Category Archives: Photo Challenges

Cliff ladder

My regular walk around Upolu Airport almost always occurs in the afternoon when I walk along the coast towards the east. This usually puts the sun at my back and the wind in my face. Last Friday, I went out in the morning and so walked in the other direction with both the sun and wind at my back. I was surprised by how strange it felt to do this. Approaching spots where I tend to stop and look for things in the water felt weird. I guess it shows what a creature of habit I’ve become.

One other oddity was this ladder propped halfway down the cliff face. I’d never noticed it before. Now, it might be a recent addition, but it’s also possible it’s been there for years because it is somewhat hidden when walking in the opposite direction.

The ladder was probably put there by someone who goes down onto the rocks to harvest opihi. The opihi is an edible limpet that is something of a delicacy in Hawaii. It can be eaten raw or cooked. Some people eat them right after they pry them from a rock. It’s a dangerous business though. They’re found on rocks right at the water’s edge and an opihi picker can easily slip or be swept into the ocean by big, breaking waves.

When I got home, I noticed the figure at the top of the photo. I hadn’t seen him at the time, but he’s an opihi picker who I ran into a little later on my walk.

Posted in response to Bushboy’s Last on the Card challenge. See more responses here.

Sulphur Banks Trail

One of the trails I took on my last visit to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park was the Sulphur Banks Trail, otherwise known as Ha’akulamanu Trail. It’s not far from the visitor center and so is usually popular with visitors because it’s an easy walk, about 1.2 miles roundtrip, and pretty level the whole way. But with few visitors around currently, I had the trail to myself.

This trail is one of several areas in the park where signs of volcanic heat can be seen even when there’s not an active eruption. Steam swirls upwards. The smell of rotten eggs indicates the presence of hydrogen sulfide in the air, one of the volcanic gases leaking from the ground along with sulphur dioxide and carbon dioxide.

The yellow tint of the ground is due to the sulphurous gases and close examination reveals the sulphur crystals that have been deposited there. The crystals photo was taken at one of the displays along the trail. It wouldn’t be wise to thrust one’s camera too close to one of the active vents, such as those in the bottom photo.

For more information about Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, go to nps.gov/havo/.

Posted in response to this week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme of ‘Close Examination.’ See more responses here.

ʻAnaehoʻomalu Bay beach

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Beautiful Beaches.’ See more offerings here.

ʻAnaehoʻomalu Bay, at Waikoloa Resort, is often referred to as A Bay for reasons that aren’t hard to figure out. In normal times this is a very popular spot. The beach is a long curve of pale sand with palms at either end. It’s popular with sunbathers, swimmers and snorkelers. There’s also a restaurant and bar at one end of the beach, facilities nearby, and shops not far away. And Ocean Sports operates various cruises out of the bay on a catamaran or glass-bottomed boat.

There’s a hike I like to do, which goes south from A Bay, and on previous visits I’ve skirted the crowds which are usually found there. However, these are not normal times. On my last visit I headed north. There was one person in the water, two on the beach. The ocean lapped gently against the shore. An offshore breeze rustled the palm fronds. Usually when I hike places like this, I’m an aberration with shoes and a fanny pack, marching through swathes of bikinis and board shorts and roasting flesh. On this occasion, I was an aberration just by being there.

What color is this octopus?

The answer to the headline is that it depends on the moment and the background. I surprised this day octopus when I came around a corner and it instantly changed color. Then it moved and changed color again. I edged away and it moved and changed color again. It changed about five times over the course of a few minutes and each change was like hitting a light switch – one moment this, next moment that.

Their default color is a gray-brown, but I didn’t see that on this occasion. The red of the center photo is a reaction to being surprised and the two mottled patterns are camouflage attempts.

Posted in response to Becky’s July Squares challenge theme of ‘Perspective.’ See more responses here.

Kilauea Military Camp

This is a view across Chain of Craters Road, in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, toward the flagpole and entrance of Kilauea Military Camp. The camp was founded in 1916, the same year as the park, as a rest and relaxation facility for military personnel. Today, it continues to fill that same function though the facilities are somewhat nicer than they were back then. There’s an array of cottages, a store, theater, sports facilities, gas station, laundromat, even a bowling alley.

While it’s been an R&R post for most of its existence, during WWII it was used as a prisoner of war camp and as a Japanese internment camp.

For more information about Kilauea Military Camp, go to https://www.kilaueamilitarycamp.com/. For more information about Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, go to nps.gov/havo/.

Posted in response to Becky’s July Squares challenge theme of ‘Perspective.’ See more responses here.

Gecko on a stovetop

I spotted this baby mourning gecko one evening, just sitting on the stovetop. This is what I call ‘making an unwise decision.’ Fortunately for the gecko, the day’s cooking was done, otherwise it risked getting fried or flattened by a pan.

Baby geckos have a fairly high mortality rate from accidents and predation by larger geckos, but at the same time, there seems to be no shortage of them. I guess some kind of balance has been achieved.

Posted in response to Becky’s July Squares challenge theme of ‘Perspective.’ See more responses here.

A plane and the moon

Becky’s July Squares challenge theme is ‘Perspective.’ See more responses here.

This photo is a perfect example of the ‘perspective’ theme. See how much bigger the plane looks than the moon. That’s because it’s a lot closer. But if the plane was up there, close to the moon, it would look a lot smaller than the moon, because the moon is actually way bigger than the plane. Also, the pilot would be in a world of trouble, or in out-of-this-world trouble, depending on your perspective.

Yellow tang

  • Yellow tang feeding
  • Yellow tang feeding on coral
  • Yellow tang
  • Yellow tango
  • Yellow tango
  • Yellow tango

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Yellow.’ See more offering’s here.

I thought I’d try the WordPress gallery feature for this post, which features yellow tangs, the first fish everyone notices in Hawaii. These bright yellow fish putter about in fairly shallow water, sometimes singly or in pairs, but often in large groups. They feed on algae, and occasionally can be seen cleaning turtles for this purpose. Unlike some fish, juveniles look the same as mature yellow tangs so shoals often contain a variety of sizes. The lower three photos show a pair of yellow tangs engaged in what I think is some kind of mating ritual.

Yellow tang are long-lived fish. They can live to be 20 or 30 years old. They’re also fish that are very popular in the aquarium trade but, since they don’t breed in captivity, all aquarium fish are collected from the wild. Currently, there’s a moratorium on the aquarium fish collection trade here, because of concerns about fish stocks and the sustainability of the practice.

Also posted in response to Becky’s July Squares challenge theme of ‘Perspective.’ See more responses here.

Yellow tang in Hawaii