West Side of the Big Island

Honomalino Bay

​After a rough night at sea, we decided to rest in the small beautiful anchorage of Honomalino Bay.  The water so clear you could see the bottom at 40 ft deep. We anchored in 25 ft just off shore of the black sand beach. Kelsey and I were immediately in the water, spears in hand. We stalked the coral around the lava rocks. The fish so beautiful we decided to not spear anything.  We spent two days reading, writing and swimming in this beautiful cove. This anchorage was one of the most peaceful times of our trip around the Hawaiian islands.  We had repairs that we desperately needed fixed so we left the beautiful anchorage and set out for Kona. 

Kona

We needed to get some parts fixed and apparently Kona is the place to get them. We pulled up to Honokohau small boat harbor at sunrise. The sky pink, gold, and pouring down rain, with spinner dolphins playing in the rain at the mouth of the channel. Steve and I prepared the boat to dock. Tahiti style again, it’s amazing how many different ways you can do one thing… We are slowly but surely going to experience all the ways of docking a boat I’m sure. We didn’t have a carabiner set up like the other boats had so I laid over the bow of the boat and strong a dock line through the eye of the mooring ball then Steve backed up the boat I had to leap under the dingy but onto the high ledge to tie the back end of the boat to the wall. After we were secure we laughed about it and strategized for the day. There were no slips available. Steve had been calling around for days with no luck. Steve needed to run around town to get parts and find a hydraulics man to fix the autopilot. Unfortunately, we were not technically aloud to stay tied up at the fuel dock all day. So we did anyways. Steve left, and Kelsey and I hid down below. We drew the curtains and through on some Game of Thrones. We hid down below for the majority of the day, sweating in the humidity. Finally, Steve returned with not only the fixed autopilot, but a cooler with ice! After a couple weeks of not having a fridge we were really excited about the cooler!
Steve ran off to the harbor master and found us a slip about 10 ft too small, but somewhere we could stay to make our repairs.  

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The lava flows

The lava flows was one hell of an adventure. We rented a u-haul, drove across the big island getting to the hike entrance just at sunset. The hike from the van and back is about 10 miles. Kelsey and I with preparation for this trip plus the sail over really haven't walked anywhere for the past two months. The lava flows were amazing. The ground metallic , with lava showing through the cracks. Ground was so hot it felt like it would melt your shoes. So excited we ran around trying to get as close as we could to this burning lava. Eventually, we decided that it was best to getting back on our long trek home. The last two miles our bodies aching and convincing ourselves to make it back to the van. Finally we make it to the hike entrance. Covered in ash we washed our legs off with hand sanitizer from the bathroom. We were so tired when we got back to the van at about 11 at night that we slept on the floor of the uhaul on our board bags. Waking up in the middle of the night from the wind gusts shaking the van. We were so tired and sore, but was well worth it. One of those stories you'll never forget.

The Alenuihaha Channel

The Alenuihaha Channel is the body of water that lies in between the volcano of Mauna Kea on the Big Island and the the volcano of Haleakala on Maui. This channel is considered to be one of the hardest channel crossing in the world. The trade winds accelerate around the islands and into the channel. They say the current so strong it's like the whole ocean is trying to fit through the eye of a needle. When the wind meets the current it can create standing seas. Not to mention it's also shark infested. Just the name of the Alenuihaha Channel strikes fear in the hearts of Mariners. The locals immediately head warning and lend advice and legends about the channel.  To say the least the locals and just everything you can possibly read heads warning about the channel. We waited for our weather window and safely crossed the channel.  Leaving at sunrise and making it to the other side about 11 o'clock before the Kona winds are at its strongest.  

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