Tag Archives: Honolulu

The Numbers Game #109

Big surf rolls in to the Kohala coast.

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 231. Captions are on the photos. You can see more responses here.

St. Andrew’s Cathedral, Honolulu

A view of St. Andrew's Cathedral in Honolulu, Hawaii

St. Andrew’s was originally the seat of the Anglican Church in Hawaii, back in the days of the Hawaiian Kingdom. But when the United States turfed out the Hawaiian royalty and took over, the church became Episcopalian and remains so today.

The main part of the cathedral is on the other side of the tower. I took this view because I was walking by on this street and I liked the traditional look of the church contrasting with the tropical foliage!

Reflecting on flight delays

Reflections in a window at Honolulu airport in Hawaii

These are the kind of photos you take when flights are delayed. Last week, our flight to Honolulu was delayed for 20 minutes because only one runway was operating at our destination due to heavy rain and thunderstorms. Coming back, the flight was delayed twice for reasons that were never explained. The upshot was that, after getting up at 5:30am to make the outbound flight, it was close to 11:00pm before we got home again!

Reflections and a plane at Honolulu airport in Hawaii

The Numbers Game #61

A gecko checks out the scene from the coin return slot of a Pepsi machine.

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 182. Captions are on the photos. You can see more responses here.

Urban Honolulu

Traffic reflected in a downtown building in Honolulu, Hawaii
Traffic, which can be brutal, reflected in the glass front of a downtown building.

Yesterday I posted a small town response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme of ‘Urban.’ See more responses here. It wasn’t until after that post went live that it occurred to me I could have used photos from my jaunt to Honolulu a few years back. It’s not the Big Island, but in Hawaii, Honolulu is by far the largest urban area.

When I got home, I had a look to see what photos I could use and came up with these images. The entire population of Hawi could fit comfortably into one of those skyscrapers.

The 1820 Mission Memorial building in Honolulu, Hawaii
The 1820 Mission Memorial building

Living in the past

The King Kamehameha I statue in Honolulu

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Images Inspired by Favorite Song Lyrics.’ See more responses here.

My final post on this theme is a photo with some history. This is the statue of King Kamehameha I in Honolulu. It’s appropriate for the old Jethro Tull song, Living in the Past. It also works for a favorite of mine, History Repeating by Propellorheads, with guest vocals by Shirley Bassey of all people! And for a final song, how about William Shatner singing(?) Has Been. I have a few William Shatner songs which feature on bad song compilations, but Has Been is actually a pretty good album in my book and speaks well to Shatner’s good humor when it comes to music.

Lāhainā Noon

Photographers are encouraged to take advantage of the golden hour shortly after sunrise or shortly before sunset, when the light is soft and golden. Photos taken here during the golden hour showcase the wonders of Hawaii’s beaches, volcanoes, and wildlife.

Taking that as my cue, I feature one of the wonders of Hawaii in these photos. No, it’s not concrete lamp bases, which can be found in most, if not all, states. Nor is it the golden hour. But only in Hawaii can you find a concrete lamp base like this one. It’s a sunny day. Those rectangular shadows are from the lights at the top of the lamp pole. But where’s the shadow of the concrete base? There isn’t one, because these photos were taken at Lāhainā Noon.

Lāhainā Noon, a name thought up by the good folks at the Bishop Museum, occurs when the sun is directly overhead on its apparent passage north and then south again, before and after the summer solstice. This phenomenon occurs in places located between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn. Hawaii is the only U.S. state in tropics and so is the only place in the country to see this.

The timing of Lāhainā Noon varies from place to place, depending on latitude. It occurs twice a year, the first time in May as the sun appears to head north, and then again in July as it dips south again. These photos were taken yesterday in Kawaihae, but where I live in Hawi, Lāhainā Noon occurred two days ago. The last place on the island to experience it will be South Point, the most southerly point in the U.S.A, on July 27.

The bottom photo shows the Sky Gate sculpture in Honolulu. This sculpture, designed by Isamu Noguchi, casts a wavy shadow most of the time, but twice a year, at Lāhainā Noon, the shadow is perfectly round. The sculpture wasn’t particularly well-received initially, but now people visit from all over the world (when that’s possible) to see it do its thing.

For more information about Lāhainā Noon go here.

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