Kaunala Trail

Yes, we still working on the write-up from our NZ trip.  In the meantime, here is a quick post from our July 4th hike.

The Kaunala ("the plaiting") Trail was an easy walk with a promise of beautiful views of the North Shore and Waianae Mountains.  We parked near a Boy Scout Camp and walked along a dirt road, keeping the camp to our left.  We climbed over a metal gate to begin the hike. The trail took us up and down through gullies and a little-traveled four wheel-drive road built on red volcanic soil.  However, the weather turned from cloudy at the beginning of our hike to rain by the time we got to the viewpoints.  Luckily the rain held off when we were crossing muddy streams but came down when we emerged from the forest canopy.

Sadly this was highlight of our hike

The North Shore is home to two wind farms

The last portion of the hike was a one-lane, seemingly unused (pothole-free) paved road.  It's unclear whether the military or Boys Scouts actually use the road since it abruptly ends a quarter-mile past the trail head.

As usual we spotted wild orchards 

After cleaning off the mud from our legs and changing into dry clothes we stopped at the Foodland ("the Foodland" since it is the only market in the area) for a poke bowl and a beer and picnicked at Shark's Cove until the sun went down and the locals got a little too close with their fireworks and scared the bejeezus out of R one too many times.  

Since we were on the North Shore we drove by Scoop of Paradise but they were closed.  It worked out better that the ice cream shop was closed; as we drove through the middle of the island coming down the hill we were able to park on the side of the road and catch the Schofield Barracks fireworks from a distance.  We also caught the Hickam fireworks coming down H-2 and heading East on H-1. At the end of the day, even though we did not catch good views during our hike, we ended up watching three different firework shows (plus local shenanigans) and a sunset at Shark's Cove.