The Miller Family: {Wednesday, October 26th} Road to Hana

Saturday, November 12, 2011

{Wednesday, October 26th} Road to Hana

Road to Hana

It is true that fulfillment lies in the journey, not the destination when it comes to the road to Hana. I don't know how many times we've attempted the road to Hana in the past only to stop around mile 18, throw up (me), and turn around and say, "Maybe next time." We were very surprised to find that within the past 8 years of us being there they have repaved (and widened) the entire road to Hana making it much easier and more pleasant to drive it. I'm happy to say that we did the road to Hana! And it blew away my expectations. Our first stop was around the 17 mile marker at Ching's Pond. It was a waterfall right underneath the small bridge that you drive across. Andy got right in a cliff jumped off the side. I attempted to get in but the water was freezing. The next stop was mile 31 at Nahiku Pond. Then Black Sand Beach a mile after that. Black Sand Beach was beautiful with the contrast of the turquoise water but I must say it was quite a small beach and the black sand was very coarse, not fine.

We didn't stay long and it was a good thing we did because the next stop at mile 42 was Ohe'o Gulch aka 7 Sacred Pools. This is the reason why we've tried to do the road to Hana so many times. I've wanted to see this place and it didn't disappoint. We spent over 5 hours here and we wished we had 2 more hours so we could have had enough time to swim to another waterfall that we found but we were trying to beat sunlight and get to the top to see Waimoku Falls. There are two trails once you get inside Haleakala National Park. We got there right before 1pm and went to the 7 Sacred Pools first. It was beautiful but not exactly what I thought it would be. There aren't 7 pools (who knew?) but there were 2 that we were able to swim in. The bottom pool was really busy so we hiked up and had the top pool all to ourselves for a while then another couple joined us. It was fun to swim over and underneath the waterfall together. After we swam we got dried off and did the 2 mile hike up to Waimoku Falls. We took a detour about 1 mile into the hike which turned out to be the highlight of our entire trip! Soon after the outlook of Makahiku Falls (a 600-700 foot waterfall) there was a path off to the right that had signs that said, "Warning" "Stay on the Trail" or something to that effect. We, of course, didn't heed the signs and discovered the Infinity Pool that is the pool on top of this 600-700 foot waterfall! Incredible I tell you. You look over into this canyon or valley so lush and beautiful the pictures don't do it justice. Behind you is another pool that the has plants draping the massive rocks that look like caves. Quite eery but we decided to go on and swim in them because we had read that after 3 pools there was a waterfall in the most surreal setting that we had to check it out. I'm not kidding you that it was the creepiest feeling getting into these dark, cold waters with no sunlight coming through. But beyond worth it when we got to the waterfalls. It was so magical it was like something you would see in the movies but here we were swimming around together in this beautiful place. This, specifically, was the highlight of our trip. We said as we were swimming back that if we had to leave Hawaii that night (only the 2nd day into our trip) the trip would have been worth it because of that moment. We got dried off and started back on the trail again and found another path off the trail. It was another very big pool and waterfall that fed the waterfall/pools that we had just been in. We decided to make it to the top and if we had time we would swim it on the way back. (Which we ran out of daylight.) We went across a huge suspended type bridge that led to a bamboo forest. Very dark, but incredible. After winding our way through the bamboo forest we made it to the top and was greeted by Waimoku Falls, a 400 foot beautiful waterfall. So incredible all the beauty we were able to experience in one place.

We were running out of daylight fast and busted our way down the 2 mile trail. We were one of 3 cars left when we got back to the parking lot which earlier that day was completely full. We got in and drove back (in complete darkness) and talked about maybe driving back on Friday so we could come back to the Park again as well as the Venus Pools, Blue Pools, and Alelele Falls which we ran out of time to see. But we were quickly reminded on the drive back that it isn't as easy as it sounds and decided that we would have to come back the next time we came to Maui. It's deceiving when you think of driving 48 miles each way but on the road to Hana 48 miles takes over 2 hours to drive (each way) without stopping (at least in the dark on our way back). It was a full day (we started at 7am and got home at 9pm) but it was the best day of our trip!

Ching's Pond