
A couple of surfers head for home after enjoying some good waves at the surf break off Kawaihae.

A couple of surfers head for home after enjoying some good waves at the surf break off Kawaihae.

The Queen Ka’ahumanu Highway was built in the 1970s to connect Kailua Kona to Kawaihae and Waimea along a coastal route. This also opened up the south Kohala coast for resort development that had been led by the Mauna Kea Resort, which opened in the late 1960s. Mauna Kea Resort is in the foreground of this image.

Kohala by the Sea is an upscale gated community on the northern edge of Kawaihae. What appeals to me in this image is the curvy roads terminating in little asphalt blobs. It gives it an organic feel, which I suppose it is in a way.

On my way to work recently, this sunrise promised much, then faded, then regrouped with this vibrant display. Mauna Loa and Hualalai provide the backdrop.

I saw this ship moored in Kawaihae Harbor recently. It looked unlike anything I’d seen there before, so I stopped by to take a look. I found the ship’s name on the stern, between the twin hulls.
According to Wikipedia, the City of Bismark is a Spearhead-class expeditionary fast transport, operated by the United States Navy’s Military Sealift Command. It was built in 2017 and entered service at the end of that year. Ironically, when I first saw the ship, I thought it looked a bit beaten up and wondered if it was an older ship that someone had bought and was planning on fixing up!


This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Fences.’ See more responses here.
Here on the Big Island, fences tend to be of two kinds – chainlink and painted wood. Walls and hedges are possibly more popular. Walls don’t need as much maintenance and hedges fill in easily all by themselves, though they do require trimming if they’re not to take over.
These fences are ones that have seen hard times. The top photo is the chainlink fence around Upolu Airport. Someone managed to take out a section of this recently. Not sure whether they got distracted or were going too fast and lost control, but several sections of fence got destroyed. Judging from the trail of damage, the vehicle can’t have fared well either.

The other two photos are of fences around Kohala Ranch, a subdivision in Kawaihae. These photos were taken after August’s big brush fire. The tidy white fences surrounding the property have been rather battered. Fixing the damage will be a significant task, though I think most of the folks living there were probably happy to have been spared more than this largely aesthetical issue.


Since the big windstorm of a few weeks ago, I’ve seen a number of Kiawe trees looking like this, on their sides with a disc of roots and dirt exposed. They’ll get cut up and probably used for smoke meat, but it will take a while to clear all of them. This one was below the trail at Pu’ukohola Heiau National Historic Site in Kawaihae.

A tug and barge enter Kawaihae Harbor around sunrise.