3 posts tagged “olomana”

III.  Jubilation Unbound

After what seemed like hours of climbing hand over hand and "Doing the Gollum."  I started to think that maybe Don wasn't as nice a guy as he first seemed.  Maybe he had only told us these lies to bring us out here away from anything, and dragged us up this mountain because the screams of the dying sound better when echoed against volcanic cliffs.  All of these fears were confirmed when we saw Rope #2.

Rope #2, as it turned out, was the rope that Don had originally been thinking of.  Rope #2 went straight fucking up. Rope #2 was where Rebar decided that this was the top of the mountain as far as she was concerned and nothing short of a pack of ravenous zombies would get her up Rope #2. 

I just stared at it a while under the pretense of 'catching my breath,' all the while fear gripped me in its icy claw.  This was it.  This was where I was going to die, dashed upon the ancient crags of a beautiful mountain.  I cycled through the Five Stages fairly quickly in my head just to expedite things.  I thought one last time about my wife, my retarded cats, and Bear.  Then I cowboyed up and began my ascent. I prayed to all Gods past, present, and yet to be for safe passage up this horrid rock.  Apparently the shotgun technique to worship works pretty well, or maybe Ba'al just wants someone to talk to now and again, because I am here now writing this for you because someone heard me and granted my request.  I reached the top and joy so intense flooded me that it threatened to scour me from the earth. 

Sadly, this feeling of euphoria was short lived.  At the top of Rope #2, the path was about 2 feet wide and dropped sharply on the left and right down something like seven million feet.  I would have taken pictures but I was busy desperately trying to not lose my shit.  I focused my eyes on the gray rocks in front of me and crawled like a worm until the path diverged. I had a choice of continuing this madness with nothing to cling to or take a more lateral approach that at forced me to look at the mountain face and give me the illusion that Death did not loom quite so near. Let it never be said that Illusion is no fine thing.

Below, my wife also petitioned the gods for safe passage:

At this height the wind howled over the mountain tops, it was like driving on a freeway in a bad windstorm.  The kind when you can feel your car bumped by particularly ghastly gusts.  This was easily the most unsettling thing in a day full to bursting with things that were unsettling. I scrambled up to a small level platform of rock where there was a cleft in the that was vaguely chair shaped.  I eased myself into this seat and wondered at how perfectly it welcomed me.  Never has or will a chair fit me so well.  "This," thought I, "is where the gods wish me to stop."  Now, some liars, deceivers, and hippies will spin yarns about the 'top' of the mountain being another 20 meters or so from my kingly throne but do not believe them.  I listened to my gods and and sat my happy ass right where I was.  I surveyed my kingdom from my mountain perch.  Then I took about four hojillion pictures to prove I had made it, which you must now view.  I did not risk my Jabba-Ass just to have you stop reading now:

II.  So it Begins

We drove to the base of the hiking trail.  Actually we drove to a small road and then hiked to the base of the hiking

trail. The road itself led to a golf course and country club and they didn't allow smelly hikers near their manicured parking lots.  It was about a half mile over paved road to the actual start of the trail.  The first part of the trail was a simple walk through wooded jungle.  It had rained that morning and the mud was a little slippery but nothing at all we hikers couldn't handle.  This went on for a quarter mile or so slowly but surely the trail began to wind uphill.  This is normal if made slightly more tricky by the slick mud.  "Now this," thought I, "is hiking."  a little further up we came to a windswept area of evergreen trees where the ground was covered in a carpet of dead needles.  There was a break in the canopy and a lookout point where we could see far we'd already come.  "This indeed," thought I, "is hiking."  Not long after the evergreens, the trail narrowed significantly.  It also became steeper, did I mentioned the ground was wet and was really slick?  I was wearing honest to God trail shoes and was still slipping all over the place.  Rebar was not, and had an even tougher time of it.  "No problem," thought I, "Don said this was EASY and would only take 45 MINUTES.  How long has it been?"

It's worth mentioning at this point that I've become fond of a television show called "Man vs. Wild,"  This is a show in which the host, Bear Grylls, gets dumped off into the ass end of nowhere and is left to find his way back to civilization on his own.  It is similar to Survivorman except it has a better name and Bear is a better host than Les, in that he whines much less.  So I've been watching this show for a while and thinking to myself, "Bear is just dreamy I'll bet he's having a lot of fun out there not eating for days at a time, then having to eat bugs and live trout he just caught with his bare hands."  This is part of the reason I was so hell-bent on going hiking.  Because Bear went hiking in hawai'i too, and I wanted to be just like him. 

