Almost Paradise

The Mānana Ridge Trail starts at the top of Pacific Palisades. For me, growing up in Pearl City, it was practically in my back yard. As a teenager I tramped its first couple of miles with my friends many times, but never more than that because the trail’s pretty long — about 6 miles one way — and being young and lazy, we never got started early enough to feel comfortable that we’d be able to get to the Koʻolau summit and back again before sundown.

So, when I started hiking again a few years ago, Mānana was on my definitely-gotta-do-one-day list. A few months ago, when I saw it listed on the Hawaiian Trail & Mountain Club schedule — and on my 40th birthday, no less! — I knew that it was a sign. I pinned that schedule to the fridge and circled the date. Summiting Mānana would be my birthday present to myself. So last Sunday I got up early and was up at the trailhead at 8:30am.

The trailhead starts at the end of Komo Mai Drive, the backbone of Pacific Palisades. There were more than a dozen HTMC regulars there, greeting each other and chatting.

Just past the gates, official DLNR signs proclaimed that the area was a Na Ala Hele trail, and also a public hunting area. Hmmmm.

The first portion of the trail is a paved access road leading to some power lines.

Near the trailhead, the trail is forested with boxwood, a eucalyptus tree.

There were plenty of strawberry guava trees along the way, and most had ripe fruit. I was tempted to scarf handfuls down, but controlled myself and just ate a few. Yum.

There was quite a bit of wedelia, a common introduced ground cover.

On the other hand, there was also a lot of native palaʻā (lace fern) too.

There was also plenty of pūkiawe.

About a mile and a half in, there’s a section of the trail that’s heavily eroded, exposing the red dirt of Central and Leeward Oʻahu.

There have been a number of plantings here over the years — these pine trees were an interesting try.

I wasn’t sure about these seedlings. Are they young pine trees?

Funny how hunters’ signs are always shot full of bullet holes.

This section of the trail is so eroded away that supports have been installed to keep it stable and safe enough to cross.

The first ʻōhiʻa lehua of the day is always a cheerful sight.

Immediately after the heavily eroded section is a wide avenue lined with paper bark trees.

There was quite a bit of ʻiliahi (sandalwood).

It was disappointing, but not surprising, to see the lower reaches of the trail infested with weeds like lantana.

There was ʻuki, the Hawaiian sedge.

Mānana was a change of pace, compared to the Koʻolau ridge trails of East Honolulu that I’ve hiked during the last few years. It was odd to see native plants like ʻōhiʻa lehua and koa so soon into the trail, mixed in with the introduced aliens. Since the trailhead started further from the summit, there was a much longer distance between the populated areas and the wild upper reaches. And the terrain seemed dryer and more open. Looking ahead, the Koʻolau summit seemed very far away.

Looking to the west, the Waiʻanae Range seemed only slightly farther.

Past the red-dirt area was one last erosion feature — an old landslide scar. In high school, my friends and I peered over the lip of this scar, where the hillside had slipped off and fallen a hundred feet or more. Back then, a carpet of turf dangled over the edge, where the earth had fallen away from beneath it. Today, more than 20 years later, the edge is smoother but it still looks like the rest of the hill could fall off at any moment.

Looking forward from the same vantage point, the trail wound up and down the slopes.

I’m not sure what this vine is, but with its glossy green leaves and bright yellow-orange fruit, it’s almost certainly not a native plant. I’m guessing Central American.

I wasn’t sure about this flower, either.

Almost 2 miles in, the Boy Scouts have built and maintained a small shelter with a picnic table. It’s a convenient resting spot, and a good landmark along the trail.

I sighted some naupaka kuahiwi, of the same species that I’d seen on the Lanipō Trail in July.

It seemed like right after every native plant I saw, there was an introduced plant right around the corner — like this passiflora.

But the farther into the mountains I got, the more native plants I saw, like this ʻieʻie.

Through a gap in the ridges and valleys, I caught a last view of the Waiʻanae Mountains. I thought I could make out the white dot of the radar transmitter atop Mount Kaʻala.

My skill at recognizing native Hawaiian plants is getting better. This is kōpiko, a relative of the coffee plant.

However, I still have a long ways to go. This native iris was plentiful on the trail, especially higher up, but its name escaped me.

Poking up through the ʻuluhe ferns were shoots of an even older lineage: wāwaeʻiole, one of the club mosses, from the ancient days when modern trees did not yet exist and fishes were busy hauling themselves out of the water to learn to walk.

The berries on this maile vine make obvious the origin of its Latin name, Alyxia olivaeformis. They really do look like little olives, donʻt they.

Then I ran across a little mystery. Apparently, a Korean hiker left this marker ribbon on the trail the day before. Iʻm guessing that the first part is just somebodyʻs name. Does anybody here read hangul? What does it say?

The alien weeds were still around. This one, clidemia, is common down in the lowlands.

