After the Sacred Falls incident in 1999, the state took a look at all their trails and discovered that Ma’akua Gulch posed the same hazards as Sacred Falls. The state indefinitely closed Ma’akua Gulch soon thereafter. Ma’akua Gulch has been closed ever since, sort of.
Ma’akua Gulch is located in the town of Hau’ula. In fact, if you drive on Kamehameha Hwy and see the Hau’ula sign, make a left and take the Homestead road to its terminus and you’ll be there near the trailhead.
Joining me was Merv. Our original plan was to do Waiahole Uka. But when I met Merv at the trailhead, it was pouring which immediately changed our plans, so we decided to do Ma’akua Gulch. Furthermore, it is not a good idea to do a gulch hike in the rain, but we took the risk. There was no flash flood in effect, yet.
I drove us to the Hau’ula-Papali trailhead on Hau’ula Homestead Road and the rains decided to stop. We got out of the car and took the paved road passing the Hau’ula and Papali trailheads. The Papali trailhead is deceiving because the sign says Ma’akua Ridge. The Papali trail starts higher on the mountain as I found out in July when the kids and I did the hike. I guess the actual Ma’akua Ridge starts at the sign, but Merv and I continued on the road further up until we hit some sort of water station.
There are signs there warning hikers that the trail is closed. We passed those signs and the water station to gain access to the trailhead. The initial part of the trail is well groomed, just like Hau’ula and Papali trails. There were also ribbons to assist. I wondered if they really closed the hike as it is apparent that people hike here all the time.
We walked in and out of a dry stream bed. The trail eventually meets up with Ma’akua stream and the real hiking begins. It would be a good idea to wear micro-spikes at this point for rock hopping. We lost the trail multiple times and had to rock hop in the gulch. Merv and I agreed it would be better to go through the gulch rather than spend all the time trying to find the trail. However, there are ribbons that appear once in a while.
Further progress upstream was unbelievable. The walls start to close in. We were rock hopping through a narrow gorge. This went on for a while and the trail is now only through the gulch. With each step the gorge seemed to become narrower. Just then it started to pour really hard. Merv and I contemplated turning around, but we created another rule. We would wait 10 minutes; if the rains continued then we would turn around. Low and behold after 10 minutes, the rains stopped and we continued on. However, at this time, the water level rose, we would monitor the water level throughout. When the gorge took an obvious right, all these waterfall chutes started to go off, it was amazing!
Eventually, we hit a small waterfall. We had to go through waist high water while all at the same time bouldering the right walls of the gorge. We scrambled our way to a deep pool. By this time the gorge narrowed to about 5 feet wide, with 1000 foot vertical walls on each side. It is fucking amazing and fucking dangerous because any debris that comes falling down during in this section is automatic disaster. Merv and I tried our bouldering skills and made our way traversing rocks provided by the steep canyon walls to a deep swimming area. I guess we could have swum, but our gear would get wet, cameras and electronic devices would have been destroyed.
We made our way to the swimming hole and a 25 foot waterfall was gushing. It looked doable to climb and there was a rope. But the falls spilled so hard that the water boiled. It would be a bitch to be trapped under there, I know I would panic. Merv and I decided that this would be a terminus, which is also the HTMC terminus as well. We were both cold, after 5 minutes I had enough and asked Merv if we could leave. I was too damn cold; I must have been traumatized from the Aiea to Waimano overnighter done last month.
While going back, the waterfall chutes were going off! We took a few pictures all the while admiring the thin striped falls spilling from the steep walls. Going back took a little over two hours. We started looking for a place to eat. It was about 2 pm. While driving, we agreed on the Waiahole Poi Factory (closes at 3 pm). We ordered two combos and decided to split the main dishes. Good idea Marvin! The squid luau was excellent.
I would definitely do Ma’akua again. Next time, if we have a waterproof pouch, I would definitely try climbing the waterfall. It is doable and if we leave the gear at the base and just carry up the camera, there are definitely more waterfalls up there.