As a caveat of that clarity, I truly love Oahu. It's gorgeous, I love the vibe here, I've found the people here to be nothing but welcoming and lovely (I had heard that people out here were unfriendly to haoles like me, but I've not once found that to be true), and it's not like I haven't had adventures and exciting moments out the fucking wazoo here. Living here has been amazing, and I am privileged to have experienced the Hawaiian islands as more than tourist (even if I'm a long term tourist by all definitions, I feel more local than I thought I would, and I often forget I haven't always been here).
One thing Oahu has in spades is hikes. I love a good hike, so Derek and I have been on a lot. There are some we have repeated (Manoa, Waimea Valley, Ka'ena most of all, just to name a few), and some we have done the once, but we've had a list of the more dangerous hikes that we've been itching to do. Some of them we saw before we came out here, and we were like, YES WE WILL DO THOSE.
Some of these hikes we have changed our minds about. We've done a couple of the "easier" ridges and after yesterday, we have decided that things like Pali Notches are a no go. I may be a depressed millennial that doesn't want to live anymore, but I'm not stupid, and I don't ACTUALLY want to die. Especially the way I'd die falling down these cliffs.
But I'm not entirely smart, either.
About a week ago, I asked some of my favorite wives on island (Kat and Lacey, who are married to each other, and Miriah, who is not married to anybody that came with) if they wanted to go on a hike to one of the more dangerous hikes on island, Crouching Lion. We had the idea that we'd do not just Crouching lion, but the rest of the loop, as well, taking in the ridge and doing the really dicey shit. Crouching Lion has been on my list for awhile, but Derek and I have been trying to keep in hikes that Gabriel can do with us. We tried to take Gabriel on a ridgeline hike with super narrow paths and steep drop offs, and he understandably panicked and we had to turn around. We learned our lesson.
Gabriel was not invited on this hike, it was just me, Derek, Kat, Lacey, Miriah, and Kat and Lacey's friend Amanda, who was billed to me as an extreme hiker with inside knowledge of all the best danger hikes on island. Perfect hiking group, and I love hiking with a grip of people.
So Miriah arrives at our house yesterday at 6:30 for a 6:45am departure (Crouching Lion is about an hour drive away, on a way other side of the island), and it's drizzling a little. I am kind of upset about this, because it's been raining off and on all week and I don't want our hike to get rained out. It's already going to be muddy and more dangerous, in my less than experienced opinion. But Derek and Miriah shrug off my concerns and remind me that the hike is on an entirely different side of the island, an hour away, where weather is more differenter. I remind THEM that that's the wet side of the island, but nobody cared. I am persecuted.
We get to our destination, the rest of our crew arrives, and it starts downpouring. Derek and Kat, two absolute maniacs, are standing out in this garbage weather, discussing if we give up for the day, when Amanda pokes her head out and was like, "this rain isn't going to relent. Let's go do Three Peaks". And I was like FUCK YEAH!
Three Peaks has been on my list since before we arrived here. It is one of the most dangerous hikes on island, people die on this hike a LOT. It is a difficult hike. It has been a sicko fantasy of mine to conquer all three peaks, especially the third one. The most dangerous one. The one where everyone falls and dies because it's god damn crazy.
I will spoil the ending for you: I did not die.
Because I did not make it to the third peak.
Not JUST because of that, I'm also a decent hiker so I know where to step and how it feels when a step isn't safe, but that's an apple most people who hike can polish on their shirt. No biggie, I'm not special.
Anyway, to truly spoil the ending, I was side stepping my way by a rock with a VERY narrow path (about the width of both of my feet) with nothing but a sheer drop straight down behind me , and about halfway through this, my brain was like, "...psst. No." and my heart was like, "don't listen to that moron, you're almost to the end, this is so exciting!!! WEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" and my brain was like, "Excuse the fuck out of me, ma'am, but who the fuck do you think we are, exactly?" and then my vagina seized up like it does when I have severe anxiety about scary shit. So I shouted up to Derek, who was ahead of me, that I would not be continuing to finish all of the peaks, I was done, my anxiety had ruined everything for me.
