This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Landscapes.’ See more responses here.
There’s a bit of everything on the Big Island, so these are just few of the landscapes to be seen here. Captions on the photos.
Big Island landscapes
Category Archives: Parks
Can you see it?
A few weeks ago, I was up at the summit of Mauna Kea with my visiting brother. I took a lot of photos up there including this one of the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. I’ve always liked this observatory as it’s cute and shiny and has all kinds of different shapes going on.
One other thing it has, is disappeared. A couple of weeks after my visit, the dome was removed, part of a decommissioning process that’s been going on for a while now. Once the pad and underground utilities have been taken out, the site will be restored to its natural state.
Gotta have rain for a rainbow
A couple of mornings ago, it was teeming down with rain at home. I still headed out for a swim because that spot, a few miles down the coast, is usually warm and dry. This was not one of those days. The sky was solid gray, the precipitation steady.
I have an irrational dislike of it raining when I swim! I mean, I’m getting wet anyway. What’s the difference? The main compensation on this occasion was the presence of this rainbow offshore. This rainbow stayed steady throughout the swim and was still there when I drove home, with the heater cranked up and the fan blowing strong.
Beware
The old boat hoist at Mahukona has been replaced, though it’s not yet ready to handle boats apparently. But recently, two new signs appeared at the site.
The top one, advising swimmers to beware of boaters is OK, though it implies there are boaters out there, cruising the waters, searching for swimmers to run down. If those boaters exist, I’ve yet to encounter them.
The second sign was the one that caught my eye though. Beware of swimmers! What do they think we’re going to do? Bite a hole in the boat? Attach a mine? Reach a long arm over the side and drag the boater to a watery grave? I guess ‘Watch out for…’ was too many letters!
The Numbers Game #26
The idea of The Numbers Game is to enter a number into the search bar of your computer and then post a selection of the photos that turn up. This week’s number is 147. Captions are on the photos. You can see more responses here.
Blacktip Reef Shark
I don’t see sharks a lot, but when I do they’re usually Whitetip Reef Sharks, which are fairly common around the island. I’ve seen others, including a few Blacktip Reef Sharks, but haven’t got photos of them before.
A few days ago, snorkeling out of Lapakahi, this Blacktip Reef Shark emerged out of hazy waters, heading my way. When it saw me, it veered off to the side, zipped past, and continued on its way. The shark was no more than four feet long, but there was no mistaking it with those markings.
It was a short encounter, so I only took a few photos and, given the conditions, had no great hopes that the photos would be any good, or that the shark would even be in them! So I was pleased that this one shot turned out halfway decent.
The eyes have it
The small Indian mongoose is the poster child for bad ideas in Hawaii. Introduced back in the days of the sugar plantations, the idea was for them to get rid of the rats running rampant in the cane fields. Alas, rats are nocturnal, mongooses diurnal, so their paths only crossed on the shift change. Instead, the mongooses appreciated the absence of predators in Hawaii and the abundance of ground-nesting birds and were major reasons for the extinction of many native bird species.
They are most frequently seen running across roads, like big sausages with little legs. Closer up, there’s an intensity about them, as seen in this photo. I’ve had a couple of close encounters and have no wish to get into an altercation with one. I’d probably win, but would likely bear the scars of victory!
The Numbers Game #24
The idea of The Numbers Game is to enter a number into the search bar of your computer and then post a selection of the photos that turn up. This week’s number is 145. Captions are on the photos. You can see more responses here.
Graham's Island 