Sad day for Hawai`i

The Hawai'i Superferry has been forced to shut down after a legal decision by the Hawai`i Supreme Court - the decision was based on arguments related to the environment. This was potentially the only alternative transport option for anyone wanting to travel between the Hawaiian islands, other than via an airline. So now the only option is to travel by air again. Can someone explain to me how that is more environmentally friendly compared to one or two large ships?

Hundreds of jobs are going to be lost and Hawai`i will once again be a state that investors and companies will want to avoid. That might be just great for those that want to return to an economy based on coconuts, pineapples and taro but this is hardly the time to shut down a company that was actually becoming successful and helping the local economy.

So what's next? Shut down the airlines? If the argument is truly about the environment then that's the obvious next step.

When will it end?

After a few "dry" days the local TV stations and the NWS have been forecasting doom and gloom again for the Big Island - another big storm is heading this way. A flood watch was issued last night and is still active although so far we've had no heavy rain at all, in fact it's been a typical British-type drizzle all afternoon and evening, and I'm used to that! I'm getting even more used to heavy and flooding rains which have been going on for weeks here and we may just get some more overnight. Just when will this cycle end?

During the last month I've spent a little time learning about photography, especially since I was given a couple of excellent digital photography books as a late Christmas present. It's really whetted my appetite although the weather just hasn't been cooperating. I'm back at the summit this weekend and was hoping to try out some of the techniques I've been attempting to learn (it's frightening how many mistakes I keep making though - this is going to be a long process) but the forecast for the summit is dire, and it's been snowing there most of the day, so there's a good chance we won't even be able to get there. I suspect I'll be posting photos from the last month here very soon, and if it goes on like this, from the last year! I think I might do a "don't do this sort of thing when taking photos" post.

Well, you learn by your mistakes I think.

Still, looking on the bright side, the weather might give me an opportunity to see if I can apply any of the knowledge I should have by now to photography of flora, but I'm getting to that age when memory starts to fail.

What was the question again?

`Io

Normally I wouldn't dream of presenting such a poor-quality and out-of-focus picture like the one below, but this is an exception so read on!

After spending the last month on vacation I tried to get back into my work routine this morning - up at 06:30 or thereabouts and then the usual stuff before heading into the office - I don't know if other people are like me, but I'm quite happy getting up at 5am on a weekend but on a workday I find it tough to wake up. Don't get me wrong either, I'm one of the lucky people who actually enjoy my job!

Anyway, just before leaving I heard a real commotion outside in the yard. The local mynah birds were making a big fuss but it wasn't the usual performance - they spend most mornings having a dancing party on my tin roof which annoys the hell out of me (and I swear they know that). This time there was real alarm in their calls. I ignored it at first but after a few minutes looked out of the window to see what was going on. I saw a couple of mynahs near the top of a tree looking very worried and fussing like nobody's business.

I finally figured out what they were looking at and was stunned to see this in the trees about 20 yards away:

It's an `Io or Hawaiian Hawk. It's endemic to Hawai`i and an endangered species. I've seen them before, but only flying around at extreme altitudes looking for prey and then only very rarely; I'd never seen one this close. I'd estimate it's length to be about 18-inches which would make it an adult.

It had caught some prey - just what, I don't know - and was starting to feed on it. It took me a minute or two and then realised I really should try and take a picture, so ran downstairs and grabbed the camera. I took a couple of very hurried photos through an extremely grubby upstairs window, hence the poor quality picture. I couldn't get the camera to focus properly and was in a rush to get any sort of shot before the bird spotted me and flew away. In fact the picture above was taken just as he or she saw me and that was that, off it went.

What a thrill though and I feel really privileged that this `Io visited my garden. It made up for all my recent whale-watching failures!

Fruitless pursuits

This has been a strange year when it comes to whale watching. February and March is usually the time the humpback whales are in my local waters just off the cliffs, but I've only seen one and that was just as I arrived at the shoreline and before I had a chance to get the camera ready. I've been hearing them at night though, so know they're still around, but even their calls are becoming rarer, after all, it's time for them to head back to the Arctic for food after breeding and giving birth around the Hawaiian Islands.

