we unwound at the top of the hill and sat in the grass for a while relaxing, chatting, eating, and deciding what to do next. We knew we would have to hitchhike back to my car, but we were hungry for dinner (the Powerline hike had taken approximately five hours) and decided to go to Smalltown Coffee for Greek food, which they serve every Saturday night.

So we headed back down the mile trail and, on the way, met an older couple visiting from England who had just arrived on the island that day. Mikayla and I chatted with the wife a bit while Sam whipped out his map and showed the man some good places for snorkeling and hiking. It’s nice to meet people. People are awesome.

So we got to the end of the trail, took off our socks and shoes, and waited on the side of the road to hitch a ride. We had observed a group of four older hikers at the picnic point who looked like they might be coming down soon, so we waited for them to see if they would give us a ride. Luckily, they were willing and let us pile in the back of their rental van, mud and all, though we left our muddy shoes on the mat. They took us a ways down the road and let us off (they lived in a little community just off the road.) We thanked them for the ride and they thanked us for our adventurous spirits. We started walking and thumbing, and it didn’t take too long for a pickup to honk and pull over, offering to take us out to the highway. We jumped in the bed and rode to the highway where we got out, crossed, and began walking toward Kapa’a, thumbing. The third and final ride was interesting—mom, you can keep reading if you agree not to badger me. :)

We had been waiting for a while and making a game out of who could guess how many cars would pass before we got a ride (it was well over 200), when finally a beat-up old pickup stopped. The jovial, middle-aged driver said he’d give us a ride if one of the girls sat up front. Sam told him that would be ok as long as he kept the window open between the cab and the bed, so I hopped in the front seat amongst old mail and empty beer bottles, and we were off. It was a short ride, under ten minutes, and our conversation went as follows (picture a laughing, half-drunk smooth-talker as opposed to a creeper):

“What are your names?” he asked.

“I’m Laura, and in the back we have Mikayla and Sa—”

“Mikayla, you said?”

“Yeah, Mikayla and Sam.”

“Laura and Mikayla,” he said. “Gotcha. Where ya’ll from?”

I briefly described that we had all moved to the island semi-recently and lived in various places on the north shore, and that we had met and become friends at a local church.

“Ah,” he said, “I’m a man of God too, so I probably shouldn’t be drinking and driving.” He said this as he took a long swig out of an open beer bottle. “Just let me know if you want to take the wheel at any point. I’m going to take a little detour, if you don’t mind.”

I gave him a Look, and said, “And just what kind of detour are we talking, here, mister?”

He laughed and said, “Oh, the kind where I take you to a deserted shack and gut you all. Just kidding, it’s the bypass.”

Luckily, I was familiar with the bypass and was able to follow along and make sure he was going the right way. Sam was paying attention from the bed, as well. At that point, the man explained that he was a Native American who grew up in Arizona, then moved to Oahu, then to Kauai where he lived on the beach for a while, and now he and a friend run a bike rental shop on the main highway in Kapa’a. He ended his story by saying, “Now I’m just looking for a young, good-looking, child-rearing woman to marry. Eh? Eh?” he grinned and waggled his eyebrows. I laughed and said, “Keep looking, buddy.”

He made several other borderline inappropriate comments, backtracked on the route just a bit to point out his bike rental shop, and finally dropped us off at Smalltown Coffee. After getting out of the truck and gathering our shoes/backpacks, we thanked him through the window and he said, “Boy, you girls sure are purty! P, U, R, T, Y—Puuuuuuuuurty!” And then he made a motorboat noise with his lips. Yep. He really did. We walked away mid-motorboat and crossed the street into Smalltown coffee, where our friend Anna greeted us (she’s a YWAMer and works there) and we ditched our shoes in the back, used the bathroom, and ordered AMAZING Gyros (with feta cheese and black olives.)

We sat around eating, relaxing, unwinding, stretching our aching muscles, and reflecting on the day. Anna informed us that the rest of the YWAMers were on their way to have dinner at Smalltown, so we waited for them and spent the rest of the evening just chilling, and stayed until about 10:00. Sam and I debated hitch-hiking home, but he insisted that I make the decision, so I decided to wimp out and have the YWAMers take us back to my car. So Mikayla, Sam, and I all squeezed into Anna’s car and we rode back to the YWAM base in Anahola, then Mikayla was kind enough to drive Sam and I back to Princeville to get my car. From there, Mikayla went back to the base and I took Sam home (he’s finished with his YWAM DTS, so he’s living in Princeville.) I got home and showered… I had to scrub my legs twice to get all the dirt off of them. They are now covered in cuts and scratches. Great battle wounds.

Today, Sunday, was wonderfully relaxing. I woke up exhausted, despite having gotten enough sleep the night before. My body feels like it’s been run through a garbage disposal. After laying in bed all night, I almost couldn’t walk on my left foot and ankle this morning. But oddly, I’m  embracing the post-hike muscular burn. Stretching feels so freaking good. Anywho, today I went to church (we had a guest band this morning, so I got to sleep in an extra hour) and ate lunch there, came home and took a luxurious nap, did a few hours of work, then met Shikinah for coffee at Java Kai in Hanalei. On my way home I stopped at the grocery store where I ran into my friend Melia and made plans to go to the beach tomorrow. On schedule for the rest of the night is a hot bubble bath, a glass of wine, and either a good book or a few episode of How I Met Your Mother. Pure bliss.

So, in store for this week (besides work) is: beach with Melia, couchsurfing bonfire Tuesday night, Bible Study Wednesday night, and HIM conference on Thursday! So stoked. Since most of our time will be spent either at the conference or shopping in Honolulu, I’m thinking about skipping my flight home from Oahu and staying a few extra days to sightsee around the island. I was planning on couchsurfing, but there’s a chance of Shikinah staying longer too, in which case we would probably stay in a hotel.

And lastly, though I’d rather not end on a sad note, I do want to mention that the hike yesterday came at an especially convenient time… it helped to get my mind off the fact that my cat, Peaches, was being put to sleep that morning. I’ll close this blog entry with the most recent picture taken of her, in commemoration. Aloha loves.