Kōpiko berries. I wonder if they’re anything like coffee berries?

At 3.5 miles in, I ran out of water. I use a hydration pack with a built-in 3-liter water bladder, and I had drained the thing dry. Fortunately, I had expected this and was carrying a second 3-liter bladder. I decided to save it for the descent, and continued on, getting a little thirsty but still in good shape.

My throat was getting dry, but the terrain around me was getting wet. The switch from lower-elevation mesic forest to high-elevation rainforest was sudden and dramatic! The trees were now slippery with moss.

To my left, down the slope, I saw a loulu palm, survivor of the pre-human Hawaiian past when the biggest land creatures were flightless geese.

I found more naupaka kuahiwi, but this time a sister species I hadn’t seen before, whose white flowers had a purple center.

Clinging to an ʻōhiʻa tree was a clump of moa.

At my feet, among the ʻuluhe, were tiny red ʻohelo berries. By tradition, ʻohelo are sacred to Pele, and if you pick them, you must offer the first one to her. I decided to leave them alone and not chance it.

I was definitely in the wao akua now. I was finding plants I had never seen before. This purple-budded plant was an ʻōhe mauka, endemic to Oʻahu and hard to find.

This one was kanawao, another endemic.

And this was naʻenaʻe, also endemic.

Unlike the Sierra Club with its keep-the-group-together policy, the HTMC attitude towards group hikes is that you set your own pace. Most of the HTMC guys are veteran hikers, and they practically run up these trails! Although between shots I tried to do double-time to keep up, all this picture-taking inevitably slowed me down and other hikers passed me regularly. At around this point a guy in a red and white jacket overtook me and I realized that I was probably the last hiker on the trail. He was pretty far ahead of me.

I hustled, hoping to at least keep from falling further behind, but to no avail. I made my way up, up, up. The sky was cloudy and the wind blew damp and cool. I traveled ridgelines where the wind was so strong and so steady that it had dwarfed the plants. Most everything there was at my knees, or at most at my waist.

I started running into hikers on their way back down. “I left the summit about 45 minutes ago,” one guy told me. I nervously started calculating times in my head. It was past noon, and 1:00pm was the turnaround time. Once you got to the turnaround time, you were supposed to turn around and head back so that you’d be able to finish and get off the trail by sundown.

Then a whole group of guys went past, and the last called to me, “Arnold’s waiting for you up there.” Arnold was the hike leader. Uh oh. I hustled as best I could, and there he was. It was 1:10pm — but I was so close!

“I’m sorry I’ve been so slow,” I babbled. “It’s ’cause I’ve been taking so many pictures. I’m sure I can make better time on the way back.” Arnold looked at me, thought for a second, and nodded. “The summit’s only about 10 minutes more,” he said. “See you at the trailhead.” And with that, he passed by me and headed back down. I turned to face the trail and kept on climbing.

The footing was muddy and slick. At one point it started drizzling, and I spent a few minutes worrying whether it would turn into a full-fledged downpour. It didn’t. It was really wet up there — so wet that I found a snail. It was a succinea, not as photogenic as the famous achatinellae but still a find. This is the one that’s sometimes called “snot in a hat”. I had to stop for one more photo.

Then, almost at the top, a flash of color off to the side caught my eye. It was a male ʻieʻie plant in bloom. OK, one more photo. Last one.

To the left, I could see down into the floor of a valley where a stream pooled. Wow. Wonder which stream that is. OK, one… more… pano…

And then, I was there. I’d made it!

The only problem was, it was completely and utterly fogged in. I was standing inside a cloud. So much for getting that view of Kahaluʻu I had been hoping for! But no matter — I’d made it to the top, and that was what I’d really wanted. Getting a good view would have just been gravy.

I didn’t have time to enjoy the summit, clouds or no. I wolfed down my lunch, pulled out the empty water bladder from my pack and put in the full one, and headed back down the trail, down through the mists.

That was at 1:30pm or so. It took me 5 hours to make it back down those 6 miles of mountain trail. The last hour or two were a little worrisome. I kept looking at the time, and figuring in my head. Would I make it out before sundown? Did I have cell reception? Would I have to call home and tell Judy that I was going to be a little late? “Don’t worry honey, I’m not hurt — just slow. I think I can make it out OK, please don’t call the rescue guys…”

When I finally got to the last mile of the trail, the sun was about to kiss the mountains.

I made it back to my car in the bright early twilight. Arnold had left a note on my windshield, and I called him to let him know I’d gotten out OK. About time, I could imagine him thinking, though he didn’t say so. I took my hiking shoes off, peeled my socks off, and rubbed my feet. A flock of small parrots flew overhead, squawking. I stowed my gear, got in the car, and went home.

It had been a very good birthday.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 18th, 2006 at 12:09 am and is filed under Hiking/Outdoors, General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.