Category Archives: Photo Challenges

Truck stuck

A truck stuck in a muddy puddle on the Big Island of Hawaii
While I always prefer to take smaller, winding roads, such roads taken are not without pitfalls.

The last mile of the journey to Mo’okini Heiau in North Kohala is an uneven dirt road studded with rocks. When the road is dry it can be navigated by almost all vehicles (I saw a smart car there once!). However, care is needed, particularly regarding clearance. Almost every time I walk the road, I see fresh scrapes on the rocks. With rainy weather, the road becomes the territory of 4-wheel drives and jacked-up suspensions.

On this day, the puddles that often form on the road had become lakes. This truck had passed me earlier and when I saw it returning I ducked behind a bank to do a little whale watching and avoid the wave of spray that would surely accompany anything driving through the lake. A few minutes passed. I realized I hadn’t registered the truck passing. It had gone very quiet. So I wandered out to the road again and saw the truck marooned. They’d made it through on the way out, but weren’t so lucky on the way back.

The truck was a 4×4 but not with extra clearance. I think their problem was that the lake was deeper at the far end (in the photo). On the way out, they’d no doubt barreled into the water and their momentum had carried them to shallower waters and out. On the way back, the same approach would have propelled them toward the deep end. I suspect a bow wave built up, slowed them, and allowed water to penetrate parts of the truck that responded unfavorably.

The two young local men seemed quite cheerful. They waded through the muddy water, tried to coax life into the truck. One was on the phone (a miracle to have service there). After they insisted they had everything under control, I walked past on the high bank alongside the road, then turned and took this photo. When I returned a half hour or more later, the truck and its occupants were gone.

A flowery flounder vanishes

A flowery flounder disappears against a rock.A flowery flounder swimming
Camouflage is a creature making a good match with its surroundings. This serves to conceal it from both predators and prey. In the water, there are many exponents of this approach, from octopuses to scorpionfish.

Flatfish are masters of camouflage. It’s a fluke to see a stationary flatfish. It’s almost always necessary to see one on the move and to track it to where it settles down. Once it’s set though, it will usually stay put, making it one of the easier fish to observe and photograph.

I saw this flowery flounder on the move but once it plopped onto a rock (above) I would never have noticed it had I not known it was there.

Bright-eye damselfish

A bright-eye damselfish in the waters of the Big Island
The aptly-named bright-eye damselfish is a tiny fish around 1 to 2 inches long. Despite its small size it aggressively defends its territory, usually a nook or hollow in the rock. It’s not unusual to see it come charging out at some much larger fish that has strayed too close.

Given that these fish spend all their time in one small area, often just hovering in the water, it would seem a simple matter to get a photo, but no. When they hover, they’re constantly moving, almost vibrating. And then they shoot off in one direction or another.

I’ve taken many of photos of bright-eye damselfish and the majority of them turn out to be pictures of bits of rock or coral. Locating the tiny fish on my screen is no easy matter, keeping it there, harder still. When I do manage that, often the fish is a blur or just a tail fin heading out of shot. Thus, this photo is something of an against-the-odds triumph – an entire bright-eye damselfish reasonably in focus.

The bench overlooking Honokane Nui Valley

The bench overlooking Honokane Nui Valley on the Big Island.
At the end of the highway in North Kohala is the Pololū Valley overlook. This is where most people park their cars (if they can find a space), snap a photo or three, and then climb back in and attempt to turn around and head back.

Quite a few people head down the steep, third-of-a-mile trail to the valley and beach below. Some walk the half-mile-long beach. Very few continue up the trail on the other side. There are good reasons for this. The trail is somewhat hidden. If it’s been raining, it can be even muddier and more treacherous than the trail down to the valley. If conditions are right, it can be alive with bugs. But for those that do press on for another a mile or so, this is the spot they will reach.

Overlooking Honokane Nui Valley, this bench is the perfect spot to experience some welcome solitude. Chances are it will be unoccupied. Chances are no one else will even pass by. I like to sit on the bench (rickety though it is currently) and enjoy the ocean stretching away on one side and the tropical jungle climbing the side of the Kohala Mountains on the other.

For more information about the trail go to bigislandhikes.com/pololu-valley/.

The Painted Church at Honaunau

The Painted Church at HonaunauBible scenes on the walls of the Painted Church at Honaunau
I’m not a religious person, but I’ve always enjoyed visiting churches. I grew up in England and the stone churches had a calm ambience with cool, quiet interiors. Usually, there was some feature of note, even in the smallest church – carvings on the pew ends, a font dating from Norman times, the tomb of some ancient notable under the floor.

The Painted Church at Honaunau, on the Big Island, is different from those churches, more fitting to its setting. A wooden structure, it dates back to 1899. Father John Velghe moved much of a previous structure to its present site and had it repaired and added to. A self-taught artist, he then painted the interior including several scenes from the bible on the walls.

What I like is how colorful the interior is, with a real tropical feel. But it too has that stillness that I associate with churches and an ambience all its own.

For more information about the Painted Church at Honaunau, go to thepaintedchurch.org.