My Milky Way is better than your Milky Way

A treatise on selfie-sticks and stone monks

I've never been a mother or a teacher but I have studied Pema Chodron, and have gently removed live rattlesnakes from my office to the outdoors.

One might say that qualifies me for just about anything, but I take nothing for granted in the muddy eclipse where humans collide with the Real World. I know there are rules.

Rule #1 :  Don't sleep under a coconut tree. 

Half asleep on a warm lava rock our first day on Kauai, surrounded by the soporific slapping of waist-high waves, the thud of a coconut making a crater in the sand reminded me paradise has potholes. Glad I brought the first aid kit.

Everyone in our little quartet had unique "play hard" chores and goals. I was responsible for securing surfskis, Sue researched hikes. Elaine tried everything, and Lynn found the best Mai Tais.

Up before dawn, scouting the best beaches from which to watch the sunrise, Sue and discovered hermit crabs every five feet at Anini Beach excavating in the cushiony golden beach sand. We waded in the turquoise water before bringing home mangos and pineapples from local honor stands for breakfast, then headed off to pick up our skis.

Tropical Storm Hilda was slow arriving, but we could feel her building up, as we fought the current around Queen's Bath, up towards the Kialoa Lighthouse. The hard-fought six miles we covered in 1.5 hours, disappeared in 20 minutes riding the swells returning to Hanalei Bay. 

Over Mai Tais, Elaine decided to join us the next day, taking a lesson from Dylan Thomas, on a downwind run.

Turtles are best appreciated in the water; a shape that seems ungraceful and heavy on land becomes a torpedo underwater. They let us swim right alongside in the fingers at Queen's Bath while they casually chewed the algae on rocky ledges, spinning and diving with ease in the churning white wash. When we paddled past turtles some two or three miles offshore they popped back underwater jackrabbit fast.

Looming above Kapaa, the Sleeping Giant doesn't look approachable. A rock pillar rising above dense jungle, the trail is smooth red clay: a local's hike.

The view is stunning, and what quickly became Peggy's Happy Ferns greeted us in the dense groves under sprawling acacia trees.

In the lower-lying regions where residential areas meet the foothills, a shorter hike to Opeaka waterfall follows a river dotted with local swimming holes.

 

I would have recognized the Napali Coast trail with my eyes closed. True to memory, the perfume of ripe guava rises from the clay soil, drips down from the trees, infuses your clothes. The lilokoi take over in the next mile, a different sweet. At the first lookout I waited for dawn and my hiking buddies, while groups headed for Kalalao 10 miles further down the coast, adjust their packs.

  Day hikers stop for a quick "selfie with mountains" and I wonder, in photographing one's self amidst splendor or with an oversized fried carnival encounter is it a full detour around the senses? How would they answer a question later about what they saw or felt or smelled along the trail? If it's not posted on Facebook, did it happen?

I have clear memories of sitting on the Hanakapiai Beach rocks with the few other locals: drying off after body surfing, watching for dolphins and storms like attentive monks ritualistically affirming each day with a sunset vigil.

I feared my memories would be tainted by that eclipse with the Real World; that there would be picnic tables or worse: a building.

But the opposite happened.

Hundreds of smooth black stones cairns greeted us. Poised stone monks held sentry, representing those warm-blooded souls who had passed through and been transformed by the magic of Hanakapiai Beach.

Rule #2 Always have a back-up pair of hiking sandals you've already worn in.

My Croc sandals gave out six miles into our eight-mile Napali trek. No problem. I had some new Chocos back at the condo. We'll revisit that.

 

I keep an Eleanor Roosevelt quote taped to my computer at work: "Do one thing every day that scares you."

Hilda had hit the Big Island hard in the night. We got the tail of the storm on Kauai, bringing strong winds and swells. Dylan came with us along our 17-mile Napali downwind run and said the conditions hadn't been this good in a long time, certainly not three weeks prior when he won the Na Pali Race. So we were pumped, but anxious.

The water itself put us at ease. Here it is soft and warm, almost comforting, unlike the cold slap in the face of California swells.

Dylan graciously coached us in combining swells for maximum speed and fun. We took occasional breaks to gawk at the cliffs beside us and considered turtle sightings good luck.

In the last five miles, from the edge of the rugged Napali to the smooth white sands of Polihale Beach, we were out of the main current, moving more slowly over near-transparent waters teeming with colorful fish and coral. Overcast skies all morning spared us a blinding sun on the water and blistering sand at the end. A perfect day.

That night, it didn’t rain, no clouds impeded our view of the stars dancing across a lava black sky on their journey across the vast Pacific Ocean and these tiny volcanic islands overflowing with flowers and geckos.

About those shoes. Those new Chacos had given me blisters in the first mile. So I wore the $14 rubber-soled water shoes from the ABC store the next day, for the 13 miles of hiking on the trails above Waimea Canyon, and out the Na'ulolo ridge trail through a magical ginger forest to the ocean, without a problem.

Trying to beat the thick fog that regularly shrouds these peaks by mid-morning, we made it out to the edge just in time to be engulfed by fog and rain.

Not wanting to get lost on a slippery razor's edge ridge, we made our way back up and over to the east side down the trail overlooking Waimea Canyon.

The petite Waipoo waterfall at the base of the trail left us wondering where the river below it led. As we were driving down the canyon in search of an IPA, we saw where that waterfall fell, invisible to us when we were hiking above it.

Rule #3: Learn to pack gloves when you know you are borrowing a paddle. Just saying'.

Callouses are one thing, blisters are different. They can get infected, especially in the tropics where they never dry out properly. I felt the sting of the denser salt water on our last paddle to the Kialoa Lighthouse.

The seas were a bit mixed up and the wind was down, so I felt every stroke, but it was worth it to be out on the ocean one last time before that last sunrise, that last rooster announcing the obvious as golden light clipped the edges of breaking waves before landing softly on a Kauai beach.

 

Mahalo