Day 3: The Seven Sacred Pools and Haleakala summit
Normally if one were to travel the Road to Hana, one would continue past Hana and arrive at this, the sort of "end goal" of the whole Road to Hana. It's called O'heo Gulch, or the Seven Sacred Pools. There aren't seven of them (there's more like 24) and they aren't sacred. Back in the day -- I think around the 1970s, but I could be wrong -- the owner of what is now the Travaasa hotel in Hana named them the Seven Sacred Pools to make this remote location more enticing to tourists. That's all. He thought it sounded good, and unfortunately, the name stuck.
Considering that we wanted to see as much of the Road to Hana as possible, and considering that we didn't want to be driving back on windy dirt roads after sunset, we ended up leaving Kipahulu/O'heo Gulch/Seven Sacred Pools for another day. It turns out this was a wise idea because we could get an early start and arrive before the hordes of tourists doing the Road to Hana got there.
So we drove through the upcountry, which, holy cow, talk about middle of nowhere! They say there is ranch country in Maui, and there is. At least the Road to Hana is paved and maintained. This road through the upcountry ended up turning into unpaved, bumpy nastiness for almost 10 miles before we got to Kipahulu. I was not convinced our rent-a-wreck was going to make it!
Nevertheless, we made it, and it was absolutely everything we hoped it would be!
Well, almost. Nothing can be perfect, so sure enough, we went down to the pools to swim and jump in, and I realized I forgot my swim bottoms. So I ended up jumping in, swimming around, and then spending the rest of the day in a pair of soaked underwear and denim shorts. Not cool.
All of the pools are on top of a series of waterfalls that used to be prime jumping grounds. You could climb up to one of the upper pools, jump down, then jump down to the next, then jump down to the next, and so on -- a pool jumper's dream come true. Then somebody hurt themselves or died, and then sued, and so technically jumping is illegal. There were no rangers around and everybody was jumping into the lowest pool, so we did the same. I'm a chicken, so I jumped from a spot that was barely higher than I am tall, and it still took me forever to muster up the nerve to jump in.
Here is a view from behind the waterfall, where we had to crawl in order to get to a safe jumping ledge.
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| Stephen scaling the rock face for a higher jump |
Wait, but didn't I jump from a 10ft platform into a pool at boot camp? Yes, I did, but it's totally different when you can see that the pool is deep and there are no rocks to bounce off of, and when the RDCs say they'll push you on the count of three, they mean "One--Two--PUSH!" so you have no choice but to go over.
Regardless, it was fun, I think. I tried it twice just to make sure that I actually thought it might be fun, but twice was enough. Maybe another time.
When we were done swimming in the cold, crisp freshwater of the Sacred Pools, we grabbed ourselves a snack and decided to check out the two mile Pipiwai hike up to Waimoku Falls. I had read in Maui Revealed that there was an infinity pool at the top of a massive waterfall that, with a little bit of searching, you could actually find a trail to get to, and I wanted to see it!
So we did the hike, and we go to an overlook for Makahiku Falls, but a few days made a big difference, and whereas the waterfalls on the Road to Hana were gushers, in this case, there was no Makahiku Falls. It just wasn't there. So we were confused, and to make matters worse, there were big red signs everywhere there even looked like a trail warning that death has occurred in the area and walking passed the sign would warrant a $100 fine. So we continued along our way.
Somewhere along the way, we also ran into a family that was doing a cruise of the islands, so Stephen and I ended up just talking with two older teenage boys who thought this whole thing was the most amazing experience ever and wanted to say "Aloha!" to everybody who ever walked by. It made the two miles go by quickly, and then we came to Waimoku Falls.
I did not realize it was a 400 foot bridal veil waterfall.
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| English is hard |
All the other waterfalls could take a hike. In my mind, this was the be all and end all of waterfalls. We absolutely ignored the warning signs and went as close to the base of the waterfall as we felt safe doing. It was absolutely incredible! Sometimes, there are things you do because you might only get one chance in your life, and warning signs be damned. It was worth it.
On the walk back, I tried to take some photos of the amazing bamboo forest.
And there was this huge, amazing banyan tree. I took a family photo for a very happy little foursome, and they were like, "Wow, this looks like it could be on National Geographic!" I guess banyan trees can make even amateur photos look amazing.
