Saturday, December 19, 2015

Lanikai beach -------------The most scenic beach of Oahu

Panoramic View from Lanikai Marker

Lanikai Beach

Lanikai means”heavenly sea" in the Hawaiian language. It is postcard perfect beach with crystal azure water, fine white sand and gentle breeze that keeps the temperature cool!

It is one of Hawaii’s best swimming beaches and frequently ranked among the world’s nicest beaches! In fact it was on number 8, among the list of top ten beaches in the world for the year 2014. And it was also ranked as US top beach in the same year!

Mokuluas Islands

It also boasts to be a popular photo spot and has lured many models and photographers over the years. No surprise considering the breathtaking scenery and surreal surroundings that the beach has to offer.

A bride doing her photo-shoot

Once on the Lanikai beach, you see two small islands in the sea, these are twin islands of Mokuluas located offshore on Oahu’s windward coast. They are called as ‘Na Mokulua’ which in Hawaiian means The Two Islands.


Kayakers going to Mokuluas Islands

Wind surfing at Lanikai

On any given day, schools of kayakers make the trip from either Lanikai Beach or the neighboring Kailua Beach Park, to “Mokes,” the name that the two islands are affectionately referenced to by locals.

Of the two Mokes, the northern Island i.e. the larger one is open to the public during the day, whereas the smaller or southern Island is prohibited to the public. This is because the southern strip of land in the sea is a bird reservation. So, it’s made a safe haven for all of the different and unique species of birds.

The islands can easily be reached by renting a kayak on nearby Kailua Beach and paddling about one mile (1.6 km) offshore (which takes about 45 min. to 2 hours depending on the experience of the kayaker and the ocean conditions).

Lanikai Beach is just past Kailua Beach. Take Kawailo Rd to Aalapapa Dr. Thee two major streets in Lanikai area are one way streets and form a loop. Aalapapa Dr leads into Lanikai and Mokulua Dr leads out of Lanikai. Many small streets connect these two, so it’s not difficult to navigate. Both the major streets also have bike lanes.

Sunset over the Kailua mountains

To get to Lanikai Beach find parking along Mokulua Dr or one of its many side streets. On Mokulua Dr there are many public access points to the beach.

Lanikai Marker

Lanikai Marker: There is a stone monument built at the entrance to Lanikai at the junction of Mokulua Dr. and A'alapapa Dr.

The Lanikai Monument is a simple pillar located on a narrow strip of land that is a high point next to the road; it's there to mark the boundary and entry point of the subdivision and golf course. It is still in its original location and its original design remains almost intact.

The tapered concrete base structure is 40-feet in circumference and 56 inches high. The pillar is made of concrete and stone.

The 16 foot tall pillar has a gentle taper from its 5-foot-diameter lower portion to a slightly narrower and rounded concrete top that is capped with a conical concrete cap. Two curved metal plates near the top bear the name, "Lanikai." (NPS)
Also known as Alala Point Coast Guard Marker, it was built in 1924 by the developers of the Lanikai housing subdivision on the rise overlooking the eastern end of Kailua Beach Park.

This spot is popular with locals and visitors alike because it sits adjacent to the Kailua Beach Park bike path and affords picturesque views of Kailua Bay, Mokapu Peninsula, and Popoi'a (Flat Island).

View of Kailua bay from Lanikai Marker

NGS brass survey marker #TU1072 (N 21° 23.745 W 157° 43.221) has also been placed at the base of Lanikai Marker as a benchmark (no cache).

Many years ago, this region was a windswept plain filled with native grasses and overlooked by treeless mountains. The Hawaiians called it "Ka'ohao" which means tying or joining together. (Lanikai is a nonsensical word meaning "sea heaven" created by someone unfamiliar with the Hawaiian language.) The ancient Hawaiians used the mountain tops between Alala Point (near the stone monument at the entrance to Lanikai) and Wailea Point (near Bellows) to watch for fish.

