The Big Island pt. I - Waipio Valley

A Hawaii guidebook has been camping out by my toilet for about a year now. It's been a while since we've done a BIG trip...we've been laying low for a while now. With the little lady on the way, bla bla bla, it's been a long winter, the time was right for Hawaii!

In our 3 hour layover, we are delighted to find an awesome play zone with a tornado replicator in it! Thanks San Fran! 

ok! Just 5 more hours and 158 nose-blows to go (I really packed it in to get all my instruction sessions done before we left and ended up with an awesome cold for the trip over). As usual, Brock took the plane trip in stride - I mean unlimited videos, Uno, and snacks... and since we are into watching Voltron as well, it was a pretty agreeable flight for everyone.

One Costco trip and a one hour drive later... we are here!! Overlooking the coast of the Waipio Valley.

Not the same day, but well placed.

In order to stay in the valley, you must make it down into the valley. Alive, ideally. Going down without 4 wheel drive is NOT an option. There is a story of a man who tee hee'd at this and his demolished car at the bottom of the hill is a sobering reminder (he jumped out in time) of the importance of torque. I had been dreading this trip since the beginning (a small anxiety price to pay to be in the heart of adventure; thank goodness Matt is always up to pilot). This road is quite notorious, here it is featured on the website, "Dangerous Roads". You'll notice the red and white sign where you have to stop and wait to see if anyone is coming; the road is one lane and the person coming up has the right of way. I can't imagine reversing on this thing.

I'm surprised I was able to release my death grip to take pictures... must not have been that bad. omg.

getting closer...

and here we are at the bottom of the hill. Success. I am already counting that we have to do the drive five more times.

(Driver's note: This was a very fun drive (for me at least) the second time and beyond, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't stressful the first time. Our trusty GMC Yukon had great 4x4 and some excellent bells and whistles, but I grew to despise the impact protection alert system the car had. Every time anything got close to any part of the car, there was loud aggressive beeping and bright red lights on the dash telling you where on the car you were close to hitting something. As the road to the valley was winding and thin, these alerts blared for most of the journey. It's a 1000ft descent over a single mile, averaging 20 percent grade, but maxing in the 40s. The car would not stay quiet, and the incessant beeping made everyone in the car more nervous than necessary. "Yes car, I know I nearly hit the mountain, and that my rear end is about to hit the guard rail over the abyss, this is kind of the only way to fit so SHUT UP AND LET ME DRIVE." I eventually found a way to lower the sensor sensitivity, but never the volume of the alarms. Some tech is hard to love.)

Ha! The valley is not for the faint of heart. Here is our spider friend on the porch to welcome us.

And our wonderful abode! Limited electricity and you can't drink the water, but high on charm and natural beauty with the lily pond, garden and incredible view of the waterfalls...

Can you see the waterfalls hiding behind another giant spider? With a web advertising X marks the spot - to any prey that might stop to find the "treasure". 

Brock with his "Murray trap" next to the lily pond.

Brock gathered flowers that had fallen from the trees every day, these yellow ones were especially and deliciously fragrant.

Our morning, and sometimes evening, dining ritual. Complete with geckos, frogs, spiders, mosquitoes, mongooses, various birds, and horses.

Passion fruit! We didn't determine they were passion fruit until much later in the trip. At this point, the fruit was simply dubbed "truck nuts". I LOVE passion fruit! Sadly, by the time we had carried them around for several days forgetting to look up if they were edible, they went bad.

Snails as bit as a Brock hand! This place is Jurassic Park!

(Video)
(Griller's note) Every night we went to sleep to the loud sounds of jungle chirping that we assumed the first night were birds. On the second night I was grilling some steaks in the dark and I was convinced that the sound was coming from only 2-3 feet away from me. Could I get a good look at one of these crazy Hawai'ian night birds?

Well, we found the Coqui frog. An invasive species with no natural predator, they are rampant, chirp at up to 95dB, and the locals hate em. We kinda thought they were neato. The next two nights Brock was excited to set out after dark with me, both of us armed with flashlights for some frog hunting. We heard hundreds. We found two. Interestingly , they each went to the exact same two places every night. And we found that getting too far away from a house in real darkness can be a bit scary. Not that we'd admit that or anything. It was just late, and probably bed time anyhow. I'm just getting tired.

