Tag Archives: Kohala

Aloha at Upolu airport

An Aloha greeting is mown into the grass at Upolu Airport

This Aloha greeting, mown into the grass at the end of Upolu Airport’s runway, greets arriving aircraft. At this time of year, it’s also traditional for the grounds crew to mow the words “Mele Kalikimaka & Haouoli Makahiki Hou” into the grass bordering the runway. It means “Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.”

I don’t have a photo of this because it’s only visible from the air, but here’s a link to the scene in 2016.

A Pueo flying

A Hawaiian short-eared owl flies over the ground.A Hawaiian short-eared owl flies over the ground.

I was driving the Kohala Mountain Road when I saw this Pueo (Hawaiian short-eared owl) hovering. The mountain road is narrow and winding so it was another 100 yards or so before I could pull over to a semi-safe place. Luckily, the pueo was in an amenable mood and hung around the area, swooping back and forth before settling on the hillside.

I love watching them, dropping onto potential prey or ascending into the skies, completely at home in their environment.

Outrigger canoe

An outrigger canoe off the North Kohala coastAn outrigger canoe off the North Kohala coast

I saw this little outrigger sailing canoe off the North Kohala coast. The two men had obviously been fishing, possibly still were, but though the canoe wasn’t too far out, I couldn’t figure out which way they were headed. I guess they must have made it safely to shore since I didn’t see anything in the news about missing mariners.

The view north from Pu’u Wa’awa’a

The view from a bench of the hike up Pu’u Wa’a Wa’a.

Another post on the WordPress photo challenge theme of ‘serene.’

The hike up Pu’u Wa’a Wa’a is a steady climb, but there are several benches along the way for a quiet break. This bench looks north, toward the South Kohala coastline and North Kohala hills.

The trail isn’t crowded at any time of day, but in the early morning, it’s positively serene.

For more information about Pu’u Wa’a Wa’a and its trails, go to puuwaawaa.org.

Upolu sunset

Sunset from Upolu Point on the Big Island of Hawaii

Another post on the WordPress photo challenge theme of ‘serene.’

Hawaii’s weather is largely influenced by the northeast trade winds and some places on the Big Island are renowned for being windy. North Kohala is one of those places. Strong winds can blow for days on end and, off the coast, the ocean is often a flurry of whitecaps and spray.

But when the wind relents, the ocean calms and can produce a serene scene such as this sunset below Upolu Airport.

Transformered

Workers prepare to remove and electrical transformerWorkers prepare to remove and electrical transformer

A week or so ago, I posted (here) about a temporary electrical substation that sprang up on the edge of Hawi to facilitate a change in the local distribution network. A few days ago, the specifics of that change made itself felt here when the house was without power for four hours or so. This outage was planned and communicated so it wasn’t a surprise.

What was a surprise was that I hadn’t anticipated the road to the house being blocked by electic company trucks for a couple of hours. What that meant was that the plan to be away for most of the power outage got off to a rocky start.

The work they were doing was replacing the small transformers on local poles with ones that operate on a new voltage, a transformer transformation if you will. At least that’s my understanding of what I was told. When it comes to electicity, I push a plug into a socket and the light goes on. If it doesn’t, I whack the lamp a couple of times and that often helps.