The Hill top house

The Hilltop House: This historical house is perched up on the hilltop overlooking Lanikai and Kailua Bay; offer 360 degree views. Built by Arthur and Anne Powlison in the 1920’s, this special home was constructed without removing or destroying any of the rocks. Parts of the walls, floor and furniture are the rocks. “We can truthfully say that we have not chipped, chiseled, or thrown away any of the rocks…only added a bit of compatible stone” Anne Powlison, Sharing Hilltop Living 1976. For three years during WW2, the military used this home as a training center and vantage point.
Anne Powlison was affectionately known by hundreds of children as the “Bird Lady”, visiting classrooms to teach about Hawai’is bird life, in the 1960’s. This home is now a private residence and is not open to the public for tours or visits.

Lanikai ‘Pillboxes’: One of the favorite spots for Kailuans is the view from atop Ka Iwi Ridge behind Lanikai. The short, steep hike to the “pillboxes” offers breathtaking views of the Mokulua Islands and Koolua Mountains. While it is unclear how many were actually constructed, we do know that both the Lanikai and Diamond Head pillboxes were part of the island’s defensive system. They reportedly were observation posts built between World Wars I and II, which could alert shore artillery batteries to any approaching enemy ships. Eventually they were stripped out and left abandoned by the military.

References:
http://www.kailuachamber.com/historicallandmarks
http://www.lanikaiassociation.com/history
http://www.aloha-hawaii.com/oahu/beaches/lanikai/
http://getbustours.com/blog/lanikai-beach-a-place-that-you-wont-ever-forget/

Friday, December 11, 2015

Hawaii------The rainbow capitol of the world

Rainbows are the most common, resplendent and awe-inspiring of many extraordinary displays that can be seen in the sky. Everybody seems to be in love with them, from children to old men, and only some can ignore its glory and beauty and continue with our daily grind .instead of admiring a fully developed rainbow.

It has been rightly said that “Life is like a rainbow. You need both the sun and the rain to make its colors appear.”

Indeed, rainbow will only be visible under three conditions.

1. The sun must be low in the sky.

2. The sun is at the back of the viewer.

3. There are water droplets in the sky.

The magical phenomenon of rainbow occurs when moisture and sunshine is combined in just the right combination. Rapid weather fluctuations, mixed with sudden drops in elevation from mountains (where rainclouds form and linger) to sunny beaches make rainbows a near daily occurrence in Hawaii.

The Rainbow appears in Hawaii everywhere, arching over its valleys, cliffs and beaches like welcoming beacons so frequently that it has been called as ‘Rainbow state’. They are called aneune in the native Hawaiian language. Even the Vehicle registration plates of Hawaii have a rainbow base.

Image courtesy –Getty images

These luminous, majestic and magnificent arcs spanning the Hawaiian skies so frequently owe there formation to the Islands themselves.

Rainbow as seen from Magic Island, Honolulu

The height of the mountains, the island distance from the equator and air currents, moving across the Pacific, gather moisture like a blessing or bouquet and carry it on the trade winds to offer them to the mountains (Mauna Loa, Haleakala, Waialeale) that blocks the way, forcing the moist air up into cooler elevation and condensing in the form of clouds.
There’s even a word for it: orographic, “an effect induced by the presence of mountains.”

