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SUPERHIKE 3
Dayle Turner |
On 10/17/98, Pat Rorie and I coordinated Super Hike 3 for
the HTMC, and 17 other members joined us for the outing. We met
initially at Anolani Street in Niu Valley and after an energetic
pep talk and pre-hike briefing by Pat, we carpooled to Waimanalo
to the head of the Tom Tom trail. Mahalo to Herman and Myra Dombrowski,
Steve Haas, Ken Suzuki, and Lin Black for assisting with pre-
and post-hike transport.
Once at Waimanalo, under a high overcast sky, we set off for
an ascent of a rarely essayed route called Kaupo Cliffs. To reach
the point where we'd begin the climb, we had to contour toward
Makapu'u for 15 minutes along the base of the mountain through
a forest of koa haole. At an old barbed wire fence-line, we turned
mauka and started a stiff upward scramble. Between huffs and
puffs, everyone remarked about the challenge and thrill of the
climb which included several sections where concentration, steady
nerves, and extreme caution were required. Wing Ng added an unusual
twist to Hawaii hiking by using an ice axe for assistance.
By 10:00, the fastest of the 19 had reached the Koolau summit
at a pu'u (1,160 ft.) just Makapu'u-side of the Kamilonui ridge
terminus. Hiroshi Sakae and Steve Haas, Peter Kempf, and two
others were in the speed hiking leader pack. Meanwhile, the last
of the fourteen others complet-ed the Kaupo ascent at 10:30 and
commenced the westward march along the Koolau spine for the terminus
of Kulepeamoa, about 4.5 miles distant. From the apex of Kamilonui
Ridge, we descended to a saddle (920) at the uppermost reach
of Kamilonui Valley. What followed was a climb to the pu'u (1,160)
marking the terminus of Tom Tom, an ascent of a steep, rocky
cliffside with the aid of a cable, and a brief scramble to a
pleasant ironwood-topped hill (1,361), where many of us took
our first lengthy break. As we would for most of the day, we
were treated to fine views to leeward and windward, with the
ocean off of Waimanalo looking especially beautiful.
From the ironwood hill, we des-cended to a canopied saddle
populated by lau'ae fern, several fra-grant all-spice trees,
guava, and other flora. In this area, we encoun-tered a group
of four eastbound hikers, bound for a descent of Tom Tom after
coming up Kaluanui (Mar-iner's) Ridge. From the saddle, we continued
westbound, climbing a first and then a second pu'u to reach the
rocky outcrop at the top of the Mariner's Ridge trail (1,560).
Near-by, we met several dayhikers who'd come up Mariner's.
The next half mile was erosion country. The most prominent
fea-ture of this segment, easily recog-nizable from the Hawaii
Kai area, is a phallic-like pu'u (1,594), that we traversed to
windward instead of hiking up and over. Beyond the worst of the
erosion zone, we passed the terminus of the Haihai-one/Mauna
o Ahi trail (1,720). Soon afterward, at noon, fourteen of us
stopped for lunch at a semi-shelter-ed hilltop a few minutes
before the terminus of Kuliouou 1. Several of us were amazed
at how much ground we'd covered to this point, but our pace,
no matter how brisk, was mod-est compared to the speed hiker
group, easily beyond Pu'u o Kona by noontime.
After lunch, we continued on, passing Kuliouou 1 (2,028) then
erosion-scarred Pu'u o Kona (2,200) and its massive sloping shoulder
that dropped precipitously to wind-ward. John Hall, Fred Dodge,
Al Miller, and several other club vet-erans have traversed this
danger-ous shoulder, and Pat and I hope to add it at some point
to the club roster of hikes if the route can be made safe and
access in Waimanalo can be gained.
Beyond o Kona, the summit crest dropped down to yet another
saddle and became more decidely green. After a couple hours of
hiking over terrain that alternated between rocky and eroded,
the romp through uluhe was welcome. We rested again after climbing
to the terminus of Kuliouou 2 (2,360). Clouds had enveloped the
summit area by this time. Beyond Kuliouou 2, there are two cable
sections, the first to assist a short descent and the second
to aid a brief, steep climb. To add an exclamation point to the
day's summit ramble, there was a final grueling pu'u to acquire
to reach the Kulepeamoa terminus (2,500), and a cheer went up
when we completed the climb.
