Cardio can be fun.
Bottom of Kokohead. / Top of Kokohead.

Not much to do on rainy days.
Tasty cigar. / Wet windshield.

Hanauma is more than just a bay.
Field atop the Hanauma Crater rim. / View of Hawaii Kai from the rim.

Two reasons to drive out to Northwest Oahu.
Mokuleia Beach. / Mokuleia Crag.

He who stands on rocks.
A penguin admires his reflection at Hilton Hawaiian Village. / The desolate Kaena Point.

Solitude and companionship.
Bus stop in front of Foodland Beretania on a gloomy day. / The Lost Trailblazers on a summit.

Using every muscle in your body at the same time.
Bouldering at Sacreds. / Bouldering the Arch.

Boy toys.
New climbing rope. / New shortboard.

Get out of the city to maintain sanity.
Road to a beach house rental in Haleiwa. / View of Kaawa from Pu’u Manamana.

Traveling off island is nice, but so is coming home.
View of my plane to LA. / View from my front door at home.

***

Like many folks, Instagram is one of my favorite apps on my iPhone. These are some snaps I took over the course of the last year.

I’ve never seen free standing boulders this big on Oahu. You can see that one is the size of a house. This area is a new bouldering spot and has been dubbed The Green Boulders.

The rock is solid but let’s hope that this one doesn’t come crashing down anytime soon.

Once we clean off the dirt around the holds, there will be many lines to climb.

On this exploratory outing, we scouted the area, established one solid boulder problem and worked on a couple projects (project = a boulder problem that has yet to be completed). The main takeaway was that this place is legit. And we need to come back with more people, more crash pads and more machetes.

The Green Boulders are located in one of the small valleys on the North Shore. (We don’t know the name of the valley yet.) Matt (the man behind Waimea Bay Bouldering) heard about it through one of his climbing buddies and scouted it a week ago but didn’t do too much climbing. Then last Sunday, he brought Joe, Brian and I out there with pads and a rope to see what this place really has to offer.

What we saw blew us away.

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If you’re looking to buy a surfboard from a local Hawaii surfboard shaper, there’s a lot of people to choose from. You got the guys that have contracts with the local surf shops, the old school shapers and maybe even your friend that does it as a hobby. All are good options.

I recently decided to purchase a custom shaped board and had to make this decision.

For me, the decision was simple, I wanted a J. Kashiwai surfboard. I see Jason in the water at my home surf break in Ala Moana every now and then so he knows the type of wave I’ll be surfing. And, my buddy Joon has a new J. Kashiwai board and recommended him. Plus, he’s a really nice guy.

You can buy a ready-made surfboard off the rack at any surf shop on the island and that’s totally cool. I’ve done that too. But, I ended up learning a lot by getting a board custom shaped. I had to do  research to figure out what type of shape I wanted and what type of wave I wanted to ride with it. I’d love to have more specialty boards in my quiver but in the end, I decided that I really needed to replace my main all-purpose shortboard.

And when I picked up my finished board, Jason gave me a tour of his shop. I’d never been in a shaper’s shop before so I was stoked to see the process and tools it takes to shape and finish a surfboard.

I posted a bunch of photos so you can get a look inside a surfboard shaper’s shop in Hawaii.

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Two days ago Cory started tracking the moon. He specializes in moonrise and moonset photography. When the moon rises at the right time (too early and it’ll be too bright out) and over the right spot on the horizon, Cory will go hike to the top of a mountain and take pictures. He told me he once spent 12 hours at the top of Diamond Head at night to shoot both the moonrise and the moonset. I find this to be awesome.

Last night, a few of us were invited on one such outing. The moonrise was just after dark. Cory figured if we hiked to a spot on the Windward Side, we’d be able to see the moon rise over Kaneohe and the ocean. And the spot he suggested was the summit of Haiku Stairs. This was an invite I could not pass up. Jen and Josh (808 Goonies) didn’t pass up on it either.

The four of us set out to the trailhead at dusk.

The one factor we could not predict was the weather. We new it was overcast over the Koolaus but we could see many breaks in the clouds. And we hoped that the cloud level would rise as the night went on. When we arrived the first platform on the Stairs, things were not looking good. We were socked in.

The mist gave the city lights a dream-like quality though.

There were a few breaks in the clouds here and there. But, no moon.

On this night, I think the real star of the show was the Stairs. The city lights gave them a eerie and ominous look.

For a few hours, we sat and talked story at the platform, taking pictures whenever there was a break in the clouds.

And finally, we descended the stairs in darkness and rain, the H3 as our torch. Even though we couldn’t see the moon, it was a fun and peaceful way to spend a Wednesday evening.

Note: Due to the controversial nature of this hike, I’ve left out the details of our approach to the trailhead.

See also:

• Josh’s popular 808 Goonies hiking blog.
• My main post on the Haiku Stairs – see the comments and links I’ve provided for more info on the Stairs.

On a hot day, a dip in the Makapu’u tide pools feels amazing. Come with friends, bring drinks and snacks and spend a few hours hanging out on the rocks and swimming in the clear cool water.

We came out here a week ago and the swell was up. A strong swell means more water flows into the pools and the water was nice and clean. (If there hasn’t been a swell from the East in a while, you’ll see slimy algae in the pools.)

A strong swell also means you get a show. The waves crashing against the rock make for a great photo op.

Behold.

But keep an eye out. Every now and then a huge rogue wave will slam against the rocks. These folks (far right) know exactly what’s coming …

…the washing machine. Strong, confident swimmers will swim in the tide pools as the water rushes in for fun. Others hang on to the rocks for dear life.

When you decide you want retreat to the safety zone, you can stay up on the elevated rocks. This is a good place to keep your stuff so that it doesn’t get wet too.

From here you can enjoy your beer and cringe when a huge set comes in and wipes out your friends. (Please note that it’s probably illegal to drink alcohol here. And by “probably” I mean “definitely”.)

Tips:

• There’s no shade here so bring plenty of sunscreen. We all got burnt on this day. Reapply when you get to the pools as you probably sweat if off on the hike over.
• If you have goggles and a snorkel, bring that too. There’s fish in these pools.

See also:

• My original post on Makapu’u Tide Pools.