Rainbow as seen from Magic Island, Honolulu

How falling water and sun creates rainbows is simple physics —but, in-spite of the science behind it often looks and feel like out of this world, almost like magic.
Sunlight contains all the colors of the rainbow; when it penetrates a raindrop, it bends. The raindrop creates a prism effect. Each color in that ray of light exists on a different wavelength, and bends to a different degree, so that when the light leaves the raindrop, the colors are all fanned out.
Sometimes light bends and bounces off the inside of the raindrop not once, but twice. The result is a double rainbow. Because the second bounce reverses the light waves, the colors in the outer, or secondary, rainbow are in opposite order of those in the inner, or primary, bow.
Sir Isaac Newton identified the 7 colors of the visible spectrum that together make up white light. All of which are present in a rainbow in the order red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet (the acronym or name ROY G BIV is a good way to remember these colors and their order).
Most rainbows we see will be a "primary rainbow" whereby the color red can be seen on the outer edge through to violet on the inner edge.
The sky within a primary rainbow is brighter than the sky outside of the arc. This is due to the fact that the millions of droplets needed to make a rainbow are spherical and overlap to create white light. At the edge however, these colored discs don't overlap so display their individual colors producing the rainbow arc.
A "double rainbow" is where a second, much fainter arc can be seen outside of the primary arc. This is caused by the light reflecting twice inside the water droplets. As a result of this double reflection the colors of the second arc are inverted with violet on the outer edge and red on the inner edge.

double rainbows

The dark, unlit sky between the primary arc and secondary arc is called Alexander's band, after Alexander of Aphrodisias who first described it in 200 AD.
Very rarely, light can be reflected 3 or 4 times within a water droplet which produces even fainter tertiary (third) and quaternary (fourth) rainbows in the direction of the sun.
Supernumerary Bows are one or more predominantly green, pink and purple fringes slightly inside a bright primary bow. They occur when raindrops responsible for the main rainbow are small and much uniform in size, and their numbers and spacing can change from minute to minute
A lunar rainbow or "moonbow" is a rare lunar rainbow or night time rainbow produced by light from the moon. The Moon is equally capable of producing rainbows, since all it takes to make a rainbow is a mass of water droplets and a light source. A full Moon is bright enough to have its light refracted by raindrops, just as is the case for the Sun.
However; the lunar rainbow is usually so faint that you don't see colors, since us humans’ only see colors if the light is bright enough.

Sunset Double Rainbows over Waikiki Sky

Sunset rainbows are special because the sun's rays are nearly
horizontal, so the top of the rainbow will be high in the sky. In fact, a sunset or sunrise rainbow is the widest arc you'll ever see from the ground: almost half of the full-circle rainbow can become visible, and you'll need a wide angle lens to capture it all. This means the ends of the arc are nearly vertical as they intersect the horizon.
These rainbows are also ‘red rainbows’ because, when the sun is low, the blue and green of its rays are weakened by scattering during the long journey to your eyes through Earth’s atmosphere. The red light travels through more directly.
Voila, you see a red rainbow.

A panoramic view of rainbow at Ala Moana Beach Park

There’s another difference to Hawaii’s rainbows, says Tom Birchard, a senior forecaster with the National Weather Service in Honolulu: salt.
Raindrops need a microscopic particle to form around. Scientists give that mote a grandiloquent name: “cloud condensation nucleus.” On the mainland, says Birchard, dust, car exhaust and other air pollutants serve as nuclei. “In Hawaii, the most isolated landmass in the world; there aren’t a lot of pollutants in the air. Our primary cloud condensation nuclei are salt particles lifted off the ocean’s surface.”
To see a rainbow, says Michael Nassir, an instructor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii’s Manoa campus, “You need a big curtain of rain in the air, and for you to be between that curtain and the sun. On the mainland, storms are huge, so it’s rare to be on the boundary. You’re usually inside the storm.” In Hawaii, where showers linger over the mountains, “you’re often at the boundary.”
Every rainbow is in fact a circle, but it just looks like a bow or half circle because the ground blocks our view of the bottom. Climb high enough, and we could see the whole, lovely ring.
In Hawaii, the rainbow can also be seen as symbolic of the various nationalities that have come to the Islands and mixed with the native Hawaiians, adding their own indelible imprint to Hawaii’s traditions.
The result is a true ethnic mosaic which has created one of the most unique and colorful cultures in the world. This Island penchant for perfecting combinations continues to thrive alongside a resurgence of indigenous Hawaiiana.
The rainbow has become an integral part of Hawaiian culture. The University of Hawaii basketball team, for example, is called the Rainbow Warriors, and the stunning waterfall outside of Hilo on the Big Island of Hawaii is aptly named Rainbow Falls.
Even the Hawaiian local radio station that plays Hawaiian music on line is called as Hawaiian Rainbow.com.
Hilton Hawaiian Village Resort has a Rainbow Tower, whose ocean facing front has a rainbow painting on it.

