Manana, Waiawa, Ahren Ditch

Hike Report: Manana & Waiawa Ditch Trail

By dkt

Despite their battered, dirt-stained state, my topo maps are among my most treasured possessions. One of my favorite pastimes is to spread a topo on my bedroom floor and trace out with a yellow highlight pen routes I've hiked. In fact, I just finished inking in a route I, along with a bunch of HTMC colleagues, hiked and cleared today. Having done that, my rough calculations indicate we covered 12 miles with an elevation gain of 2600 feet. A decent workout in the mountains it was.

In what may be a surprise to some, we weren't hiking a ridge trail to the summit of the Koolaus or Waianaes. Indeed, we never came close to a summit. During the course of the day, we crossed three streams—Manana, Waiawa South, & Waiawa North; we hiked along an old ditch trail (Ahren); we climbed to a high point of 1400 feet and descended to a low of 350; we battled uluhe, ginger, and palm grass; we descended and ascended muddy, slick slopes; we strolled along motorcycle trails; we sauntered along old jeep roads.

We also encountered over half a dozen hunters and double the amount of hunting dogs. Some of us saw (4) pua'a. We all saw many areas damaged by pigs. A handful temporarily went astray (we refuse to say we're ever lost). One temporarily misplaced personal items that were recovered. Some used gas-powered tools to attack encroaching flora; most used handtools to clear the trails we hiked.

The majority—the cross-country crew—started at the Manana trailhead atop Pacific Palisades. A smaller group—the covert crew—began hiking from a locale with problematic access but with quicker access to the major work area.

Covert crew: Pat, Ed, Ralph, Roger, Thea, Reuben, Bill.

Cross-country crew: Jason, Charlotte, Georgina, Carole, John, Connie, Nathan, Gordon, Mike, Helene, Kris, Ken, Thomas, Stuart, Carmen, Deetsie, Dayle.

Since I was with the cross-country crew, I'm in better position to describe what our day was like. We gathered at the end of Komo Mai Drive at just before 8, having seen our colleagues in the covert crew whisked away in two vehicles about twenty minutes prior. Stuart, who'll coordinate the club outing on 2/25, briefed us on what to expect, and we were off up the single-lane paved road for about a quarter mile. At a large metal powerline tower, we turned left off the road and followed a trail that after an initial level section began descending steeply to Manana Stream. At a fork a third of the way down, Tom, Jason, and I opted to descend a steep trail to the right; meanwhile, everyone else veered to the left to descend and clear a trail that way.

Once at Manana Stream (dry), Tom, Jason, and I crossed it and picked up a trail on its far bank. The trail, overgrown and damp from the previous night's precipitation, was still passable, and Tom and I began ascending it through uluhe, then guava, then low-level dryland vegetation. Jason, not a big fan of the status quo, decided to climb a vaguely-trailed spur to our left. In the meantime, the others were heading up a better trail further downstream (this is the trail that'll be used on the club hike and the best of the three).

Once the climbs via the various trails were completed, we all, in various ways, found our way across a grassy, flat-topped mesa to a broad, powerline-topped spur that filtered down toward Waiawa Stream. In anticipation of hot, thirsty conditions later on, some of us stashed water bottles along the trail on the mesa for the afternoon return leg.

The descent steepened for a couple hundred meters then eased as we made our way through a grassy meadow along an old fenceline. Ken pointed out a seemingly out-of-place orchid by the fence. As we approached Waiawa Stream (south branch), Carole came upon a hunter and his dog. Even though I wasn't far behind Carole, I didn't see the hunter nor the dog, which had blood spattered on its face, according to Ms. Moon.

Waiawa South was narrow and gently flowing at its ford. Soon thereafter, after passing the toe of a prominent middle ridge, we crossed broader Waiawa North, the main river, just upstream of a large circular pool. With ribbons from last year's hike removed by some unknown person, we faced the challenge of finding the trail to ascend out of the gulch to a junction with the Ahern Ditch trail. Charlotte, who has a nose for such things, eventually located the trail; meanwhile, I was nearby doing some "exploratory ascending" through guava, vines, and pig paths (no, I wasn't lost). :-)

After completing the stiff, sweaty climb from the stream, we regrouped at the junction with the ditch trail. Snacks of various kinds appeared and eagerly and thankfully disappeared. Though we had done some work on the rollercoaster cross-country trek from Palisades, our real labor commenced on the ditch trail, where we whacked down christmas berry branches, palm grass, clidemia, ginger, uluhe, et al. As we worked and hiked, remnants of the now waterless ditch lay to our left.

The ditch trail, cut into the side of a large ridge at the 900-foot elevation, winds in and out of several clefts in the mountainside. Kukui trees are plentiful along the trail as were areas rooted out and decimated by resident pigs. After a mile and a half, the trail entered a crease between two ridges and switched back to gain a saddle at the crest of the righthand ridge. At that point, the ditch trail dropped into Waiawa Valley via switchbacks. At the saddle, we stopped to eat lunch and chat with a hunter who was tracking his collared dogs in Waiawa Valley with an electronic device.

The hunter, a friendly man, answered our many questions about his equipment, his dogs, and his hunting experiences. The senior man in his crew, he was hunting with several other men and over a dozen dogs. The dogs had killed at least three pigs in the morning: two babies and a 90-pounder too badly mauled for dressing and hauling out. He had no problem with us being there. In fact, he especially liked HTMC's no-dogs-on-hikes policy.

After lunch, we ascended west along the ridgetop (the club no longer hikes the switchbacks down into Waiawa). We worked hard to clear back thick patches of uluhe and large lantana plants. After an hour, we finally made the connection with the covert crew, who'd been clearing the route the club hikes as a loop in a clockwise direction.

Meetings like these are always happy times, for not only are we glad to meet friends we've not seen all day, but we also know our work for the day has ended. And that's a good thing.

Though our chopping work was completed, we all still faced a rugged return leg to get back to Komo Mai. The group I was with continued around the loop counterclockwise, admiring the nice clearing job the covert team had done. Eventually, we emerged on a motorcycle trail just seconds after a pack of dirt bikers noisily roared by. The motorcycle trails, after some initial ups and downs, descended steadily southwest, with three critical left turns to make to return back to the junction with the ditch trail.

By my estimate, the loop is about four miles, with a third being motorcycle trails, a third a graded ditch trail, and a third an ungraded (but now well-cleared) ridge route. The loop's high point, and in fact the highest point of the entire hike is 1400 feet. The crossover from Palisades to the junction with the ditch trail is about two miles and involves two large descents and ascents. Double that for the roundtrip.

Slippery morning slopes were drier and easier to manage in the afternoon. Additionally, cool, overcast conditions helped lessen overheating problems we might have faced on the double-dip crossover back to Palisades. Stashed bottles of water also didn't hurt.

Worthy of note was that just about every wahine who attended today's outing didn't go "topless." That should make Jay Feldman proud and/or envious. Also worthy of note were the steamed hot dogs Mabel served up for post-work consumption. I had at least six, sans buns, of course.

Next Sunday's TM outing: Pu'u o Kila in Kahana Valley. Meeting time is 8 a.m. in the parking lot on the mauka side of Kam Hwy across from Kahana Beach Park. Come on down if you can.