Dispatches from Volcano: Late Saturday, August 31, 2019. Topics a la La-Rain...

La-Rain is a long-time friend, and years ago, she introduced me to "Topics". Because we talked kinda infrequently, to keep news updates on track and to try to prevent wandering conversations, we had Topics. She'd pick, then I, and we'd talk story.

I keep intending to get with the program and write more frequently, then Life gets in the way: The Mauna, bits and pieces of other writings and meetings, dealing with an arthritic knee, and on and on. And now here it is September. And here we go:

The Mauna

I've been sharing info up at Puʻuhuluhulu University with interested folks. It's been fun, interesting, and challenging. Up at 6,500+ft, the air is thinner, and commuting up for a few hours can be, I've found out, exhausting. Then too, the weathers are always changing; calm, clear and skin-searingly hot one day, cool and foggymisty the next. But we take it all as it comes and marvel in whatever scene is presented. Folks of all ages, from many places throughout our archipelago, are excited about the learnings and I'm happy to be able to contribute.

A CORRECTION: If any of you have attended one of my classes, I've talked about the two Puʻukole...one on Maunakea, site of one of the last eruptions there about 4.500 years ago, and a tan-reddish one across the way on Maunaloa. HOWEVER: The Puʻukole on Maunakea is correctly named. The other, on Maunaloa, is named Puʻukoli. Similar, perhaps, but different. Mayhaps my ears misheard, or lack of oxygen confused me...I apologize for the error. If it's clear skies tomorrow, I'll try remember to take photos...

Lots of pics and video are here and there online, and when up there, taking photos isn't a high priority. I've been telling friends and acquaintances that no matter your feelings or thoughts regarding TMT (the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope) on Maunakea, visiting Puʻuhuluhulu would provide good, in-person, first-hand information. Especially if one is skeptical about reportage, GoBeThere...

At Kīlauea and Halemaʻumaʻu

at the Keller Well, December 2018

The link above is to a Big Island Video News piece about the Keller Well, which was drilled on the floor of Kīlauea Caldera in 1973. Itʻs 4,140 feet deep, and the local water table was found to be about 1,660 feet below the surface. Itʻs believed that that water table is likely contributing to the pool at the bottom of Halemaʻumaʻu, about a half mile away. The well is near the September 1982 lava flow, on the south (Kaʻū-side) of Kaluapele. GoGoogle for technical papers.

The view below is in the other direction, toward the east, with Puʻupuaʻi (barely visible) at the middle top.

USGS HVO

Wai welawela: hot fresh water... At about 160dF, itʻs not quite boiling, but gases escaping through the pool cause it to bubble, and sulphur and other chemicals in the gases are captured in the water, making it green. Who woulda thought???

We live several decades, and some may expect "things" to be ever-the-same. One value of education is we are able to study history, make observations and attempt to understand, or at least make some sense of, our surroundings. The

be outside...pay attention noho i waho...a maliu

thing. But Iʻve learned that learning about something is entirely different than experiencing it. Especially the still-incomprehensible Hulihia Kīlauea during The Three Months of 2018.
From the Hawaiian Dictionary by Pukui and Elbert:

huli.hia

Pas/imp. of huli 1, 2; overturned; a complete change, overthrow; turned upside down. Chants about Pele with verses beginning with the word “hulihia” are referred to as hulihia. See prayer, kualakai 2. Hulihia ka mauna, wela i ke ahi (PH 204, 225), mountain overturned, hot with fire. Hulihia Kī-lau-ea, pō i ka uahi (PH 197), Kī-lau-ea [Volcano] is overturned, darkened by smoke. Kaua hulihia, revolutionary war. (PNP fulisia.)

Hmmm...What if...What if weʻre entering, or are in, a period of general hulihia? Just watch, listen to the news of the day...

USGS HVO

And then thereʻs Highway 132, the road between Lava Tree State Monument and Kapoho...

During construction, having dug down at least 15 feet,

USGS HVO

temperatures of 750dF (more or less) were recorded. Itʻs too hot to pave (the Temporary Road) with asphalt, so our County geniuses are asking FEMA for an extension to the October deadline for completion of Hwy132. SIIGGHHHH...

Rock is a really good insulator. The 1959 lava lake in Kīlauea Iki is perhaps 300 feet deep and is still hot. It steams when it rains. Thick walls of our old stone churches maintain cool interior temperatures. Pelehonuamea is still present. Heat + Rain = Steam = Her... Not till her younger sister Hiʻiaka brings greenery does Pele yield. And it matters not to our Mayor. Or maybe it does, but the tens of millions of dollars of Federal Funding matters more. And still, a year after, residents wait to return to homes and farms in kīpuka.

It we had paid several hundred thousand dollars for a gravel access road over the new flow, the access wouldʻve been done in January or February. But what do I know??? Oh. Oh... I know that when it rains down in Kapoho, on the new Federally Funded, Paved, Built-to-Federal Specs Highway 132, itʻll steam. A lot. Making driving just a bit hazardous.

Slow shaking of head... And I think that Iʻm beginning to understand that in County lingo, "Recovery" means getting people back to Puna Ma Kai. Building a new small boat harbor at Pohoiki, blessing the new shopping center in Pāhoa (not far at all from the 2014-15 lava flow), paving more roads and highways, etc etc etc. That definition of insanity??? Doing the same thing over and over (1790, 1840, 1924, 1955, 1960, 1977, 1983-2018) and expecting a different result...

Back up at Keanakākoʻi

While lehua, save for the odd random ones, seem to be pretty much pau bloom, Iʻve been taking photos of a particular branch I visit on the way to Keanakākoʻi. Trying to learn how long from bud to seed. More or less...

Photo above, April 24, 2018.

Same branch, photo below, today, August 31, 2018.

Above pic, as many are, isnʻt the best, but the seed pods are just opening (at the right). A neighboring cluster is shown below. The fuzzies are ʻanoʻano lehua, future ʻōhiʻa perhaps.

KOLOPUA: fragrant, as air laden with the perfume of flowers

Though the blooming of kāhili ginger is an annual summer event up here, and the flowers are a spectacle, they are sneeze-provoking, and worse, the very thick rhizomes form mats, choking any natives desiring a foothold in the forest.

ʻAwapuhi (gingers) bloom when days are long. They bloom too when streetlights shine on them at night. White ginger is a favorite, and is for me, sneezeless. Weʻve had stretches of icky ikiiki weather...hot, nearly windless, humid, sticky, but that makes for kolopua. Car windows wide open, driving down the hill between Glenwood and Mountain View, good noses can pick out sections where white gingers bloom, then in turn, the yellows.

I remember fondly a big patch in the back of Waipiʻo. I call it Waimā, because itʻs not far from the end of the road there, the "index finger" of the valley. ʻAwapuhi Waimā is white, but with a bright yellow heart