On the way back, we took one more attempt at Makahiku. I was pretty sure I knew which forbidden trail it was, so, when nobody was looking, we ducked on to one of the trails and under the chain link fence that had conveniently already been torn up on the bottom left corner from previous trespassers. We made our way carefully through the thick vegetation and came out on some rocks just above a pool. Sure enough, we had found the infamous "infinity pool" on top of a 200 foot waterfall (that wasn't falling). The water was stagnant, so we exercised caution and didn't go in, but we did crawl as close as we dared to the edge of the waterfall to look out over the gulch and into the Pacific Ocean in the far distance.
That whole adventure took the better part of the day, and with a 2 hour drive back to Kihei, we decided it was time to head out and maybe think about getting dinner. Then, suddenly, on a whim, I suggested that we go up to Haleakala summit and catch the sunset. We were planning on getting up early to see the sunrise, but oh, why not? I had read about something called the Brocken Spectre, a rainbow phenomenon, and I desperately wanted to see it. I needed to add it to my collection of rainbow pictures.
We stopped on the side of the road to take a picture of this, because the cloud was literally raining a rainbow. How much more awesome rainbowness could we get in one day?!
To get into the National Park, you need to pay on what I read was an "honor system." I have a military National Park pass, and there was nobody at the pay booth, so we just looked at the automated thing off to the side and then continued on our way. Then we got pulled over by National Park police. Note to self, don't just drive by the pay station next time.
We were in no way prepared for the weather on Haleakala. Don't forget, at this point, we're nearing the top of a 10,000 foot mountain, and I still have wet underwear and shorts from the morning's debacle. Somewhere in there I changed into the lovely teal sundress I had for the dinner date we were planning on having, and that was it.
First, we stopped at one of the outlooks that was supposedly the best to see the Brocken Spectre, but it was a cloudier than usual day, so the best we could do was see the fluffy whiteness drifting by us and around us. It was ethereal and beautiful... and cold. I didn't last very long before I wanted to continue higher to see if I could get a glimpse from a higher vantage point.
We continued up to the visitors center, where I actually did get a few glimpses of the Brocken Spectre. Some visitors didn't know what they were looking at, but they were pretty sure they were seeing something special, so I explained that yes, they were in fact seeing a rainbow in those clouds. One guy got really excited and kept calling people over every time he saw the rainbow. I was happy I saw it, and then we decided to continue up to the summit.
We saw so many silversword there that it was incredible! If I remember correctly, when I was a kid and we visited, there weren't very many. I was happy to see the one that I got photographed with. In this case, I got to take my pick of silverswords to be seen with, and I unknowingly chose wisely, choosing one that was a similar scale in relation to myself as the one I stood next to when I was 9 years old (I think I was 9).
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| The elevation is no joke |
We walked around the summit, checking out the observatory and reading all the signs. Everybody was on one side of the summit, watching the sun prepare to set, but on the other side, with the sun behind me, on a cloud floating between me and a small hill, I saw a real, strong, bright Brocken Spectre. It was so clear and brilliant that in some of the photos, you can make out the shadow of my arms holding the camera up. For a few seconds, it was so bright that you could make out a double rainbow, but none of the pictures I took on my camera could do it justice.
In ancient Hawaiian lore, at least according to Maui Revealed, the sight of your shadow surrounded by a rainbow was a sign from the gods that your soul would be taken care of in the afterlife. Maybe I was just tired from a long day, and maybe the thought was really that comforting, but being alone, just me with my shadow surrounded by a rainbow in the clouds, brought tears to my eyes.
And then it was time to go watch the sunset.
I cannot begin to describe how incredibly beautiful a sunset above the clouds is, even if I was wrapped up in beach towels because that was all we had! The clouds reflect all the colors of the sunset, and you feel almost alone in the world.
You can almost forget the white trash family that pulled out the chips and Tostitos queso for the occasion and spends the entire thing griping about how hungry they are and is it sunset yet? And yes, they leave as soon as they realize the sun went below the clouds. The sunset is so amazing that you can almost forget how obnoxious that was.
We were absolutely not equipped to stay out long and watch the stars rise. If I ever get to Maui again, that is something I will definitely make a point of. We were both freezing -- I had taken all the towels and Stephen was toughing it out like the manly man he is, and for all that he loves the brisk temperatures of fall, which these were reminiscent of, even he had acclimated to Hawaii's warm climate so much that he was frozen to the bone. So, a long drive down, a bite to eat at the only restaurant that was open, and barely at that, and then another long drive home, we crawled in bed, called it a day, and prepared to wake up in four hours to do it all again.