I want to point out that I am not afraid of heights. In the least. I find dangerous shit thrilling as fuck, I had really wanted to get through all three. But alas. I wienered out. This hike was not nearly as hard as I thought it was going to be, but it wasn't easy. And there are parts of it that are VERY fucking dangerous. The drop is nothing to sneer at, and it's narrow and it's steep and there is a LOT of using ropes to scramble straight up rock faces, and the ropes don't exactly instill you with confidence, because they are frayed (I was making a climb up one side, saw the rope was EXTREMELY frayed in a section, and climbed right the fuck back down, even though I was already almost at the top and continuing to use a frayed rope to stop using the frayed rope was dumber than just finishing the five foot climb up and not bothering with it anymore) and they don't feel strong, they can be wet and bouncy. The wind at the top is alarmingly strong, and fucking relentless. I was just texting to Miriah that it's not for fucking nothing that we spotted not a single dog or child on this trail. In fact, I don't think I saw anybody younger that 20, and only two people obviously older than 50 (one lady was a complete and total cunt rag, and Miriah yelled at her when I got stuck climbing down a rope wall. More on that later). The trail may not have lived up to the expectations of craziness I had built up in my head, but that doesn't mean it was easy and danger free.
So. Here's how yesterday went once we started Three Peaks.
I want to say that I brought my camera and my camera backpack. Carried my camera, my wide lens, my long lens, my water bottle, and my snacks, on my back, adding an additional 15 pounds to what I should have been carrying. Derek told me not to, but I was expecting Crouching Lion, and figured I would be fine. If I had known we were doing three peaks, I wouldn't have brought it. I also barely used my camera, because once shit on the trail started getting a little hairy, I didn't want to bother with fiddling around in my bag. So I pretty exclusively used my cell phone (which had IMPECCABLE signal, all things considered) to take photos, and because it's just my cell phone, it doesn't really
A) look great
and
2) give good perspective on what we were doing.
Also, I'm really pleased with myself for managing this hike and all of these climbs with an extra 15 pounds of jangly camera equipment on my back. Felt kinda like a bad ass. Anyway, on we go.
Space is pretty premium on the islands, so I'm totally repeating myself when I say that there was no immediate parking near the trail head. We had to park about a mile away and walk through a private country club to get to the trail head. We were greeted by a really nice guy who told us that we had about a mile to go, but we couldn't miss the trail. He was right!
I will say that, unlike pretty much any other area we've hiked, this one was fucking trash free. I didn't see a single piece of debris that didn't belong in the forest, and I was properly chuffed about it.
This is the first bit of the trail. It's muddy as FUCK. This is maybe an eighth of a mile in, we had already been sideskirting massive mud pits and mucky puddles and it was squishy and humid and my hair puffed up and made me look like a really fucking ugly persian cat with bad roots.
I remember looking at Miriah and going, if this is the easy bit, I'm not sure I want to get to the hard bits. It never stopped occurring to me that I was walking my way up a mountain, but I was vaguely annoyed that I had to like...do it at an incline. Can't mountains be FLAT like roads, or my bed? Rude.
We had been trucking our way through the dense, lush, humid as balls forestry for about thirty minutes or so, with a pause so Derek and Kat could take some photos of an adorbs patch of shroomies growing under a log, and we stepped out into the gusty dryness of the for real part of the ascent. The sun was nice and hidden behind the clouds, so all we felt were the puffs of wind, and when I say puffs, I mean like...gale adjacent. But this was the tameness of the wind we'd experience later. We walked on the red bits for a little while, and then, out of nowhere, we were in the stringy tree forest, and it so reminded me of Markham Park, back in Florida.
It's a cell phone photo, don't fuck with it.
It was so lovely and cool in there, with the wind rustling all of the branches and the swish swish swish sound was all encompassing, I loved it.
I thought we were going to get a bit of an incline respite, but no. no we were not going to get that. Mountain. We kept trudging uphill (honestly, it wasn't so bad, I'm just exaggerating because it's kind of my thing. My camera backpack was clunky, though, and I was already regretting bringing it, and I was a little afraid of how I'd fare once the really really real ascent started, but it's not like I could just leave it there, now could I?) and then Derek found a little snail, and he and Kat stopped to photograph it for a little bit while I walked uphill a bit to explore and see if there was anything I wanted to photograph. Like, with my camera, not my cell phone.
There were nice views, and I DID take some shots with my camera, but I'm not gonna lie, it's been a weird week, and I haven't uploaded my shit yet. I'll do it tonight, since we leave for Big Island tomorrow in the early morning and I need clear cards for that trip. Anyway, there was a cute little view through the needles. You could see if it I were better at cell phone photography! But I'm not. And I don't intend to be, if I'm being honest.
