Kuliouou Trail Work & New Contour Route
By dkt
Some deranged person posted some fairy-tale, knights-of-the-roundtable write-up the other day using my name. Let it be known that I have discovered and dealt with the culprit swiftly and surely, and he's now in custody at the funny farm in Kaneohe. Okay, enuff said about that.
Tomorrow's HTMC hike is Puu o Kona, which the club has often done via a middle ridge starting at Papahehi Place. However, that access is now gone as the lot owner has decided to build. In response, Wing opened a new route from the end of Kalaau Place. Today, a handful of us went back to Kuliouou to do additional work on Wing's trail and open a contour route from the middle ridge over to the west ridge.
In contrast to yesterday's rain, today was a scorcher—a great day for the beach, judging by the crowds I saw at Sandy’s and Makapuu afterward.
Refining the New Route
We began by rerouting the start to stay out of view of the last house on Kalaau. The trail now starts about 15 yards from the chain across the road, following ribbons through haole koa and along the dry Kuliouou Stream. After crossing the streambed, it climbs steadily up a spur ridge. Wing did a great job establishing the line; we spent the day chopping and clearing rocks and dead branches.
Halfway up, we cut a small side trail in a Formosan koa patch for a shaded rest area with a view. From there, the trail stays on the ridge crest, offering great breezes. We put in 2.5 hours of work on the way up and did some touch-ups on the descent.
Kuliouou Iki & The West Ridge Contour
After reaching the middle ridge crest, we rested in an ironwood grove. While Gordon took a nap, John, Jay, and I pushed on to mark a contour trail into the narrow valley between the middle and west ridges—I'll call it Kuliouou Iki (Little Kuliouou).
The trail into the valley is excellent and gently graded, but the existing path out the other side was surprisingly steep. We scouted around and found a much gentler contour out to the West Ridge crest, which we cleared and marked. Evelia and Peter joined us here after their trek to the summit.
Comments
Post a Comment