Hau’ula Loa-Papali Uka – December 29, 2012

This trail is not to be confused with the Hau’ula Loop Trail. This route is for experienced hikers only. There are some dangerous spots, however until this trail gets cleared, bushwhacking is the only way to get past this ridge.

The goal today was for Merv and I to start on Hau’ula Loop, and then veer off onto the Hau’ula Uka trail to a spot called Three Ribbons Pu’u. From there, the Hau’ula Loa trail begins. We would continue on the Hau’ula Loa ridge trail until Castle. From the Castle trail, we would go left until we hit the Castle-Papali Uka Junction. Then we would go down Papali Uka. I predicted this hike would be 8-10 hours. That would not be the case. This hike would take a total of 17 hours and 45 minutes to complete.

Since my car would have been at the trailhead for some time, I messaged fellow hiking friend Sensei if I could leave my car at his house since he lives near the Hau'ula-Papali Loop trailhead. He gave the okay and said that he would join us until Three Ribbons Pu’u.

I picked up Merv at about 6:45 am and made the long drive to Hau'ula. Sensei was waiting outside for us as we arrived at his house. We walked from Sensei’s house to Hau’ula Loop at around 8:30 am. After about 1 hour of hiking, we veered off Hau’ula Loop and onto the Hau’ula Uka trail. The Uka trail was overgrown with uluhe, but there was a good swath.

Sensei did a great job keeping up with us as we hiked up some steep hills. In a little over the two & half hour mark, we got to Three Ribbons Pu’u. The tree actually has 6 ribbons, we were on the part of the ridge where Kaipapa’u Gulch was to our right and according to Daniel, to our left was the end of Waipilopilo Gulch and where Ma’akua Gulch would come into play. After a short break at Three Ribbons, Sensei chose to go down the Waipilopilo trail leading back to Hau’ula Loop creating a loop out of his hike, while Merv and I were off to start Hau’ula Loa.

The first hour (3 ½ hours already) on Hau’ula Loa was great. There was a swath, albeit with heavy vegetation overgrowth. Then the trail pretty much ends and bushwhacking takes place. I don’t know how to explain it? Let’s just say the vegetation is bad. If you bushwhack uluhe, yeah it takes effort, but uluhe can be trampled upon. However, the other plants on the ridge aren’t forgiving, and trampling over it is not easy. Contorting your body around the strong plants or trying to step over the plant may be the only way to get by.

Merv and I took turns bushwhacking the trail. The trail eventually narrowed to no more than 2 feet wide with precipitous drops into Ma’akua Gulch on the left. For this section we tried to stay to the right side of the ridge, attempting to stay on the Kaipapa’u side. We were risking falling off. But it was better to stay on the Kaipapa’u side where the drops weren’t too precipitous. In my opinion, this was the most dangerous part of the hike. This part, not too long distance wise, took a lot mentally out of me because I had to stay focused throughout the section. It also took us a little more than one hour because of the constant bushwhacking. 

On one part of the trail, I remember pushing through vegetation, checked my backpack strap and saw my camera wasn’t attached to the strap anymore. Oh shit! I thought. So I told Merv to hold up while we looked for my camera. But with the overgrowth of the trail, it was no use. My camera was swallowed up by the ridge.

We continued on, adding insult to injury, it was a roller coaster hike, hill after hill we bushwhacked. At this point of the hike we may have been doing ¼ of a mile every 45 minutes or so (estimation). Doubt crept in my mind; I even asked Merv if we should turn around. But turning around would not be a good idea as we would have to bushwhack our way back and go over the narrow section again.  Merv and I alternated being the ox, and pushed through the heavy vegetation, inch by inch, foot by foot, that was all we were accomplishing for the time being. Merv said we were making progress. Pretty much, that is all you can hope for doing a ridge like this. At times the overgrowth was over our heads creating disorientation, we checked Merv’s gps file to see if we were staying true to his estimated track & eyeballed how wide the ridge was. If you haven't hiked on overgrown trails before, one thing you have to consider - false steps. 

