Hawaii 2015: Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa
Wednesday, 9 December 2015 19:57![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iguana
I was going to cover the non-Kona parts of Hawaiʻi in a single post, but looking through my photos I just can't do it! Mauna Kea and Waipio Valley deserve their own entries at the very least.
Mauna Kea
At US immigration in LAX airport, while I was having my bag searched and being asked questions about my employer who was letting me have three months on a tropical island, the officer expressed surprise that I had packed winter gear. "You won't need those!" he puzzled.
This is the view from near one of the observatories on Mauna Kea, the tallest mountain on Big Island and in Hawaii, where oxygen levels are 60% of sea level. It is cold up there!
It is also stunningly beautiful.
To get to the top you need to hire a four-wheel drive and spend several hours at the visitor centre at 3000m to aclimatise before ascending the last 1200m. There is also a walking route from the visitor centre, but we didn't get time to attempt it in the end. However, we were able to take a short detour along part of it to see the glacial lake pictured above.
We were there to see sunset and take a brief tour of the Gemini telescope, one of a handful of observatories situated near the summit. Mauna Kea has the best conditions in the northern hemisphere for telescopes.
We even got to spend some time inside the telescope building since Emily was able to arrange it through work. We saw the control room where staff spent all night monitoring equipment, and watched the giant mirror come out to play after dark. Before going outside to watch the sunset we checked our oxygen levels and had to take a few good deep breaths to get ourselves up to a less woozy 90%.
When we came back down to the visitors centre, there were also some telescopes set up - this time portable ones that visitors could have a look at. They had pointed them at Jupiter, Saturn, and the Moon. You could see the stripes on Jupiter and at least four of Saturn's moons.
At US immigration in LAX airport, while I was having my bag searched and being asked questions about my employer who was letting me have three months on a tropical island, the officer expressed surprise that I had packed winter gear. "You won't need those!" he puzzled.
This is the view from near one of the observatories on Mauna Kea, the tallest mountain on Big Island and in Hawaii, where oxygen levels are 60% of sea level. It is cold up there!
It is also stunningly beautiful.
To get to the top you need to hire a four-wheel drive and spend several hours at the visitor centre at 3000m to aclimatise before ascending the last 1200m. There is also a walking route from the visitor centre, but we didn't get time to attempt it in the end. However, we were able to take a short detour along part of it to see the glacial lake pictured above.
We were there to see sunset and take a brief tour of the Gemini telescope, one of a handful of observatories situated near the summit. Mauna Kea has the best conditions in the northern hemisphere for telescopes.
We even got to spend some time inside the telescope building since Emily was able to arrange it through work. We saw the control room where staff spent all night monitoring equipment, and watched the giant mirror come out to play after dark. Before going outside to watch the sunset we checked our oxygen levels and had to take a few good deep breaths to get ourselves up to a less woozy 90%.
When we came back down to the visitors centre, there were also some telescopes set up - this time portable ones that visitors could have a look at. They had pointed them at Jupiter, Saturn, and the Moon. You could see the stripes on Jupiter and at least four of Saturn's moons.
The Saddle Road
Between Mauna Kea and Hawaii's other big mountain, Mauna Loa, runs the Saddle Road, named for the route it takes between the two peaks. It gets up to 2000 metres high itself, and is often three lanes wide. Not the most interesting road, but the smaller highway it replaced still joins onto it part way along, running down -- and up, and down -- to the north west of the island.
You can even see a couple of the observatories from the bottom, white spheres sitting near the peak.
There are also a lot of small cinder cones, now covered in shrubbery and grass. We heard but didn't see some nēnē near one of them that we climbed to watch sunset from. We could also see the inversion point of the clouds that formed while we watched.
Between Mauna Kea and Hawaii's other big mountain, Mauna Loa, runs the Saddle Road, named for the route it takes between the two peaks. It gets up to 2000 metres high itself, and is often three lanes wide. Not the most interesting road, but the smaller highway it replaced still joins onto it part way along, running down -- and up, and down -- to the north west of the island.
You can even see a couple of the observatories from the bottom, white spheres sitting near the peak.
There are also a lot of small cinder cones, now covered in shrubbery and grass. We heard but didn't see some nēnē near one of them that we climbed to watch sunset from. We could also see the inversion point of the clouds that formed while we watched.
Mauna Loa
Mauna Loa means 'long mountain' and though it's not as tall as Mauna Kea, is more massive. It's also active, having last erupted shortly before I was born, and is expected to do so again soon.
As such it doesn't have an array of telescopes on it, but there is apparently a weather station and volcanic measuring equipment near the top.
We took a drive up Mauna Loa Road one day to see what was there. It was a really nice drive, with parts winding through forests, and other parts along raised causeways between lava fields.
At the top of the road is the beginning of a three-day round trip to the summit which I unfortunately didn't get to do, but we walked along some of it to see how it looked.
We also found a cave, which kept me happy!
Mauna Loa means 'long mountain' and though it's not as tall as Mauna Kea, is more massive. It's also active, having last erupted shortly before I was born, and is expected to do so again soon.
As such it doesn't have an array of telescopes on it, but there is apparently a weather station and volcanic measuring equipment near the top.
We took a drive up Mauna Loa Road one day to see what was there. It was a really nice drive, with parts winding through forests, and other parts along raised causeways between lava fields.
At the top of the road is the beginning of a three-day round trip to the summit which I unfortunately didn't get to do, but we walked along some of it to see how it looked.
We also found a cave, which kept me happy!