Beware falling coconuts ... here are some new coconut tree babies.

and there were wild horses too.

Yes, we drove over this. And hiked through as well. We should have stuck to hiking as the truck's side bumper popped loose and we acquired many scratches on the front in our voyage to the other side.

(Driver's Note: The back rear fender got knocked loose on this river and continued to come loose over and over again on the trip. Once or twice a day I had to pop it back in. When we returned the Yukon, I only halfway fessed up to this. I told the guy that I had just noticed the rear fender loose early in the trip and that I had to keep popping it back in. Then I offered my insurance info as they still hadn't taken it at all. The guy said, "well it sounds like you fixed it, so thanks. We're all good." That's when Brock came around the back of the car and excitedly told the rental car attendant, "There was this huge river!! And my daddy went zoom in the car real fast and the SMASH over a bunch of rocks!!! and it was like BUMP BUMP SPLASH BUMP BUMP SPLASH!!!...." The rental car guy is now heartily laughing, which has encouraged Brock to embellish the story and add more extreme hand motions; You must never let a captive audience go to waste. When he stopped laughing he just said, "I love kids. You always get the truth."  They still didn't care at all about the fender.)  

Soooo, we wanted very much to find a hiking trail back to the waterfalls and our guide book hinted at such but noted that if there was a trail it would be amongst private property. There seemed like there was once a trail head that was now closed? Anyhow, let's talk about "Kapu". This is Hawaiian for "forbidden". And apparently hiking to the waterfalls is Kapu as it is a sacred area (we thought this was lore spread by the very protective locals who don't want visitors hiking around, so we were a little wishy washy about the whole thing) and there is a burial area somewhere and the "trail" (there is no trail) is quite over grown and slippery. Am I getting across that we were discouraged from hiking back to the falls? Well, we found an irrigation pipe and thought that it must lead somewhere, so we smartly followed it into the jungle. Let's just forget that Brock is not yet 5 and I am 5 months pregnant.

We found remains!! Architectural, not human, thank goodness (although I do think I found a small burial site - I did a special dance to ward off spirits and did not take pictures, that should work, yes?).

Ah ha! The trail (not really at all as you can see).

Matt scouting ahead to see if there is anything remotely resembling a trail.

Nope. no trail. But there is a river! Surely that will go to the falls! Oh sigh. We didn't make it. We did have an amazing time crossing the river and exploring, but in the end, the falls kept its Kapu secrets to itself.

On our way back, our third horse siting.

We head out of the valley that night to visit Big Island Brewhaus, a real treat with great food, beer and charm. Totally worth the drive up and back down the RFH (road from Hell).

The next morning we brave RFH to check out Akaka Falls and hit a water hole for swimming.

on the trail to the falls, we have our first encounter with the amazing banyan tree. Brock is pointing to the inside of the tree.

Trying to capture the rainbow made by light behind the falls, but it is subtle.

This may just look like a bad picture, and it is. More importantly, it's the first in our Hawaii series entitled: Family Attempts to Take Selfie Staring Directly Into Hawai'ian Sun. I had certainly learned this in physics class, but trying to take pictures of rainbows every day really drove home the point: you are always standing directly in between rainbows and the sun. So to take a rainbow selfie you must stare into the sun. Brock outright refused here at Akaka Falls, but fear not blog readers! By the end of our journey he is the most fearless and hilarious sun-starer of them all. 

Ahhhh!! A back seat bandit! Sadly, the water hole was closed due to lead, but we still had a lovely time at the falls and stopped for dinner supplies on the way home.

And a closer look at the many spiders of the Waipio Valley. They were EVERYWHERE. Any span-able space was a possible web in the face situation.

Amazing bayan back by our casa. Oh my tree-house dreams were running wild.

And. Here. Is. The. Car. That. Didn't. Have. 4-wheel. Drive. We could not even find the make or model. Holy moly. Just 2 more sojourns on the RFH, not that anyone is counting.

The valley connects to the ocean with a beautiful black sand beach. The sea is a little rough here, but not so rough not to take in a solid frolic.

I think we are seeing some Jedis here in action.

The long stroll home from the beach is marked with taro fields, views galore and fine weather. We will miss you so valley, a fine fine start to our trip that will be hard to beat! Up next: Volcano...