Category Archives: Places

What the tide washed in

Beach debris Big Island

These are scenes from the coast of the Big Island, a few miles northeast of South Point, the island’s southernmost tip. This stretch of coast is notorious for the amount of marine debris on its shores.

In late January of this year, a mass of rope washed up at Kamilo Point, just a few miles from where these photos were taken. The rope mass was estimated to weigh around 40 tons. Kamilo Point is nicknamed ‘Plastic Beach’ because weather conditions and ocean currents bring huge amounts of debris ashore there. At least some of this junk is believed to have come from the ‘North Pacific Garbage Patch’ and before that, Asia.

In early March, volunteers gathered 11.6 tons of debris from this same stretch of coast.

The debris in these photos is mild be comparison, but still unsightly, and dangerous for everything from seabirds to Hawaiian monk seals, turtles, and humpback whales. That said, the blue plastic soaking tub (below) on the ocean’s edge, looked awfully inviting.

Beach debris near South Point

Jacaranda flowers

Jacaranda flowers cluster

Jacaranda flowersA final response to the last edition of the WordPress photo challenge with a theme of ‘All time favorites.’

I headed back to Pu’u Wa’awa’a last week, because this is the time of year when several kinds of trees are in bloom. One of those trees is the jacaranda, which blooms from April to June, and produces masses of blue to lavender flowers. Jacarandas prefer cooler elevations so the lower areas of Pu’u Wa’awa’a are right in their zone.

I wasn’t disappointed. Several trees were covered with these delicate flowers, which somewhat made up for the fact that the entire hill was shrouded in thick vog, exacerbated by the ongoing eruption down in Puna.

Jacaranda flowers and bee

Smithsonian Submillimeter Array

Smithsonian Submillimeter array

Smithsonian Submillimeter array dishesSmithsonian Submillimeter array dishes with textAnother response to the last edition of the WordPress photo challenge with a theme of ‘All time favorites.’

I post this for two reasons. The first is that recently I had an exchange on this blog with the wife of the Director of the Submillimeter Array (SMA). The second is that Mauna Kea is a favorite place of mine to visit.

So here are a couple of photos of the SMA taken a few years back. The dishes are mounted on those little round pads in the photos, and they can be moved to different pads to produce different configurations. In my ignorance of most things scientific, I marvel at the idea of moving a dish a few meters makes a big difference in observations of things way the heck out there in space. That’s not an official measurement there.

The top photo shows seven of the eight dishes that make up the array.
The other photos, of three dishes and what immediately popped into my head when I saw them, show why I never made it as a scientist.

For more information about the Submillimeter Array, go to https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/sma/.

The eyes have it

Sheep with older lamb

Another response to the last edition of the WordPress photo challenge with a theme of ‘All time favorites.’

After a recent hike, I was returning to my truck and saw a small flock of sheep ahead on the track. These two caught my attention. The smaller one on the right was, I assume, the other’s lamb. Just before I took this photo, I saw it going for milk with that pneumatic drill approach that lambs have.

Before and after that, the ewe stood still, unwaveringly fixing me with those intense eyes. Then the two of them ran off to follow the rest of the flock that had already moved on.

Dead tree in the lava

Dead tree in the lava

The twisted remains of a dead tree lie, under heavy skies, on an old lava field at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

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

Posted in response to this week’s WordPress Photo Challenge ‘Twisted.’

 

Abstracts: Tiny fish

Abstracts-Tiny Fish

A photo of some colored lava rocks. But wait. Why are there tiny fish among those rocks? No, they’re not skittering about on minuscule legs, a living proof of evolutionary theory. Instead, they’re swimming in very shallow, very clear water near the edge of a freshwater-fed pool, just inland from Akahu Kaimu Bay, south of Waikoloa Resort.

On my last hike along that stretch of coast, I stopped here for a refreshing dip. The entry to the pool was over these somewhat rough lava rocks. While I was feeling my way across them, these little fish seemed greatly interested in my feet, which suggests life in the pool must be very dull indeed.

Posted in response to this week’s WordPress Photo Challenge ‘Liquid.’