Forbidden Island #2

The day after Christmas, 15 hardy souls decide to visit Forbidden Island to experience the spectacular view and get in some exercise after a big Christmas meal. Besides Handy, Cutie, Giggles, and Captain Charlie, who has made advanced notice to her visiting family members about this "tough" hike, the additional hikers are nephews Henry and Sam, nieces Angela and Kelly, children Jamie, Ryan, Xin, five-year old Nuan, Chloe, Justin, and Rexplorer. At the crack of dawn, the three-car caravan head to the trail head.

With island in sight, everyone eagerly descends to get closer.

Giggles is excited after an absence of 20 years since her last visit to Forbidden Island

Rexplorer helping Chloe rope down the steep cliff, Xin looks on with some sckepticism

Kelly goes next, with no problems

Handy happily performs hikers' favorite "butt-walk" down the sandy slope, with the help of his hiking pole

Henry takes a rest on the beach

Rexplorer in teaching action, showing the different coral formations

Sunrise casting long shadows as hikers explore the shoreline for interesting findings

Chloe and fearless five-year old Nuan

Ever well prepared Cutie shielding wind and rain. Fortunately neither lasts very long

Rexplorer, Justin, Xin, and Sam in the swim hole, keeping a respectful distance from the edge

Justin, Xin, and Ryan checking out the other "swimming hole" with Rexplorer's help

Sam doing a yoga pose, CC, Giggles, Rexplorer, Kelly with Xing, Chloe, Justin, Nuan hiding behind Justin, Angela, Ryan, Jamie, and Henry. Not in picture: Handy and Cutie already part way up the hill

It is definitely a great hike for everyone. We are happy that everyone wakes up early and gets ready swiftly for our usual meeting time to start the hike. This is a must-do hike for all visitors.

Circle Hike

With most hikers still busy biking, traveling and engaging in other activities, three of us continue our Sunday hike tradition last Sunday. We choose the old stand-by circular route from our driveway since the Xterra trail has been cleared recently.

Peppy arrives at 6 am, but Chops takes the 6:15 starting time more seriously and arrives exactly then. We three take off up the potholed Savana Road. With much catching up on our various updates, we keep a good pace through the chicken farm and old Esco, down Talofofo Road. It is a cool and breezy morning so we are very comfortable even on some of the steeper hills. After beating through wet and tall grass last week, keeping our legs clean and dry now seem like a luxury. We reach Kingfisher golf course entrance quite a bit sooner than we expect. We take a short break at the base of Xterra trail and get acquainted with the barking dogs, roaming roosters, and a show-off turkey.

The Xterra trail has indeed been cleared, and judging from the amount of cuttings on the ground we can see how much it must have grown in before the clearing. Just as we come to the end of the flat pathway, we all spot a fresh lime lying in the middle of the path. As we raise our eyes, we see the beautiful kaffir tree is loaded with plump round lime fruit. We of course have to stop and pick some of this rare find. Having hiked past this tree many times over the years, this is the first time we find it fruiting.

Further up the trail, we are quite shocked to find that the trail has been eroded and rutted severely during this year's many heavy rainfalls. One section of the trail has not only dropped off precariously, nearly cutting off the trail, the remaining section is also uncomfortably undermined. We can see how the water has rushed down the side of the trail and washed off the weak section. The trail continues to show deep gouges all the way to the round-about section. It appears that some of the mountain bikers would really enjoy such a challenging trail.

We end the hike at CC's back deck to enjoy a cup of coffee. We agree that the hike is a good one to stretch out our legs and exercise our lungs.

Peppy & Chops showing off muscles

Barking dog...

Strutting rooster...

Show-off turkey...

Peppy & CC picking up limes...

Chops (aka Stretch) reaching for high branch

Peppy's pockets full of limes

Huge erotion

Relaxing with Sukha

New Caves

After two weeks of hiatus, the Sunday Hikers resume the routine last Sunday. Three "muskateers", Chops, Giggles, and Captain Charlie, take off at the Last Command Post, heading toward Banzai Cliff Trail. On the road to the cliff, the wind blows so strongly that we can barely hear ourselves talk and "gossip". But as soon as we enter the trail, we are sheltered from the wind.

As we approach the Cow Town beach, we can hear the roaring of the sea, so we detour to the beach and are rewarded with the impressive scene of massive waves rolling onto the beach. It seems to be even bigger than the ones we saw three weeks ago. 

Coming out of the Cow Town Trail, we veer up to Santa Claus Lane in search of the two caves. The entrance is easy to spot, as someone has installed a yellow ribbon next to the old red ribbon. We enter the boonie and follow the ribbons. The boonie is fairly thick and damp, and full of rocks and tree branches. so we are careful to pick our way and locate the first cave. It is very wet and slippery down there, so we only take a look at it and proceed to the next cave, which is also slippery. We will definitely bring ropes during drier days to explore both caves.

We exited back on the CowTown trail and the main road. We make a quick stop at the roadside cave to check out the old war relics and a very realistic looking "mother and child" formation of two rocks. We figure many of these rocks have tumbled down the cliff during cannon bombings, and some of them rest quite precariously on smaller rocks barely large enough to support these huge boulders.

We chat with the souvenirs salesman at LCP and see some cute stuff. 

Giant waves at Cow Town

By the second cave

Checking out the cave on Middle Road

Mother and Child rocks

Looking good...

Cute Piggy Bank for sale

The hike is not very long, but a good one to get back on our feet.