FRIDAY & SATURDAY JANUARY 9-10, 2016 HAWAII

 FRIDAY Jan 9 -- Afternoon/Evening

I register at the Road Scholar desk, receiving a hug and lei for my neck.  Andrew Lockwood is our leader.  All 28 of us gather for dinner, orientation and brief introductions.  Many of my character defects appear as I see other people as better than I am.  I know I’m judging my insides by other people’s outsides but, darn, their outsides look so good!   There are only three of us single women.  The person who would have been my cabin-mate on the yacht cancelled which gives me more space and privacy but without a near-at-hand-buddy,  I’m feeling socially insecure.  I’m working on Steps Two and Three.

SATURDAY Jan 10

A - First Part of the Very Full Day

I’m looking at a woman in the lobby who looks consolingly like my friend Helene.  Same hair.   She takes off her red strappy shoes and smiles at me.  Maybe the Universe sent her to say I should relax and know I’m with friendly people.  I’m going to interpret it that way.

I can hear the lobby cafe’s espresso machine and am so tempted to get a latte but I already brushed my teeth after two cups of excellent Kona coffee in my room.  It was in one those little dinky coffee makers on the bathroom counter.  Whoever heard of terrific hotel room coffee?!

If you want to read my notes on a geology talk, keep on reading.  If not, skip to Section B.

I very much enjoy our first educational experience, a talk on Hawaii geology with dynamite graphics by Dr. Art Reed, retired marine biologist from University of Hawaii.  “Island Chain Formation and Evolution of the Hawaiian Islands” is the topic.  Several million years ago the single continent of Pangea breaks apart.  Then the new continents crash into each other.  There’s a photo of tectonic plates.

Good grief he’s losing me and we’re only five minutes into the talk.  Other people, however, answer his questions with authority. 

When magma erupts from under the surface, they call it lava.  There are 3 types of volcanoes:  midocean ridges, subduction along boundaries with land, and hot ppots (like Yellowstone).  Hawaiian volcanoes are mild.  You typically run toward them, rather than away from them. 

Iceland is the only island on the midocean ridge because there’s a hotspot right on the ridge, which created the island.  This is unusual.  (Marguerite and I stood on the midocean ridge betw the European and North American plates.)  

The crust of the earth in the Hawaiian area moves north west so as hot spots erupt, it creates an island chain 1400 miles long in the NW direction from the big island (the newest island) to Kure Atoll.   Kure Atoll is 6 miles wide but is an atoll, because it is now under water due to “subsidence” a.k.a. sinking.  It has travelled so far north it is no longer tropical.  It is above the Tropic of Cancer at the Darwin Point, where coral will no longer grow.   I actually understand this part because his graphics are so wonderful.

These volcanos are not peaky.  They’re called shield volcanoes, with most of the island being underwater.  Sometimes part of an island breaks off and falls down into the ocean.  Quickly.  One day the island is shaped one way and the very next day it’s a different shape.  This creates a tsunami. 

Kilauea has been erupting steadily for 30 years.  We’ll be hiking in that area.  There will probably be a big eruption in Hilo; Dr. Reed thinks the city will be wiped out.  So a lot of this is still happening.  Do you want to buy cheap land?  Unsafe areas near volcanoes are usually cheap; there is no volcano insurance. 

The bottom of the ocean here is 17,500 feet so the mountains have to be very tall to show above the water.  Mauna Loa is 56,000 feet above its true base on the sea floor, making it the largest volcano on earth.

There are several earthquakes per day in Hawaii but most of them are small. 

A “caldera” is a slump where there was an eruption, which can be a violent wall collapse.  Because the magma sinks down, it’s very dynamic.  When there’s an eruption, lots of bad chemicals come out like sulphur dioxide and  sulphuric acid so people can’t safely stand around. 

Because it’s warm and rainy, it takes 2-3 years before ferns and mosses start growing.   THIS IS VERY DIFFERENT FROM ICELAND, where it can take about 200 years.  Some people come to honor Pele the god of volcanoes to placate her.

