Here’s a little gallery from my last two trips out to sea. During my stay at the Waikoloa village, I had extensively surfed the web for good dive and dolphin swim companies, and I made two selections based on recommendations that I could find on review websites such as Tripadvisor, and based on price and group size. Hawai’i does become expensive once you have reached certain hotel standards and want to add ocean sports activities.

So after I had left the Waikoloa village yesterday and headed down here to Kailua-Kona (where I am currently sitting by the pool of my hotel, drinking a soda and typing away on my laptop), I had reached the area of the big island of Hawai’i with the biggest number of such activities and tour operators. Most of them operate out of Honokohau harbor, which is very conveniently located three blocks up from my hotel, which came in handy for my evening and early morning check-ins at the boat dock.

Yesterday I went out with Blue Wilderness divers for a two-tank trip right next to the Kona Intl (and military) airport for a Manta dive. We had of course very high expectations, especially after our first dive trip before sunset, where everyone was just talking about previous Manta Ray encounters they had had. All the more disappointing then when getting into the water again right after sunset, racking up that courage and energy to stay warm (it does get a little chilly after a while out on the water, even in Hawai’i), doing all the prep work and sending down the light box and waiting for the Plankton to come up and just sit there as free food for the Mantas – the star of the show did not make it to the venue. This is apparently a dive sport where you can either have very numerous Mantas (they talk thirties here) – or then: None. Seems I had picked the wrong time or dive company. This is to say, because the Blue Wilderness usually operates out of other harbors and has only a few Manta dives each month, of which this should have been one. Well I guess I may have to return for another try.

At least the Drammamine medicine had worked all right and I did not yet feel seasick. This was quite important as I returned to the harbor that night only towards 9:30 pm and would have to be on the boat again by 7:30 am the next morning. So after a quick breakfast of raisin bread in my room and swallowing some more tablets, back to Honokohau. This time it was a bigger boat and a bigger party, but apparently also better experience of the company (or better luck), as we were hardly out of the harbor when we encountered the first school of dolphins. I think we are talking 200 plus here, most of them Hawai’ian bottlenose Dolphins (the regular Tursiops truncatus or “Grosser Tümmler”) but also some spinner dolphins (Stenella longirostris). This was really a blast to be in the water with them, but I must say it was incredibly hard work. Without the usual dive gear just having mask, snorkel and standard (speak: “cheap”) fins, hauling my underwater camera gear was so heavy and bulky. Also you want to get the dolphins between you and the sun, so this means 1) in the right direction (which means a lot of swimming, anticipation and hope you are in the right place when they fly past) and 2) you want to be at least at the same depth if not below the dolphins – a lot of free diving, and I got out of breath so quickly. And as a bonus, we did spot a few Mantas (I think there were three of them, but hard to tell as I was a bit far out) at their cleaning station, which is probably not quite the same as the Manta night dive would have been, but it does make up for it a bit.

This trip was a great encounter (see pix for yourself), but man was it tiring! What an experience!

This is now the third day that I am staying on the Big Island of Hawai’i and that I have a room at the incredibly big and ostentatious resort at Waikoloa. The whole thing is already a town in itself, with its own train, boat service, various towers, uncounted numbers of restaurants and pools and activities. Yet this is just one resort of many at Waikoloa, and that of course means there is also a shopping mall (two, actually), services, various golf courses etc. etc., you name it.

It would be certainly much nicer to enjoy at least two together, but for the moment I am happy reading the newspaper or my books preparing me for the NPS stint at HAVO, lying at the pool lagoon, bumping into the sea turtles that seem to enjoy the waterfall at the other end of the lagoon just as much as I do I found out (I really didn’t know they were hiding over there, I just bumped into them while approaching the artificial waterfall that the resort has running) and observing the dolphins from the dolphin quest. There is even mommy dolphin with baby dolphin.

With my HHonors vouchers that I got at checkin, I get very much by on the resort without spending much more money, which comes in handy for the moment as Hawai’i is expensive and the rental car, the fuel, the next stays and of course the dive and snorkel activities that I have booked will put me out of pocket a bit.

Driving long stretches of road alone in the car gets me thinking. In particular, I was thinking about the vast natural wonders the US in general and the Southwestern States (Arizona, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico) possess and how vast crowds come to see them. I am unsure if this is really because they are so uniquely spectacular (don’t get me wrong, they certainly are) when compared to other countries and continents or if it has also to do with the ease of traveling in the US and the many people speaking English. It seems that for Australians, New Zealanders, people from the British Isles and other English speaking countries naturally choose the US for their travels and discoveries.