On the other side of me was this view of the pali, and it was magnificent:
I do not apologize for how terrible these cell phone photos are, because there really does come a point in the excursion where I panicked at the idea of taking my camera out of my bag because seriously...the ridges are narrow and the fall is...you know...long. With a bumpy ending. I stopped taking photos altogether and there is no selfie of me, or a group shot of me, Derek, and Miriah, at the top. Because nuts to that, man. Honestly, I don't know why none of us suggested we take a shot together at the top, but none of us did. Moving right along.
Derek kept going, "do you want me to get in the picture? Nobody is going to be able to tell the scale of these paths, or the incline, without perspective" and my stubborn ass knew he was right, but what was I going to do, admit that? Like some sort of hubris-less MONSTER? I think the fuck not. So I declined his offer, and kept taking photos that undersell the massive quad, glute, and calf workout we were all getting.
It really does just look like a normal little jaunt in the woods. I will say it isn't difficult, but I mean...it isn't exactly a fun stroll. I was putting in work, but I wasn't like, pushing my limits and huffing and puffing or struggling to manage the difficulty level. It just wasn't leisurely. Kat was struggling a bit, though, so Derek and I took a lot of breaks with her. Which was fine, her wife Lacey and their friend Amanda had forged ahead pretty solidly, and Miriah left us behind when we started taking photos, so there was no need to rush and put pressure on Kat to over exert herself. It's not like the view wasn't nice:
Derek and I had a little snacky snack break and some water while we were waiting. I was properly pleased, because I found not one, but TWO packable keto vegan snacks in bulk at Coscto when I want a few days prior, so I had a few keto almond bites (they tasted like crumb donettes! Delightful!), and some trail mix with fake cheese puffs (again, delightful!) while Derek and Kat talked about camera equipment. Not among my points of interest, honestly. I'm not really a gearhead like Derek is, I just know what I like to use, and I also know I am guilty of desiring the prestige that comes with having, say, a Canon 1DX mk iii, but that doesn't give me the savvy about gear that Derek has. Lusting after prestige and knowing your shit are two vastly different things, and honestly I tune out the latter extremely hard.
WAIT. Hang on. Are you lusting thirstily for pictures of scopeless, rooty inclines that don't show at all the trail you're in for if you take on Three Peaks? Holy shit, do I have some good news for you!!
It almost looks like we're heading downhill. But we're not! It's uphill, and thanks, I hate it.
Maybe this will help lend a bit of perspective to what looks like an otherwise benign tree. I'm a 5'9 woman. Tall for a lady, not so tall compared to the average man (damn you, patriarchy!!!), but I'm not shrimpy. I have VERY long legs, as well. A nothingburger of a waist, very short waist. I'm more leg than I am anything else. Exhibit A:
(For the record, I fucking hate family guy, but this is legit my body type)
To get up onto those roots, I had to lift my long ass legs about halfway up my midsection, grabbing the root up above me and hoisting myself up. I don't know if that helps give that photo scale, but I tried.
And here was the last of the easy bit. It got steadily more shitty as this uphill walk continued, because this is where the bouldering and scrambling started. Now, I've mentioned before that I have the finely tunned upper body strength of an aborted fetus, and I am definitely underselling myself with that description. Underselling as in my body strength is worse than that, I'm just embarrassed by it. So I was starting to worry that I wouldn't even be able to manage the bullshit ahead of me. But I get to the top of this bit, and I see what's waiting for me:
And I thought, oh! Not so bad!! This will be perfectly manageable. I was right, and I was super fucking elated.
Not bad at all. It's a piece of cake, she said, like Sara, and like Sara, that would be my downfall later. Not as harsh as the cleaners, but not great. However, the upcoming bit was pretty alright. More difficult than what we had been doing prior, and it involved a LOT of arm strength, of which I have none, but I surprised myself and did well with the parts where my arms were necessary. And I was rewarded with views like this:
Kat was not enjoying herself as much as Derek and I were, though, and we were needing to take breaks a lot more often, because the terrain was getting more intense, and she had made it a point to let us know that she is pretty out of shape. Derek and I were totally cool with that, we don't mind stopping to take photos so someone doesn't feel like they have to either really press themselves (and risk injury) or like they have to not come on a hike because it may be more than their fitness level comfortably allows (I do want to say that Kat was crushing it. She may have had to go slowly, but she did great for someone who didn't think she could do it at all. And not in the self deprecating way that I say I can't do stuff). However, I didn't want to leave Miriah alone, since it was me that suggested she come along, so I told Derek and Kat I was going to head up and catch up with her.
