The Back Door to Waipio

Waipio Valley is a monumental valley carved on the North side of the island by the continuous streams that flow from the Kohala mountains. It is also known as the Valley of the Kings. This is the front end of Waipio, a very popular tourist lookout.....

The Popular Front End of Waipio Valley

Well yesterday we went on a hike with our friends Antonio, Mila their daughter Mirra (she's in Syd's class) on a hike that goes from the end of the White Road in Waimea to the lesser known but by no means less Majestic BACK end of Waipio Valley. This is where it starts, right at the foot of the Kohalas.....

Here we are taking off from the green pastures of Waimea, a cloudy cool foggy day, excellent for a hike!

And as in all cool hikes here, there are plenty of no trespassing signs all along and closed gates, but since there was "cinco" of us and not "tres" we figured we weren't breaking any rules...because we were not "trespasing" we were "cincopassing"...besides, gates are made to be jumped over, right?Hike starts through the Kohala Forest Reserve and soon joins one of the old sugar mill plumes. Many of these plumes were damaged by the 06-earthquake, however it seems that reconstruction and fixing is taking place now.Like this section here that used to be a concrete bridge and has now been replaced with a high density poly pipe....to get to the back end of Waipio you pass through many different vegetation sections, from bamboo forestsfern forests

forests where the top of the trees seemed to have been chopped off by a giant weed-whacker

forest with fuzzy trees

All this within a 40 minute hike.....and then you are rewarded with some of the most spectacular views in the world...... THE BACK END OF WAIPIO...

As with any natural wonder, the pictures don't make any justice to the place, so if you will have to come and visit in order to appreciate its full impact.....

Here we are, the happy bunch of hikers...

with such a gorgeous setting, we just had to do a photo-kiss for a happy ending...

On the way back, Charlotte, always the curious plant person she is, decided she wanted to "look under the roots of a tree"....so she just flipped it over.

Good thing we know how to read in spanish....A hui hou.......