I'm going to try for the next month to see if I can take a photo of one - hopefully breaching but a fin or tail slap would do just as well - they do that in the bay around here but never when I have a camera with me...

Unfortunately my favourite whale watching spot was taken by fishermen, so not wanting to disturb them I went back to my sunrise photo spot. The site taken up by the shore-anglers is great because I can look into the bay to spot whales, but the other spot is right in the middle of the bay's shoreline, so there's a huge expanse of ocean to scan and it's easy to miss a whale on the surface. Oh well, my fellow whale watcher in the picture above gave up shortly after I took the picture and I gave up half an hour later when it started to rain.

Still, it's a wonderful place to just sit down and watch and listen to the ocean. Nothing relaxes me more.

Free car insurance?

I saw an advert on the goggle box this evening about car insurance (for my American readers, goggle box = TV and car = auto; I hope that clears things up!). I think it was made by a company called 21st Century although I might be wrong. It claimed that on average I would hope to save around $400 on my insurance bill compared to Allstate.

Allstate have also been running adverts saying that I might expect to save something like $300 on the bill compared to Geico. This sounds wonderful especially as I'm insured by Geico.

So, all I need to do now is wait for the next company (let's call it Company X) to advertise that I can expect a $300 savings on my bill compared to 21st Century and if I have my calculations right my car insurance will be free! Perhaps, though, I should wait for the next insurance firm to undercut Company X and then it sounds to me as though they'll be paying me to be insured with them.

That'll be too good a deal to miss I think.

Puna sunrise

The weather finally cleared overnight. Although the other islands are suffering from heavy rain and thunderstorms, the windward Big Island was glorious this morning, so I finally bit the bullet and got out of bed well before sunrise to take a few shots at the nearby cliffs. I've been wanting to do this for several weeks but the weather has been so poor the opportunities have been somewhat limited. So Mr Mad Guy here was on the cliffs to watch the pre-dawn sky on a Saturday morning.

This panorama is of the ocean and Puna coastline just south of Kaloli Point in Hawaiian Paradise Park. It's also one of my whale watching spots although I saw none this morning. It's coming towards the end of the whale season here in Hawai`i although there are still whales around. I saw one yesterday just as I arrived at the cliffs for sunset but it disappeared into the ocean depths before I'd got the camera out.

Looking north from my spot you can see all the new housing that has been built in the last few years. Most of these houses didn't exist when I first moved here over a decade ago. The views are wonderful, especially in the morning when the sun rises and you can really understand why people want to live here. Apparently, the housing here is relatively cheap, although I don't think so. The 0.5-acre plots of land on the cliffs are selling for $250,000 (and that's for a quick sale) and remember, that's without the house. I think my half-acre plot cost $15,000 a decade ago although I'm a few hundred yards back from the cliffs.

I would love to live in a little place like this right on the cliffs, although I'd be continually scared about a tsunami. The only thing lacking here is a beach - perhaps one day, if enough rich and retired Californians continue to move here, they'll build one! Given the economic climate these days though, that's probably not going to happen...

Congratulations to Mr and Mrs Canspice

Mr and Mrs Canspice welcomed their first baby into the world the other day. Congratulations to both parents and I hope Elizabeth has a long, healthy and happy life ahead of her. She has wonderful parents so she's off to a very good start!

Mr Canspice (Brad) has worked with us for quite a few years now, but I suspect I must take some blame for him and family living here. Brad was an intern/student of mine for a few months many, many years ago when he was still an undergraduate at a Canadian university. He wrote some fantastic code to enable those foreign astronomers (i.e., those that are not British) to reduce and analyse data from what was then a revolutionary infrared spectrometer - and it still is in many respects.