I got stuck in some Hawaii traffic of the non-goose variety:
And at the top of this, I was back in the trees again, but this time, without the oppressive humidity. A welcome change to the first part of the hike way down below, where it was so humid that I honestly had concerns my pee would float when I popped a squat behind a tree because I was convinced the air was heavier than actual liquid.
I'm going to demonstrate my naivety here like the wild harlot I am and say that it was at this point I was beginning to question why this was one of the most dangerous hikes on island. It was a great challenge, for sure, but I didn't feel like I was in danger. Or even close to danger. My idiot brain was lulled into a false sense of security because I conflated "challenge" with "danger". So I felt pretty great about the rest of the hike, I was dreaming about reaching the third peak and being able to say I conquered all of them like a warrior goddess, I was jamming along, texting Miriah to wait up for me, that I had left Derek and Kat behind to catch up with her so we could ascend this monster together as planned. Also, 10/10 service on the Olomana Trail, for fucking real. My service isn't even as good at my house, a factoid I shared with a group of climbers as I gripped for dear life onto the rocks of the peak where I chicken shitted out, and they shared that they lived in Haleiwa and ALSO had shit reception, I said it was an island wide epidemic, and then they left (but not before making me feel like an asshole when I whined about my gear being heavy and they told me they were using Three Peaks as a warm up for going backpacking along some crazy route back mainland side. Well. I felt weak, but whatever, they don't know my life!). I was making really fucking good time, and then I stopped for a tiny water break, noticed this tree covered in carvings, and laughed and laughed at this:
MOM.
I pushed forward, because I was ready to get to the top. I was fucking gunning for that third peak. I have really bad news from the future about that, but we'll get there.
Hooray! More hikes that rely on leg strengths and less hike that relies on arm strength, 2020!!! That's a platform I believe in!!! I VOTE YES!
I CAN CONQUER THIS MOUNTAIN!
- Sir Didymus AND Ondrea Tucci
I got to a point where I could peak a little through the trees, and I could see the Pali and the valley and I KNOW my cell phone does not do this shit justice. I know it. But I didn't want to waste time taking out my big camera, I had three peaks to take on.
I was super invigorated. The hike was challenging, I would give it about a 5/10 up to this point. I joke a lot about my capabilities, and my fitness, and my endurance levels, but on the real, I'm in pretty fucking decent shape. I jog every day, I live for going hiking when we've got the time, I'm not a slouch in this arena. I wasn't struggling, I was just working. But you guys. The rocky bits started taking over the foresty, uphill tree root bits. Like, in a major way.
My arms were all, "Why, though?
That bit isn't distorted, it was pretty straight up, but plenty of hand holds and no need for a rope, which explains why there wasn't any. I told my arms to calm the fuck down, we could make it make it.
My arms were like, "WANNA BET, BITCH??"
I told my arms to calm the fuck down again. The rock was REALLY fucking slick, which explained the rope, but I kept on chugging, because it was just rock that I had to walk up. It looked more daunting than it was, and I AGAIN mistakenly reassured myself that this was the most difficult it was going to get. Miriah had sent me a photo of this rock earlier to tell me where she was, and she sent it with the disclaimer "I'm here, and it's starting to get scary". I felt superior. I felt tough. My arms were like, WE ARE INVINCIBLE! And my thighs were like, "you fucking what now?" And my brain was like, "Calm the fuck down, man, who knows what's coming??"
Just kidding. My brain was not like that. My brain is stupid and my brain thought we had this bitch on lock.
Elevator to hell, going up.
I stopped up at the top of here to take in the views again. In retrospect, it seems so silly to have continuously taken photos, because they all look kinda the same to me NOW. But back on the hike, each new peek out at the land below me was new and exciting and magnificent.
Was each view also a teensy, tiny bit of an excuse to catch my breath for a minute or two before I pressed on? Yes. Yes of course. I'm not an Olympic Athlete.
I pushed onward. Onward AND upward, because that's how ascent works.
