Day 1: Nu’alolo Trail, Nu‘alolo Cliffs, A-something Trail

I’m not really kidding anyone, myself included. Very good odds that Day 2 never gets posted, even better that Day 3 never does, and so forth. Regardless:

I’m starting with the payoff. Or one of the payoffs. Of the trail. That I went on. Where I nearly died of dehydration. Again. But, for you, payoff with no work. Inasmuch as this photo constitutes “payoff”. Now I wait with baited breath to find out whether DDF feels this is a photo that anyone could have taken. I can never tell myself. I think these are mostly Na Pali cliffs, though, fwiw. Taken from the trail heading out to the Nu’alolo Lookout. I like the colors. Think it sort of looks like something the happy trees guy would’ve painted. Wish he were still around. And that I remembered his name. Rather than just his hair.

 This photo looks better on my laptop screen at full-size. It’s the trail that goes out to the lookout. At this stage in the ordeal, I was not yet aware that it was to be an ordeal. That came later. I may or may not talk about it further down in the post. Mal sehen, nizh wahr?

 Sometimes I think I’m clever for taking “pattern” pictures. Anyone could’ve taken this photo. Looks way better at larger resolution. Sorry.

Signs at the trailhead and later on the trail indicate that the trail is watched out and potentially lethal. The washed-out lethal parts weren’t that washed out or lethal, although there were probably three steps that I took that seemed like they could’ve resulted in immediate and unrevocable death. But it hardly seemed dangerous. FWIW.

Seriously, the payoff here was fantastic. Unfortunately the lighting was way beyond anything I knew how to deal with. Plus all the shots I got look so darn pedestrian. And I’d never sweated so much in my life:

 Ah, sweet onset of dehydration!

On the plus side, once I got to the other trailhead (too lazy to go look at the name of the trail I took back to Koke’e Road — something with an A at the beginning), I figured I was good as dead if I didn’t get a ride for the 1.5 miles back to my car at the lodge. So: first time ever hitchhiked (in the United States). And successfully. Nice adverb.

When I’m on vacation, I’m constantly worried that I’m doing it wrong. And it doesn’t help when everyone assumes there are two in my party. Bah.

bkd