It was 1:45, and we had needed three hours and change to cover
the distance from Kaupo to Kulepea-moa. We later received word
that the Sakae/Haas group had reached Ano-lani Street in Niu
about 1:45, ending an amazing handful of hours blazing through
the eastern Koolaus. The rest of us went down the Kulepea-moa
trail at a steady pace and en-joyed the splendid views left into
upper Kupaua Valley, right into upper Pia Valley, and downslope
to Niu Valley proper and the east Oahu shoreline beyond. Strong
winds whipped over the ridge at one point on the descent, adding
yet another memory to the outing. In addition, Ken, our resident
Hawaiian plant expert, pointed out a rare species of naupaka.
Nice. After hiking about 2 miles down Kulepeamoa ridge, we veered
right in a grove of iron-woods to begin a short, semi-steep descent
into Pia Valley, where we picked up a trail that led us back
to Anolani Street. The group I was with, which included Pat Rorie,
Lin Black, Naomi Nasu, Herman and Myra Dombrowski, Dave Webb,
Dick Beat-on, Ken Suzuki, and Robb Geer, ended our day in the
mountains at 3:45. As I mentioned, the lead group that included
Hiroshi Sakae, Steve Haas, Peter Kempf, and two others, finished
before 2. Also, four others opted to exit via Kuliouou 1. In
sum-mary, a great hike on a fine day in the mountains of Oahu.
Super Hike 4 is tentatively slated for March '99. The plan
is to ascend Laie, cross over on the KST, and come down Malaekahana. |
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HIKING THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE
John Hall |
(In the last newsletter, John began recounting his adventures
hiking the Continental Divide Trail with Stuart Ball, Grant Oka,
and Reuben Mateo. This is the final installment.)
The next day, we drove to Choteau to consult with the Forestry
office about where we could hike that would NOT be in a major
fire zone. After some investigation, we decided on a 7-day trip
beginning at Head-quarters Pass, that would take us back to the
Continental Divide Trail some 5 or 6 days south of where we had
originally entered it. Our daily hikes would be shorter, but
we would still see most of the spectacular Chinese Wall in the
Bob Marshall Wilderness. So we camped that night in a camp ground
at the foot of the Headquarters Pass Trail, and the next day
climbed 3 miles through a series of lovely alpine basins to the
top of the pass, and then down a long, rather dreary valley that
had been burned over 10 years before in the great Gates Park
fire, for another 8 miles to a lovely campsite on the banks of
the North Fork of the Sun River.
At our next camp we were visited by an attractive young woman
ranger on horseback, and learned that we were well known throughout
the adjacent forestry districts as the "fellows from Hawaii
that had to escape from the fire". We had seen a notice
at the trail-head warning about the presence of a dead horse
beside the trail a little further on that would presumably attract
the attention of bears and cougars. The notice had not been dated,
and we asked her if there was still a hazard. She said there
was not. Two horses had been tied in tandem to a tree, I gathered,
and one had managed to loop the tie rope around its neck, and
then panicked and strangled itself. Because of the amount of
human traffic on the trail, the forestry people were concerned
about the risks of encounters with grizzlies or cou-gars feeding
on the carcass. The horse was too heavy to drag a suit-able distance
off the trail, so Forestry had placed a couple of sticks of dynamite
under it and blew it into a "pink mist", as the ranger
described it. We were told to watch for a crater and pine trees
with a few limbs stripped off on one side, but these could not
have been TOO conspicuous, as none of us noticed them, even though
we must have passed right by the site.Another fire was smoldering
near the top of Moose Ridge, and we followed the plume of smoke
for several days as we wound around past this area, but this
blaze remained small and confined.
The Chinese Wall is a mag-nificent limestone formation, containing
trilobite fossils, cut by past glaciers into a sheer white cliff
that runs for miles along the Continental Divide in the Bob Marshall
Wilder-ness. We hiked and camped for sev-eral days along the
foot of this great cliff, and saw several mountain goats perched
on ledges on it.
The 3rd night we camped at My Lake, a shallow little alpine
jewel of a lake, near the Wall. There were some half-tame mule
deer at this camp, and we saw a number of as-tonishingly naive
spruce grouse on our hikes through these forests. They would
allow us to walk almost right up to them, and one could easily
see how early explorers could bring down a grouse with a stone,
to provide a nice "chicken" din-ner.On the second day
of our revised trip, I noticed that my boot soles were becoming
detached from the uppers. Fortunately, that day I picked up a
3 ft. length of leather thong that some packer had dropped, and
so that night, with the help of some copper wire I was carrying
and Grant's Leatherman tool, I attempted the first of a series
of repairs. The first 2 repair attempts lasted 1 day each, but
on the 3rd day, we finally found a system that lasted the rest
of the trip. Grant "Duct Tape" Oka swaddled my boot
toe with duct tape, and indeed, would have turned me entirely
into a duct tape mummy if he had had enough tape and I had allowed
it. It is amazing how many miles I could walk on a few turns
of duct tape before they wore through, although their main function
was to keep the even more durable leather thongs in place.