I got a text from Miriah saying that she met up with the girls who passed me about twenty minutes beforehand (those tattling little fucking over achievers!!! It had maybe been TEN minutes. Women need to support women) and she was just going to go on ahead with them, so I was like, oh, ok, cool, I'm almost to you, but that'll give me a minute to take a water break and maybe grab some actual camera shots. Except I summed it up a bit better than that. So that's what I did. I had a water break, took some photos, maybe stopped for about 20 minutes when I heard Derek's voice booming through the hush, so I figured I'd sit and wait for them to catch up, since Miriah had already pressed on and I felt like kind of a dick for forging ahead and leaving Kat and Derek alone.
There he is!! AND holding Kat's tripod!! What a gentleman!
I figured I'd just hang with them for the duration of the hike, because Lacey and Amanda had long left us in the dust, Miriah had found new buddies to go forward with, and I missed company. Kat didn't seem to be having all that great a time, and Derek was nice enough to bring up the rear so I could go first and show Kat that this stuff was more than manageable, AND give her a clear path to emulate so she didn't get stuck. We got caught in a little bit of traffic again, and I sat by to let everybody pass, including Kat.
CRUSHING IT!!!!
She had been so apprehensive, and she was killing the game. It really wasn't all that intense. It was just super light scrambling.
Nothing to sneer at as compared to a Sunday stroll, but nothing major. Just good, slippery fun that kills your thighs if you don't use them often enough. Which Kat kept assuring us she did not.
Then the rope shit started back up. UGH. My arms were not having a great time, because now I DID need to use the ropes. The rocks are muddier and more slippery than they look.
It was a little daunting, because common sense tells you to just trust the rope and walk yourself up. But common sense ALSO tells you, once you grab the rope, that this shit is old and springy and could break any fucking second..it does NOT feel reliable...do not trust this rope, find another way. So managing both trusting the rope and utilizing it was an effective tool to scale upwards and NOT trusting just the rope and finding a different way to scale upwards at the same time was...well...interesting.
Here's the dumb part:
If you keep following the path on the left to its natural conclusion, it takes you to the very tippy top of where I climbed with that rope. You know who was dumb enough to climb the rock bit? Me. You know who was smart and took the steppy incline on the other side that wasn't nearly as challenging? Everybody the fuck else. There's Kat, being smart and taking the road MORE traveled. Fuck you, Robert Frost, the fuck? You never stated that "all the difference" made by taking the road less traveled meant I would be an idiot and everybody else would be working smarter not harder. We were making good time again, though, despite me being a hapless fuckwit.
The ropes went away for a stretch, and it resumed being a solid quad workout. We ran back into traffic, a sign I took as encouraging that Kat was doing way better than she thought she could do, and that I wasn't slacking off now that I had my troop with me again.
LUNGE, god dammit! LUNGE UPWARD!
This is another one of those shots that's missing perspective, which I assure you there will be later. Derek grabbed a hideous photo of me moseying my way awkwardly up here, wherein I look like something of the swinely variety. But this isn't sized the way it looks in this photo. Eh, fuck it. I'll just throw it in here now and I'll beg your aesthetic forgiveness later.
ASCEND, YOU FUCKIN' HORSE.
We stopped for a two second water break, because...story time:
Back in 2015, I was a bigger idiot than I am now, and I suffered heat stroke because I didn't listen to my body, I didn't hydrate like an ocean monster as I do now, and I wasn't in shape. I was 45 pounds heavier PLUS I lived in Texas, where "You have heat stroke" is the welcome tagline when you cross into the state line. I was hospitalized, and I've never been quite the same. I am VERY sensitive to heat now, it fried my brain in a lot of ways that kinda fundamentally altered my personality, but important to this blog, I am very heat sensitive. I really listen to what my body tells me now, and my body was telling me that I needed a water break in a major way, and I needed to dial it down a notch or five for just a few minutes so I could cool down. I was dangerously close to being close to overheating. Sounds silly to say it that way, but that's where I was.
Not a bad view, for the break:
The two second water break was more like five minutes. There was a REALLY nice breeze, so I cooled down fairly quickly. Good thing, too. We had been plugging at this for a good two hours now, and it's pretty safe to say that help wouldn't come easily if I stroked out.
On to the next bit!
I won't lie, I was a little worn out by now. It was hot again, because we were back in a humid area, and I was beginning to think that the peaks themselves were just a fucking myth, that I was in some kind of Dantean hell circle that was just a constant ascent in a humid, mushy jungle, and I was a bit internally frustrated. Then came the fun parts.
Oh come on.