This means that certain parks and natural monuments had to implement crowd control. This comprises the very well organized mandatory (Zion) or voluntary (Bryce Canyon, Yosemite etc.) free shuttle bus system to avoid that parks are being “loved to death”, as a National Geographic Magazine article once stated. But it also means that not all natural sights are freely accessible to everyone anymore. I am not sure this should be the case. I just stumbled across “The Wave” again, e.g. see Wikipedia, and how hard it is to actually be allowed to get there. There is an online lottery for which you have to pay USD 7 for each entry irrespective whether you win an entrance ticket or not, and there is a daily lucky pot of 10 admissions in the BLM bureau in Kanab (UT), which means many people drive from Page AZ the long stretch to UT everyday to try their luck. While this reduces “emission” at the sight (The Wave / Vermilion Cliffs) itself, it adds an incredible amount of “emissions” for travel and logistics. It should not be a money and effort issue in who can queue the longest to get to a unique feature of nature. I think this is not the right way to do it yet don’t have a better solution at hand right now. It just makes me feel a bit jealous as I always wanted to see The Wave but will certainly not go through this hassle. Lucky me that I found my own “small wave” at Escalante this afternoon.

… are said to provide the only true access to the vast scale of the Capitol Reef National Park and the Grand Staircase – Escalante National Monument (or GSENM for short) areas.

Guess what this is?
Solution to follow below…

So that’s why I got an AWD car with some clearance (huh?!) to navigate these backcountry roads. Most of them are gravel, fine gravel, sand or sand dunes literally, and consequently there’s a lot of dust and a little bit of rocks in between. Well, driving the backroads of Notom-Bullfrog and Burr Trail in Capitol Reef and then the Hell’s Backbone Road north of Escalante were in total more than 100 miles on dirt track and some of it (probably the “Hell” part) was a bit too much for the car – or at least for one tire.

Funnily enough, before leaving in the early morning, the information panel showed “front left tire pressure low” and after filling the rear left tire with some air the message disappeared. However, there was no indication that something could be wrong with the tires, so I happily left and cruised through the dust. After reaching Hwy 12 again and passing through Red Canyon, I wanted to stop for some more pictures and getting out of the car I heard a hissing sound – from the rear left tire. The source was quickly identified, it was clearly losing air. So no photos but speeding to the next town some 15 miles down the road in the hope of making it there before all the air made it out of the tube. I was lucky and got even an open tire center with a young boy of about 13 years running the entire shop and fixing the problem for 10 dollars in no time (let’s see for how long). Because: After locating the hole and before fixing it, a large screwdriver was used to get the hole bigger and the hissing noise louder (“now it is really leaking air!”). Then some red stuff was forced and squeezed into the tire, air added and off I went. This is my person of the day!

This is the rear window of the car!

And here’s the boy fixing the car!

So let’s try again: I am sitting in Cedar City and want to get across the mountain range to the east to reach Bryce Canyon. Yesterday I had to drive this terrible detour that led me to a place where I will be staying in five days, and it made me wonder if I really want to go there. Luckily I have a prepaid non-refundable rate so there’s not much choice. The detour was not really announced and on the webpages it said a dirt bypass would be open nights and weekends. So it wasn’t and the last 10 miles became 50 or so.

As the lady at the hotel desk thought the road should really be open at least one-way from this side and it wouldn’t cost more than 5 wasted miles if that proved untrue, I tried again. Five miles up the mountain, road closed, gate open, drive on until the next gate is really closed. Turn around and head north on I-15 again to do a wide loop.

Finally I reach Bryce around noon, and I decide to drive into it and check the sights out before using the shuttle service to the sightseeing / eclipse viewing areas closed for private traffic. All the way to Rainbow point and back is not too inspiring in plain daylight, and I almost felt a little disappointed as I was really looking forward to seeing Bryce. Getting out of the car and avoiding most of the crowds by hiking the (short) loop trail improved my feelings a little – this was not too bad after all.

