< Haleakala craterYesterday (Wednesday) we drove round to the south west coast of Maui, south of Kihei. The road runs out where it meets the lava flows that entered Laperouse Bay around 1790. The landscape turns from beautifully manicured resort gardens to dry scrub land to bare lava clinker fields in a few miles. The lava is a a mad jumble of jagged rocks from the size of a pebble to the size of a truck. Almost nothing has yet begun to grow on it. Amazing stuff.
Then this morning we decided to drive up to the top of the Haleakala volcano field, 10,000 feet up at the highest point on Maui. The drive was arduous, with dozens of switchback/hairpin bends on a very narrow road with numerous alarming drops - rather like the Tour de France! L, who doesn't like heights, was not a happy camper. The views from the top were breathtaking, however. We've put up a photo gallery elsewhere to show some of the sights.
< Silversword (Ahinahina) at 10,000 feetUnlike the Big Island, the volcanoes on Maui haven't been active for hundreds of years, but the scenery is unearthly. Like something from Total Recall.
The first photo (above) shows a view into the Haleakala crater from near the summit.
The second photo shows a Silversword (Ahinahina), an attractive fleshy leaved down covered plant, a foot or so in diameter, that only grows at the highest parts of Haleakala. This one was at around 10,000 feet. It's making a comeback after nearly being eaten into extinction by grazing cattle.
4 comments:
I am SO jealous I can hardly SPEAK. What amazing photos, what an amazing landscape. Why is it so ruddy? It's all supposed to be grey.
Apparently it's iron oxides.
It's amazing the difference rainfall makes in the rate of vegetative growth over fresh lava.
On the Big Island's wet side, lava flows from the 1950's are indistinguishable from the surrounding vegetation.
Contrast that with Haleakala's hundreds of years old flows that are still as bare as they day they were released.
Of course, if you look closely under the ferns and ohia trees on the Big Island's slopes, you see that all the plants are growing out of nothing but rock!
The volcano ejects black and red cinders - I'm assuming that the red ones have the iron oxide.
Better not tell the Chinese that there is iron oxide there, or they'll want to buy the whole island! ;o>
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