Vegetation does grow on the side of the mountain making it look like the ridge is wider than it really is, especially uluhe which appears to grow on any part of the mountain. What appears to be a wide trail, is not so wide, and taking a false step can be dangerous. 

After the narrow section, the ridge became a little wider, of course with no trail in front of us. There were minor swaths here and there, probably from pigs. After about 9 ½ hours of hiking, we were nearing the Castle trail. However, darkness fell. I remember texting Sensei and my wife to say we were going to hike in the dark and that we were safe. We took out our headlamps.

I wore long socks on this hike, but that didn’t work because the uluhe rolled my socks down. The uluhe scratched my legs so bad, it bled. The pain was sore, but what the hell, I guess it's time for some gaiters? My arms also bled, maybe it's time for some long sleeves? On the other hand, Merv looked comfortable layered in clothing, but he appeared to sweat a lot. By the way, before nightfall hit, it was hot all day with little wind.

We pushed through another hour in the dark (10 ½ hours already - estimation). At this point, the ridge split, we had to make a choice. After some discussion, we chose to stay right, but encountered massive 10 ft+ of vegetation. We couldn't trample over the vegetation, so Merv crawled towards the right side of the ridge and I followed suit. We created some type of tunnel. Eventually, we hit a dead end and couldn’t penetrate the vegetation. The only choice was to head left and try to climb up some sturdy plants. Finally, after a strong effort, we got to a manageable part of the ridge where we could visually see where we were going. At about 11 ½ hours into the hike, we saw a graded trail in the dark. I yelled out, “yes, we did it”. We took a long ass break on the Castle trail. I texted Sensei  and my wife to let them know that we hit Castle; I also updated facebook, to let everyone know that we were safe.

I didn’t remember this part of the Castle trail last time I did it with HTMC. Merv said, "it was the Castle extension". Unfortunately, we lost the Castle trail in the dark. We walked down some random hill. A year ago, Merv and I would have panicked, but we stayed true to Merv’s gps, and backtracked our way onto the trail in no time. It took us over 1 hour on the Castle trail to get to the Papali Uka Junction. We didn’t even go to the waterfall lookout, like it would have mattered anyway in the pitch dark. At this point, we were most likely near the 13 hour mark.

The Papali Uka trail was beautifully maintained in the beginning. It looked like someone cleared some of it (maybe coming from Castle), and appeared like an actual trail. Papali Uka is another roller coaster, maybe not as hard and long as Manana, but similar. The trail eventually gets overgrown, mostly with uluhe, which already added to the pain I was already feeling. It started to drizzle, then rain. Not wanting to be cold and wet, I took my poncho out. I never wore a poncho before this day; it was always in my bag just in case. Today was the most opportune time to use it as feeling cold on top of an already sore body would add more misery to the situation, an experience I didn’t want to feel at the moment. On the other hand, Merv was wet, but seemed quite comfortable in his layered gear.

Last time, Merv did Papali Uka in 4 hours; he expected the same thing again. I texted Sensei and my wife that we would most likely finish the hike at 1 am. Merv and I methodically hiked on Papali Uka – hour after hour passed, until we could see the coastline. Adrenaline kicked in, and we rushed our way onto Papali Loop finishing the hike at about 1:50 am. We got to Hau’ula Homestead Road and encountered two young ladies. WTF?, I thought to myself. They were just out late; they were startled to see us coming out of the trail.

Merv and I walked to Sensei’s house, Sensei left some drinks and food for us, a great gesture! We were so hungry! I drove Merv home, but I was so tired and dehydrated that I started to hallucinate. What a crazy experience! I never hallucinated before. I saw a black cat, which turned out to be the road. I also saw people standing on the side of the road, which turned out to be road signs. Creepy experience!

This was a long hike, one of the longest ones I have ever done. I’m not going to say it was enjoyable, but what it does, it opens some doors. Doors like Kahuku, Pe’ahinai’a, Kipapa, Waialae Nui – All hikes I thought were too difficult for me to accomplish because of overgrowth, however, may not be out of the realm of possibility now because we got this one done.