The path continued to get steeper and narrow.  It also became rockier.  Many places we had to use branches or the rocks themselves to get up and over them.  The idea of a trail was left some way behind us.  Now there were only sharp rocks and branches and vines.  All of which were wet because it had rained and thus made this much harder.  I found myself starting to wonder exactly what we had gotten ourselves into.  I also wondered how we were going to come down with the rocks as slick as they were.  The mud was caked in our boots, and by this point we were both puffing a bit.  Don asked us repeatedly how we were doing but I couldn't possibly show a sign of weakness.  I just thought to myself What Would Bear Do and soldiered on.

Then came the ropes.  The ropes that Don had apparently come to show us.

We reached a point on the trail where it went from hiking to rock climbing.  The rocks were too step to climb up using branches and what-not so someone had had the great idea of leaving some ropes tied off to various trees and rocks to get up this part of the trail.  "This," thought I, "isn't hiking anymore."  This was one of the hardest parts of the climb.  To be honest, I thought Rebecca was going to throw in the towel.  She had come to Hawai'i to lay on beaches and drink fruity drinks with umbrellas in them, not haul herself up the side of a mountain.  But to her credit, she powered through and made it up with us.  From here on, almost everything on the trail was very narrow, very steep, and really scary.  The trail was nearly vertical after the rocks that actually were vertical.  After the ropes, the climb was pretty much nothing short of torturous.  I cut my hands up climbing the rocks and had a few near falls that could have ended very badly for me.  Don said he remembered only one set of ropes and that rest of the trail should be a cinch.  Even weighed against what listening to him had brought us, we continued the ascent, a move hereafter referred to as FOIBLE TWO (2).

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I. Prelude to Sorrow

One of the things highest on my 'to do' list while in Hawai'i was that I really wanted to go hiking.  Hiking is an exercise that I enjoy and have been known to do my own free will.  This sets it apart from almost every other forms of exercise because, generally, I would rather put live bees in my mouth than walk to the fridge.  Hiking though, there is something exotic and wholly unexcersizemenly about it.  So hiking was foremost on my list of things I wanted to do.  This desire, herein referred to as FOIBLE, proved to very nearly spell the undoing of everything I hold sacred.

First let me explain something, I'm in rotten shape.  You know how some people who really aren't in rotten shape but they say they're in rotten shape and you just sit there and think, 'you are NOT in rotten shape.'  I'm not one of those people.  I'm more like one of those people who says they're in rotten shape and you think to yourself, 'tell that to twinkie no. 4.'  Please direct your attention to the visial aides at the beginning and end of this paragraph for a before and after comparison.  I think I need say no more.  Doubtless climbing up mountains is best left to people who are in a shape that is not round.

At any rate, upon landing in our host home we noticed a giant mountain viewable from the back lanai (that's Hawaiianese for porch).  It stood dauntless and proud like a giant, a big green triangular giant.  Little did we know that before the passing of a fortnight this giant would become our immortal enemy locked in a struggle that would take several hours and leave us wishing for death's sweet embrace.  It was called Olomana (which is ancient Hawaiianese for "big fuckoff mountain").  We called it many other things before the week was out.  Still, it makes for a nice view off your back lanai-porch.

Don, our host, on hearing us (read: me) talking about how I wanted to go hiking told us that it was a beautiful hike up Olomana and that it was EASY and WOULD ONLY TAKE ABOUT 45 MINUTES.  Even though it might seem I'm leaving it a little ambiguous, I am, in fact, drawing attention to these words that Don used.  We'll be referring back to them later.  He also said if we were going to hike one mountain in Hawai'i, we should make sure that it was Olomana.  He went on to tell us that the ticket price paid for the entire mountain but we'd only need the edge.  This went on all week and secretly I kept looking at Olomana when we would drive by it on the windward side of the island and think to myself, "I'm gonna mess you up."  So by the time Hiking day happened, we opted for Olomana over something easier.  Don even offered to go with us as a sort of taskmaster guide and to show us the ropes.  If I had any idea how true that would be, I probably would've tried to chew my way out of his house in the night. 


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