Thursday

Hilo

Hawaii

As we sailed towards Hilo (on the island of Hawaii, “the Big Island”) at 7am all that could be seen were some lights and very dark clouds pouring rain down. It rains in Hilo 275 days a year. The rain had turned to a fine mist as we docked at 8am.

The predominant colour in Hilo is green; with that much rain anything would grow here.

I had booked a tour to go to the top of Mauna Kea, which is an extinct volcano 13,796 (4300m) feet above sea level; and is actually the tallest mountain in the world (as the guide Al pointed out) as its base is about 15,000 feet below sea level. This tour wasn’t as popular as some of the others and I was one of 8 in a 4 wheel drive minibus.

After driving through the main business area of the town (which has surprisingly many buildings from the 1940s and 1950s considering that Hilo has had two big tsunamis since 1945) we had a stop to see a waterfall, which looked just like a waterfall, not particularly high or wide or fast flowing. I was more interested in the guy with the brush cutter off to one side who looked like he had a job for the rest of his life as he cut through a jungle beside a path. Also, there was another fellow making hats and bowls from palm fronds; I would have bought a hat but didn’t, knowing that it was unlikely to get past quarantine inspection back in Sydney.

We all clambered back onto the bus and headed to the interior of the island. After about 25 miles we stopped at an altitude of 5000 feet near a very large lava flow dating from an eruption in 1984 from Mauna Loa, the volcano adjacent to Mauna Kea. Al the guide said that this type of lava is known as Ah-Ah lava; as that is what you say if you step on it before it has cooled.

The bus door was high enough off the ground that it was advisable to use the small portable step that Al the guide put in place before we alighted. But at this stop the old git sitting closest to the door decided to hop out before the step had been put in place and fell over on the ground. I suddenly saw the whole tour being curtailed as we took this fool to the nearest hospital. I was about to say ‘leave him where he is, we’ll pick him up on the way back” when he got up, with some assistance, and declared himself fit enough to continue. His wife didn’t look so sure and I had to gently hit her in the back of her head with my camera to distract her as she was about to say something about her husband’s condition. So that couple was left to commiserate with each other about their respective injuries as the rest of us went off to look at lava.

We then drove in about 15 minutes up to 9000 feet to a visitor centre/shop where we waited an hour so that we could acclimatize to the altitude and watch some videos on astronomical telescopes (of which there are many on the summit of Mauna Kea). The remaining 8 miles to the summit is half dirt road and half asphalt. The dirt road is very heavily rutted and the worst road I can ever remember driving on. When we got on the bus in Hilo and started our drive I noticed that the bus had many rattles; after being on the dirt portion of the road I know why. The road is left as dirt because in the winter black ice will form on asphalt but not on dirt and because the road is so steep it would be even more dangerous than it is currently is if it were covered with black ice. The road is supposed to be graded on a regular basis; we saw the grader but no driver.

We drove above the clouds and all vegetation disappeared; the landscape looked like the photos sent back from the latest mission to Mars.

Al the guide told us that he had oxygen to assist people who were having breathing difficulties, hallucinations, heart palpitations and so on. The only cure for altitude sickness is to go to a lower altitude quickly and really serious altitude sickness can be fatal. When we got out at the top I felt a bit light headed but a quick self-diagnosis confirmed all vital signs within acceptable limits.

The view from the top was breath taking, literally. We were above most of the clouds and could see all the way to the island of Maui, which is about 100km away.

We went into the Keck Observatory; or more correctly one of the two building housing matching telescopes. Each telescope has many hexagonal mirrors and the mirrors are kept in alignment by tiny electric motors that flex the mirror surfaces so that all the hexagons function as if they were one very large mirror (fuller explanation available on request).

There are both optical and radio telescopes on top of the mountain. One of the radio telescopes is part of what is called the Very Large Baseline Array, with dishes located from Hawaii across mainland USA to the Virgin Islands in the Caribbean. One of the dishes is located just outside Pie Town New Mexico (but this is not the dishes that I saw 2 weeks ago, that was the Very Large Array); it’s a small world!

After spending about 30 minutes at the summit, where it is warm in the sun but the wind was freezing, we drove back down to the visitor centre and had sandwiches for lunch. We then drove back to Hilo and the ship. If we hadn’t stopped for lunch then nearly 14,000 feet above sea level to sea level could have been driven in about an hour. Or an hour plus the time we waited for someone to find her room card and photo id so that the bus could be admitted to the port area. I sometimes wonder if some people hear spoken words as just an annoying buzz that they then ignore. About 15 minutes before we arrived at the port Al the guide said very clearly that we should all find our room cards and photo id as these would be examined at the port gate. When we got to the port gate and the security guard stuck his head in the door of the bus this woman looked as though she’d been asked to juggle five flaming torches while reciting excerpts from Macbeth. I obviously didn’t hit her hard enough with my camera.

Tonight we sail North West to the island of Oahu and spend a day in Honolulu; home of the Hawaiian shirt.