Two days before reaching Benchmark, Stuart's back was beginning
to trouble him, so Reuben and Grant decided to continue on the
more scenic but strenuous route up Ahorn Creek, while Stuart
and I took the more direct and easier trail to Benchmark. As
we neared Bench-mark on the last day, we began to encounter more
and more fishermen and day hikers. I stopped to talk to one fellow,
who said he was from Maryland. He noticed the HTMC patch on my
hat and commented, "We have 3 old Hawaiian Trail and Mountain
Club members in our party!" Sure enough, a few feet further
along I ran into Evan Evans, Jeff Grovhoug, and Jeff's daughter,
Briana, who hiked with HTMC back in the 70's and 80's. Evan lives
in San Francisco now, and the Grovhougs in San Diego. Every summer
they get together with friends from Maryland and go hiking. I
did not remember them well myself, but Grant recalls being on
campouts with them at Kawainui.
The Challenge Fire, from which we fled, eventually burned
nearly 8500 acres, and was considered controlled, but not yet
out, when we left Montana. It never did burn down the valley
in which we were hiking, or the Forest Service Badg-er Creek
Guard Station, but at the time, it certainly looked like it was
headed directly for us, and we had some very anxious hours.
Addendum by Grant Oka: September 12, our last day.We ate a
tourist breakfast at the swanky St. Mary's Lodge. It was not
as substantial as the local--style breakfasts at the Thimble-berry
Restaurant in East Glacier, but decidedly more elegant. We then
drove up to Glacier National Park and left one car at each end
of the Siyeh Pass trail. We began hiking at 9:30 AM at 5900 ft.
elevation under sunny skies. The trail wound its way upward through
the forest, crossing several dry stream beds. We saw occasional
dried bear scat, but very few berries or wildflowers.
At Preston Park we entered the subalpine zone and were surround-ed
by spectacular peaks: Piegan Mt. (9500') to the west, Piegan
Glacier on its slopes brilliant and defiant in the hot sun; Going
to the Sun Mt. (9600') to the east; and Matahpi Peak (9365')
beside it.The trail forked, and John, Reuben, and I (Grant) took
the left fork for a side trip to Piegan Pass, while Stuart continued
up the Siyeh Pass trail. After contouring along the scree slope
of Cataract Mt. for several miles above the tree line, the three
of us reached the Pass at 7700', arriving just in time for lunch.
We could see Mt. Pollack and the Bish-op's Cap to the left, and
the back side of the Garden Wall. The Conti-nental Divide was
just on the other side of the Wall. Below us a stream of glacier
melt ran toward Swiftcur-rent past a lake milky with glacial
flour, of a cloudy cobalt blue color. The day and the scenery
were per-fect.
About 1 PM we headed back down to the junction and turned
up the other fork to Siyeh Pass. There were gorgeous views of
Mt. Siyeh and the Piegan Glacier in the dis-tance. The climb
was steady but the trail maintains an easy grade. The Pass is
deceptive, for as we reach the top of what appears to be the
Pass and look down the valley on the other side, we realized
that the trail continued to switchback up the mountain to the
right and over another saddle that would lead us down into an
entirely different val-ley. There is a deep, wild valley to the
north, while to the south are the rocky crags and a narrow valley
that opens into Sunrift Gorge. Sex-ton Glacier with its tremendous
runoff that feeds the waterfalls and creek below is to the west.
Stuart was nowhere in sight. John headed down the long, long
switchbacks looking for him, while Reuben and I hung out at the
top of Siyeh Pass just to absorb the vast scenic vista. The bright
blue sky, cold breeze, the glaciers and mountain peaks, the forest
and flowing creek below, the bigness of everything was just too
much to take in at a glance. We sat for awhile in awe, soaking
up the beauty. There were several mountain goats on the steep
slopes below Sexton Glacier.It was getting late, so we headed
down and soon overtook John. We got to Sunrift Gorge by 6:00
PM and found Stuart relaxing on a rock overlooking Lake St. Mary.
Coming down the trail, he had seen a black bear by the creek
below - the only bear any of us saw on the whole trip. We had
delicious trout dinners and frazzleberry pie at a cafe outside
the Park. A perfect ending to a 15 mile, 9 hour, awesome dayhike!
It was dark by the time we reached East Glacier. We packed
up for an early start the next day. It has been a great vacation,
but by then, I was looking forward to Ha-waii and home. |
