This being our last day on O’Ahu, i just HAD TO go to the top of Diamond Head, the crater of the extinct volcano which we’ve been looking at for the last three days. So I skipped the visit to Pearl Harbor (honestly, I know the story, and don't need to see it in person), and headed out bright and early, to avoid going up in the mid day heat. I missed the sunrise there, but that’s OK because, from the number of people coming down as I was going up, it must have been quite crowded up there at sunrise: You have to make a reservation to enter, as the park department limits the number of people who can be there at one time. Which is good, because it must get very busy in peak season.
The climb to the top is slightly under a mile, and is a well maintained trail - with a series of switchback making it easier, and then stairs and tunnels through the rim of the volcano to the top.
This spot had anti aircraft and canons equipment during WWII (still has a military based in the crater itself), so all this infrastructure was built to support it, not to make it easy for tourist to get to the top…. Still it’s cool and you can even get into one of the silos (requires a bit of crawling) and down part of the hill on this cool spiral staircase. There were little kids doing it (though most were whining about it), as well as people in flip flops and out of shape (definitely a lot of huffing and puffing was happening) So it is not a huge achievement to make it to the top, but it’s still a lot of steps and up hill the entire time!
The views are of course what it’s all about and well worth the climb.
It’s also a great spot to observe the weather: our guide had warned us that, even when the weather is completely sunny, it ca start raining at any time. And that’s true. More than once now, I’ve been rained one while there was no cloud at all above me. From the top of the crater, you can clearly see that at any time, any of the puffy clouds can produce a shower and my guess is that there is enough of a breeze that, even if not right under the cloud, you end up caught in the shower. Considering the weather, it’s actually rather pleasant - although on our first day here, we ended up caught in a short but strong downpour. As our guide pointed out: the worse that happens is that you get wet, and it’s warm enough that you’ll dry quickly.
Also, showers produce rainbows. This one points to our hotel - the smaller pink one now completely surrounded by much larger building.
Since I had started so early, I decided to walk back to the hotel rather than taking an Uber: it’s only about 2.5 miles and it was very pleasant. On the way, I took pictures of the flowers (see end of blog)
and tried to take pictures of the local birds, but they have the annoying habit of flying away when I get near…. Still, here are a red crested cardinal, a yellow fronted canary, a common Myna and an egret.
But bar far the most common birds here are white pigeons (some are tanned or grey too, but white is the most common color) and chicken. Wild chicken are apparently all over Maui, but even here, in very developed Honolulu, there are chicken on every patch of grass! All type of chicken: small, big, beautifully colored, dull….. (more chicken and pigeons at end of blog).
The beach on the way back has nice water and surf inspired sculptures.
And of course, there are trees! I have a hard time not taking pictures of every magnificent tree. So here is just one for today
Joe went to Pearl Harbor and took cool pictures of the memorial and of the USS Missouri - but agreed that I probably enjoyed myself more by going up to Diamond head.
In the afternoon, we got to try the outriggers canoes, which is the traditional canoe of the Hawaiian people. They are very good at taking advantage of the waves to move fast, and it was a lot of fun!
Fish tacos, decadent desert, and then sunset and moonrise - a nice last evening on Waikiki and O’Ahu. Tomorrow, we are off to the Big Island (Hawaii).
Flowers, chicken and pigeons.
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