It was getting late and I hadn’t eaten much other than these Wheat & Cheese biscuits and stuff, so I checked into my hopelessly overpriced and style-free motel room (demand dictates prices!), got a little rest and got ready to carry all my gear (three cameras, lenses, filters and two tripods) to the shuttle station. Only there did I realize this was not the first stop of the bus route, so buses arrived already full and hardly loaded more than 5 people at a time. This was starting to be a socializing event, and finally I made it to the visitors center where I got out of the bus to had a drink – bad choice, as I then had to get onto another bus, but this time squeezing in was surprisingly easy. Got off – like most people – at Bryce Point and headed a bit up to get a fair view of the Western horizon for the Annular Solar Eclipse. As it was still hot and sunny, everyone was cramming into the shade, and of course I found myself crouching next to two swiss people on a long-term leave: Looping all around the US. With the other travelers, e.g. from the UK and Western California, this really became a socializing event, spending four hours together observing the event and enjoying just as much all the stories told in the meantime.

Only bigger accident (I expected about half the people to become blind by staring unfiltered into the sun, but the Rangers did a great job handing out solar glasses and pamphlets explaining the situation) was that the top end of the golden plug for my remote control of the camera actually fell off (it did not break) and remained stuck in the corresponding connection inside the camera so it thought it should release all the time.

Who said that the long driving would be over? Distances stretch in Utah. I was up just after 5 am local time (Mountain Time), which would be 4 am in Pacific time so I was up really early after my drive in from the Bay Area yesterday.

Nevertheless I took the opportunity to leave real soon after and to make it for sunrise at the badlands and driving early into Zion NP – this is possible in early morning anyway, as the parking lot will be closed as it fills up, and riding into as well as throughout Zion is then possible only by Shuttle.

I was glad to park and unload my gear inside the park and then hope onto one of the small shuttles riding into Zion main canyon. I was early enough to get the first red color at the mountain flank behind the Virgin River and the drizzle at the Emerald Pools.

I did a small hike from the Pools to the Grotto, hopped back onto the shuttle to reach the furthest point in the Canyon, the temple of Sinawava and the narrows of the Virgin River. Funnily enough, it was just then that the 10 am morning hike with a Park Ranger started, and I was more than happy to join the small group to experience again first hand what would be waiting for me in Hawai’i and chat a little bit with the girl who had been working in so many National Parks as an interpretive ranger already.

The day was progressing quickly, and I left Zion to drive through the “famous” (rather annoyingly delaying) Mount Carmel tunnel and reach Kanab town and the Coral Pink Dunes State Park, which is probably left out quite a few times over the more famous and large National Parks in the US Southwest, but is just as interesting and fascinating. Take a look!

The title of this post was just a word play that came to my mind, persiflaging the Eagles song “Long road to Eden”. Not quite sure St. George UT is like eden, but arriving after 12 hours on the road sure was.

Day 1 of traveling involved the long and boring ride down to Utah from the Bay Area. I left at 6:15 am, the sun was just up. I guess this will be good for Utah sunrises given the 1 hour time zone change. The first stop at Walmart was not really helpful, there is no sensible “no contract” phone plan that allows tethering with unlimited data. 65 bucks is a bit steep, so I gave it a pass for the moment.

Driving is boring, and navigating everything at the same time also – I wish I had lane assist. Or that Subaru Outback in front of me, which would have more ground clearance and traction than my “All Wheel Drive Chevy whatever it is people mover” with 12 seats or so, and it would be much better on fuel economy 🙁

A good distraction on the road is the loop to Red Rock Canyon, where I do a bit offroading – or as much as I dare with the Chevy. Randsburg Ghost town however is rather strange, and the other Ghost town off I-15 is a cheat, with an entrance fee and busloads of people. Forget it, drive on!
This roundtrip is accompanied by Don Henley on 106.5, and the road stretches to the horizon.

Then I hit traffic on I-15 north. Skyrocketing hotel prices in Las Vegas on weekends are known, this is why I had wanted to avoid LV and go straight to St George in Utah instead (another 1.5 hours of driving). What I missed, however, is that in order to get there, you have to drive I-15 to and through Las Vegas. I tell you: I-15 North on a friday afternoon is a very bad idea!

…did not only take off, but also landed just fine. Immigration, however, is still a bit of a pain with 2 hours of queuing! Nevertheless, got a car (“some car”) and made it to my first overnight stop at Livermore before my long drive down tomorrow.

By the way, I will try to post at least a “daily photo” and “daily video” whenever possible even if I don’t write too much. These posts will not show in the frontpage in order not to clog the real messages. So check out the direct pages link above to the corresponding photo and video section!

The suitcases are checked, my hand luggage made it through security (and I did, too), and finally API is also complete at the gate. I think I am ready to go. Am I really? Excited about the solar eclipse, the National Park in Hawai’i, the diving, the driving through exciting scenery, but also it is a long period and quite a project! See you, guys…