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View From Here - Hawaii Travel Blog - Hiking & Land Activities

Total Number of Entries - 60

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The Magical, Mystical World of the Alakai Swamp

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Thu 8/30/2012

Destination: Kauai

Last week, I headed to Kokee State Park on Kauai to do some hiking on the Alakai Swamp Trail at about 4,000-foot elevation. (This in order to train for my backpacking trip this Labor Day weekend through Haleakala National Park, at elevations starting at 9,740 feet.)
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Music on the Mountain

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Wed 8/22/2012

Destination: Oahu

It was only when the faint drone of a plane’s engines tapped the edges of my serenity that I realized how quiet this trail was. Just 10 miles and 20 minutes from the heart of Waikiki, Kuliouou Ridge Trail starts at the dead-end of a suburban road in Hawaii Kai. Within a half-mile on the rocky, tree-lined and switch-backing trail, I’d left the one-way streets, stoplights and pedestrian crosswalks behind. Far behind.
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Hiking Sleeping Giant. Training for Haleakala. And Michael Phelps.

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Wed 8/1/2012

Destination: Kauai, Maui

I hiked Sleeping Giant behind Kapaa last week. I’m headed to Oahu this week and hoping to squeeze in a hike. Didn't you just hike Kalalau Trail, you may be asking. What's up with all the hiking? I am actually training. But not for a sporting event. Hiking hasn't made it to the Olympics yet. (Neither has surfing, although some think it deserves a spot among the rings.)
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Hiking Kalalau Trail along Kauai's Famous Napali Coast

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Fri 7/13/2012

Destination: Kauai

I went for a hike along Kalalau Trail with friends last week, and shortly past the half-mile mark--after stopping to pose for photos with the dramatic Kee Beach as our backdrop--I looked up and caught my first glimpse of the distant Napali coastline. The cliffs stacked up like dominoes in the glaring, late afternoon sun, one after the other fading into the light. My feet stopped moving while my finger rose to point. My mouth opened and one word came out. “Look,” I said.
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Why I Chased the Transit of Venus

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Fri 6/29/2012

Destination: Kauai

June 5, 2012, started clear and sunny, as summer days do in Hawaii. Perfect for a day at the beach. Perfect for a sunburn, if you weren’t careful. And perfect for observing the planet Venus as it made its transit between the Earth and the sun. For about six-and-a-half hours, a dark spot would blemish the sun, looking like a perfect circle, no more than a freckle, really. Peering through a telescope, you might have mistaken the transit of Venus as possibly a mole on the very pregnant belly of a woman.
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Happy 99th Birthday Kilauea Lighthouse

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Fri 5/11/2012

Destination: Kauai

The 99th anniversary of Kilauea Point Lighthouse drew quite a crowd on Saturday, May 5, 2012. The weather forecast predicted a repeat of the day before: a line of marching squalls and gunmetal skies.
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A Spot of Time on Manoa Cliff Trail

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Mon 4/16/2012

Destination: Oahu

I sat in the cozy Protea Café awaiting a salad--pear and (go light on the) gorgonzola salad after a morning switch-backing Round Top Drive and hiking Manoa Cliff Trail atop Mt. Tantalus just outside Waikiki. It was another inspiring iPhone and Olloclip photography outing—an artist’s date, as Julia Cameron would call it--as well as time for contemplation. It took a mere 15 minutes to get to Mt. Tantalus from Waikiki. But the psychological distance is much greater than that.
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Birding at Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Wed 4/4/2012

Destination: Maui

Earlier this month, when I was on Maui, my rental car naturally gravitated to a familiar place for me--a national wildlife refuge. Like Kilauea, where I volunteer (on Friday afternoons, stop by some time), this one is dedicated to birds. Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge is located at the south end of the isthmus that runs between East Maui's Kihei and Wailea and West Maui's Lahaina and Kaanapali.
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Kapalua Coastal Walk

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Wed 3/28/2012

Destination: Maui

I didn’t plan it. Seriously. But I went on a bird walk in West Maui. In my defense, I thought it was a fitness walk. When will I accept that I am a birder? Am I in denial of age? Because, stereotypical or not, I always think of birders as, well, older. Or am I in denial of the feathery cute- and cuddly-ness of birds? I met Ben Auerbach at Kapalua Spa at the decent hour of 9:00 a.m. A couple from Wisconsin, a mother and daughter from Dallas, Texas and another couple from Central California joined us.
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A Hike with the Sleeping Giant Feeds Me

Kim Steutermann Rogers on Fri 2/24/2012

Destination: Kauai

I visited Sleeping Giant the other day. He snatched my breath away in nearly the first step, wrapping his paw of a hand around my heart in an instant. Almost two years have passed since I last hiked the humble mountain known as Sleeping Giant situated behind the town of Kapaa on Kauai. And it shows.
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