FUCK. I forgot to say that Kat had long stopped hiking with us at this point. Lacey and Amanda had finished the trail and circled back, we chatted with them for a few minutes, and Kat decided not to keep going. I was a little sad for her, Lacey and Amanda said we were about twenty minutes from the top and Kat had come SO CLOSE!! But knowing your limits and listening to what your body says to do is the smartest thing you can do for yourself. I say that knowing what hell I am going to give myself in about...40 minutes back on the mountain.
So up we went, and I was like, Hooray! Made it, arms! You did great, you fucking gangly, wimpy little body sticks! And my brain was like, SLOW YOUR ROLL AND SAVE THE YAYS FOR ANOTHER TIME BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO USE ROPES AGAIN.
My brain was right, as it almost always is.
Hang on, a person, for scale:
If I had any upper body strength to speak of, this would have been a cinch. Nothing to worry about. But seriously, I have VERY weak arms. After my accident, I was just kinda like, FUCK IT and wrote off my arms for the rest of my life.
So, I figured the way on the left looked shorter, and I was like, cool, that's the route for my stupid arms!
So up I went. I got to the ALMOST top of that route and saw that the rope was frayed as fuck and my dumb dumb brain went GO DOWN GO DOWN LEEEEEEEEEEEEAVE!!! And instead of rationally going, no no, just finish climbing up, the rope has held your weight and you'll be fine just go to the top, I panicked and climbed back down on the SAME FUCKING FRAYED ROPE. Like a champion.
And I made it just fine. It was a short little climb up, and then there I was, staring across the ridge at this:
WAIT! A Panorama:
Fucking magnificent.
Derek hadn't come up yet, so I think he was kindly helping people figure out how to get down, as he had to do for me later because I couldn't see past my own ridiculous tits, or see around my backpack.
But here I was, at the fucking top. I'd done it!!!
What. A. View.
I found Miriah, we sat down and had a tiny little snack break (OH! I forgot to mention about half way up, I started having EXCEPTIONALLY BAD stomach cramps. Those vegan keto almond bites had something in them that did not agree with me, and I was doubling over and complaining as we climbed. It wasn't great. So they were not what I was snacking on), and I was like, right the fuck on, let's keep going to peak two!!!
I'm just...I'm full of spoilers, sorry. I didn't even get to peak two. There was a little bit where I had to inch my way around a boulder sticking out of the side of the cliff, on a bit of rock that was maybe about feet width across. I saw how it was done, I was like, no problem, I've got this. And when I set about doing it, I made the mistake of looking down. I looked down and saw the fucking nothing below me, just the sheer god damn drop and my brain was like BITCH WHO DO YOU THINK WE ARE???? And I tried to calm my brain down and say it's cool, we've got this, we're not even scared of heights, just close your eyes and go (honestly I did not intend to make so many fucking Labyrinth references when I started writing this, but I just went ahead and leaned in, because why not?), but I could neither close my eyes NOR go, because my anxiety really fucking glamped on to me and wouldn't let go. My heart was totally in it, but my brain was having none of that bullshit. So I had to call it a day. I told Miriah and Derek I'd wait if they wanted to keep going to the other peaks (I had asked how much further both peaks were when I had it in my mind to do them, and a lovely pair of fellows assured me that it was about 45 minutes total to the third peak, but I was tapped out. They both said no, so down we went. And let me tell you, I gave myself fucking hell the entire way down. I'm not scared of heights, I know how to climb well, I know how to be careful, how to disperse my weight, I fucking grew up billy goating my way through Red Rock Canyon doing shit just like this. I don't know what the fuck happened, but I was so mad at myself. So. Fucking mad.
I chastised myself the entire way down. And also. The way down? WAY worse than the way up. It went by fast as fuck, which was nice, but Miriah slipped and fell three times, I tore BOTH of my fucking rotator cuffs, and it's been five days since the hike and my thighs are STILL fucking shattered.
But for all of that, it's easily been my favorite hike on island to date. I am so excited to get back here and do the other ones on our list, hopefully with Lacey and Amanda and Kat (when difficulty levels allow. I don't want to push her) because hiking with a group is a fucking blast. I told Derek we need a Hungover Hikers, Honolulu Chapter, and he laughed. We'll see?
Anyway, we leave for Big Island tomorrow, so it's going to be radio silence for who fucking knows how long. I AM going to learn from Maui, though. I'm bringing my laptop to blog EACH DAY instead of waiting to do it at the end. I'll just add the photos when I get home.
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