Despite being supervised by me, Brad decided to come back. Now he writes code to allow people to reduce and analyse data from several revolutionary instruments - and now he gets a wage as well! I suspect, however, that his productivity will decrease for the next few months. I'm sure everyone at work will be able to accept this, but can I now feel a little less guilty about calling the father at night when we have a technical problem at the summit knowing he's likely to be awake anyway?

No, I won't do that. I promise!

It was a dark and stormy night

An early start this morning - as usual I woke up before the alarm went off. It doesn't seem to matter what time I set the alarm to, I'll always wake up before it goes off. This morning it was set to 3:45am and I was still awake to cancel it before it went off!

Still, waking up so early is not pleasant and to make it worse, it was set at such a ridiculous time because the "treat lady" had to fly back to the mainland and her home this morning, starting on the 06:23am flight from Hilo to Honolulu. This just sucked and it gets no better over the years. I hate the days when her visits end, it's always so depressing when I arrive back home after seeing her off at the airport and it's empty again. Oh well, it's back to normal life again as well as back to work next week.

During the treat lady's visit the weather has been the worst I can remember on the Big Island. Not the most atrocious storm or worst flooding rainfall I can remember, but just weeks of wind, cold and rain and very little sun. Today, after catching up on a bit of sleep, I went to the local store to get a couple of things and heard on the radio that there was a high surf warning for the east shore (which is where I live). It turns out the warning was for the other islands but the surf was also very high here. So, on the way back I took a couple of shots in the usual place, the cliffs close to my house.

It was at around sunset so the light was poor, and being my usual stupid self, I'd taken the tripod out of my car so had to hand-hold the camera despite the long exposure times required (around 1/3 sec). Given that, I was surprised these shots came out without being blurred to hell. Unfortunately, I took what ought to be a wonderful panorama with some spectacular clouds, but since the camera was in my hands rather than on a tripod, I haven't yet been able to create a decent stitched image. Oh well, there will be more occasions...

I'll have to check to see if the sky will be clear tomorrow morning, as I think these shots would have looked really nice with the rising sun in the east. The surf should still be high tomorrow, the waves are supposed to be 10-14 feet high and that looks about right given the height of the cliffs, which are around 15-20 feet.

And now back to the cats who are wondering where their next treat is coming from...

It never rains, but it pours

Over two weeks ago I set the alarm clock for well before sunrise in the hope that I could go down to the local shoreline and take some photographs of the cliffs, ocean and rising sun. Well, since that day I haven't seen the sun again. The island, especially the windward side, has been ridiculously wet, windy and cold - at least for Hawai`i! Unfortunately, my visitor was looking forward to several weeks lying on a beach in paradise and swimming in the warm ocean, but instead has been kept out of the water by several high surf advisories and the unpleasant weather.

Still, one of the things to see in Hilo on rainy days, or even better, just after a period of heavy rainfall, is Rainbow Falls on the Wailuku River.

The waterfall is so named because on sunny mornings the cascading water and vapour forms a rainbow although there's been little chance of that lately. Still, I thought it might prove to be an interesting visit one evening to see just how powerful the falls were as the last time I was there, during last year's drought, there was barely a trickle of water. I wasn't disappointed!

Having said that, in all the trips I've made to Rainbow Falls, I've yet to spot Hina. Apparently, the moon goddess of the Polynesians lives in the cave under these falls.

The land that time forgot

Kilauea Iki Crater shot at sunset from its overlook in the Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island. The last eruption of Kilauea in this crater occurred in 1959 with some spectacular lava fountains, some of which are shown at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory site.

Although the setting sun was very bright and drowned out some details, the late-day colours were fantastic. The crater itself is in the foreground and you can still see evidence of activity under the surface by the steam vents on the crater floor. Beyond the crater you can see the current volcanic plume from the Halema`uma`u Crater at the summit of Kilauea and to the right of the setting sun is the distant yet massive Mauna Loa volcano.

I've been busy vacationing recently (and still am) hence the lack of blog activity in recent weeks, but I'm creating quite a good archive of pictures for future posts!