By PETER SUR By PETER SUR ADVERTISING Tribune-Herald staff writer Mauna Loa was no cakewalk in 1794, when the first party of European explorers reached its summit. The path to the summit has shortened since then, but it hasn’t gotten
By PETER SUR
Tribune-Herald staff writer
Mauna Loa was no cakewalk in 1794, when the first party of European explorers reached its summit.
The path to the summit has shortened since then, but it hasn’t gotten any easier.
Monday, four descendants of 3rd Lt. Joseph Baker, a chartist on the Vancouver expedition who was in that initial group, reached the summit and encountered a few unexpected hurdles.
They had planned to stay at the cabins at Mauna Kea State Park, but they hadn’t realized that bookings must be made at least seven days in advance. So instead they began the journey from Puna before dawn.
On the trip were three brothers, Peter and Timothy Twiddy, both of Scotland, and Andrew Twiddy, and Andrew’s son, James Twiddy, both of Canada. They arrived at the end of the paved Mauna Loa access road at the 11,150-foot elevation, and began the long hike uphill.
Andrew Twiddy’s writeup of the trip reads like a cautionary tale for anyone considering the hike:
“Once we reached 13,000 feet, the headache started to set in for all of us, but not in a manner that affected our capacity or our determination to reach the top, so we simply treated it as collateral damage and got on with the task,” Twiddy wrote. “I found that I struggled for breath more than the others at steeper parts of the trail and at the highest elevations, so I usually became the lagging part of the convoy. …
“As we reached the lip of north pit of the crater, the trail divides, giving one the choice of a 1-mile route across the pit floor to the cabins, or making the further 2.6 miles and 600 extra feet of elevation to the summit. It was tough to believe we had a further two and a half miles to go.”
Yet they plodded on, and reached the summit.
“I paused briefly and silently to remember our family and our ancestor who had been here 218 years ago, to remember the Hawaiians who supported him, and all those Hawaiians and others who before and after him have had reason to visit this inhospitable and remote spot,” Twiddy wrote.
By this time they had fallen two hours behind the recommended time for reaching the summit on a day trip. They didn’t reach the trailhead by the time night fell. Navigating the desolate terrain by flashlight, the Twiddys took a wrong turn off the jeep trail and realized too late that they were off course. Fortunately for them, they had brought extra food and water.
“When we realized that we were running a course in a manner than appeared to be parallel to the paved observatory road, but further away from our car, we knew it would be wise to turn back, but I had little relish for upward climbing at that point,” Twiddy wrote. So the four men descended to below 10,000 feet, laid out a sleeping mat, and huddled together in the cold.
“I do not remember sleeping much or at all, but I do remember hearing the others snore, feeling the warmth of being tucked up beside each other, and feeling the cold on the tip of my nose,” he recalled.
Around 3 a.m., they resumed the hike uphill. With a bright moon lighting the trail, they were able to reach the Mauna Loa atmospheric observatory around sunrise. After a short nap to refresh, they returned to sea level around 10 a.m. Tuesday.
As Andrew Twiddy, the Anglican priest, recalled:
“For all that, it was magical to experience this mountain both by sunlight and by moonlight, I fully realize how easily one could get into a life-threatening situation at this elevation without adequate resources and preparation, and Mauna Loa, in all its vastness, commands and deserves the respect of anyone who wishes to spend time there.”
Email Peter Sur at psur@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