The largest erupting plume of lava in Hawaii was 1900 ft high.  Rift zone eruptions can cause a curtain of fire, where lava is coming out, covering over lava that is already there.  It comes out about 2,000 F. degrees, melting rocks that are already there.  Chuckling, Dr. Reed  says, “There are a lot of singed eyebrows on the volcanologists.”

Kipuka occurs where a ridge is caused by lava, protecting the old growth forests.  Makes for nice studies between living things growing on new lava vs what is right next to it.

Lava tubes eventually form by cooling lava.  You can walk thru those, seeing tree roots above you.

Pahoehoe is stationary ripples.  Hawaiians named it but it’s now an official geological term.  Grass and ferns come in quickly.  If not much rain comes, it will stay grasslands.  Otherwise, forestation begins in about 20 years.

Not much ash cause, here, there’s usually not water mixed in with the lava (unlike Mt Saint Helen’s).  When lava runs into the sea, it creates steam.  Black sand beaches are created but they’re transitory because it slumps quickly (disappearing into the deeper ocean).

Moloka’i is about 1.9 million years old. The big island is much younger. 

B - Second Part

Our Small Plane to Molokai

After this most wonderful talk we take a bus to the intra-island part of the Honolulu Airport.  A medium-sized plane flies us in 15 minutes to Molokai.    Three vans of us go to the Molokai Museum while a fourth van takes all our luggage to our boat. 

C is our driver.  She is proud to say she is 75% Hawaiian.  Andrew explains that although he was born in Hawaii and never moved away, he can never be Hawaiian because he is “white”.  True Hawaiians have family who came here originally from Tahiti.  Because inter-marriage is popular, the part-Hawaiian percentage is increasing rapidly. 

When I learn C is a musician, playing ukulele, I talk with her privately. “We stayed at the Hawaii Prince Hotel which is owned and managed by Japanese.  Much of the food is Japanese and signage is English and Japanese.  However the ambient music is Hawaiian.”   (Personally it seemed odd to me; I would have expected Japanese music.)   Is it unsettling to her and other Hawaiians?  “In a way, but we also have compassion.”

 

Sugar Cane

  Molokai Museum grounds has a stand of the original sugar cane brought from Tahiti.  We are welcomed by kind and knowledgeable Noelani Keliikipi (Aunti Noe, pronounced like Noy-Ee, sort of).  Inside we see a movie and historical photos about the families who were split apart because of Hensen’s Disease (leprosy).  Most of the tragedy started in the 1800s but continued  until there was effective medication (which occurred about 1946).  Molokai’s peninsula of Kalaupapa was, and is, so hard to enter and leave that people were segregated there.  

 

Window on Old Sugar Mill

Governmental agencies thought the disease was contagious so they locked in the patients on this isolated island.  I am grateful to Brenda for suggesting I read “Molokai” before going.  Although a work of fiction, it is remarkably true to life.  We will return Sunday night for a pa-ina, an intimate luau.  And then on Tuesday we’ll spend most of the day on Kalaupapa.

  (Hawaiian alphabet has only 13 letters in it so there’s lots of repetition of the letters.) 

 

Signage in Park; Can You Read It?

 C drives us to a beautiful and short trail in Pala’au State Park so we can see Kalaupapa from above.  

A short trail on the right gives us a fabulous view of that peninsula and the ocean crashing into the rocks. 

Woods Are Piney and Beautiful

Noe Points Out Kalaupapa

Isn't this gorgeous?  If you're wondering when we get to be IN the water, stay tuned...   It's worth the wait!

Phallic Rock

 

Then we walk down the left hand trail to see Phallic Rock.  One of C’s relatives had tried to become pregnant for 16 years.  Against her usual compunctions (about believing legends) she sat on the rock and became pregnant in two months.  

My Bed

 

About 5:30 we board the Safari Explorer.  My cabin is on the starboard side (cause I’m a star, is how I remember that).  Cabin B-9.  I’ve got it all to myself.

ME IN LIFE VEST

 

 

After unpacking briefly we go for a safety lesson.  And have a most wonderful dinner at 7:00. 

Our Harbor At Night

Do I sleep soundly?  You betcha.