Rainbow Tower of Hilton Hawaiian Village

According to a Hawaiian legend, Kahalaopuna is known as the Rainbow Maiden, born of the divine wind and rain of Manoa Valley. Since ancient times the valley has been regarded as “the royal palace of rainbows,” where the beautiful Rainbow Maiden can be seen playing wherever the light of sun touches the misty rain.
Hawaiians have mixed views about rainbows. In such respected source books as Olelo Noeau and Nana I Ke Kumu, rainbows sometimes foretell misfortune, presage a death, or announce that a chief is journeying, watched over by the gods.
“It depends on when it happens,” says Naone, “and what the person is looking for. Many times the rainbow is a hoailona, or omen, that the ancestors or gods favor what you did or plan to do.”
Whatever the legends may be, Maya Angelou has said it so beautifully “God puts rainbows in the clouds so that each of us - in the dreariest and most dreaded moments - can see a possibility of hope”.
They remind us that even after the darkest clouds and the fiercest winds there is still beauty.

In Ireland rainbows symbolize blessings from heaven, and this is reflected in some of the wise old words from generations past. Some of the blessing quotes are:

“May you always have work for your hands to do.

May your pockets hold always a coin or two.

May the sun shine bright on your windowpane.

May the rainbow be certain to follow each rain.

May the hand of a friend always be near you.

And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.”

Another one says--May you have all the happiness, and luck that life can hold, – And at the end of your rainbows, May you find a pot of gold.

But

“Don’t miss all the colors of the rainbow,

Looking for that pot of gold.”

References:

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Sunrise in Oahu

Hawaiian Islands are known for eye catching Sunrise and Sunsets. Eye-catching sunrises and sunsets also seem to favor certain times of the year.

At sunrise or sunset, sunlight takes a much longer path through the atmosphere than during the middle part of the day. Because this lengthened path results in an increased amount of violet and blue light being scattered out of the beam by the nearly infinite number of scattering "events" that occur along the way (a process collectively known as multiple scattering), the light that reaches an observer early or late in the day is noticeably reddened. Thus, it could be said that sunsets are red because the daytime sky is blue.

And because red has the longest wavelength of any visible light, the sun is red when it’s on the horizon, where its extremely long path through the atmosphere blocks all other colors.

Some of the photos of beautiful sunrise as seen on Island of Oahu.

Sunrise as seen from the Ala Moana beach park

Sunrise as seen from Hilton Hawaiian village Pier.

The Blue Umbrellas

Blue Umbrella

The golden hour

Sunrise as seen from Magic Island

Sunrise as seen from magic Island

The Nature's color Palette

The Baobab Tree

The Baobab Tree

Baobab trees at Ala Moana Park in summer

Baobab trees at Ala Moana Park in winter

As I was settling down to my once in a week routine of browsing the magazines and books over a cup of coffee inside the local Barnes and Noble near my house in Honolulu, I heard excited chatter of children and mothers around me.

It was story telling time during the Holidays and today’s book was “The little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Seeing the crowd my curiosity was aroused, so I went and sat at the back listening to the story. As the story progressed, I was fascinated by the baobabs tree in the story.

The little prince

The baobabs are giant plants that grow on the prince’s planet. The prince tells the narrator that: They start off as tiny weeds, but if not uprooted and discarded when they are little, they firmly take root and can even cause a planet to split apart.

On a metaphorical level, the baobabs stand for unpleasant things in one’s nature – if we don’t spot them and weed them out early, they will take firm root and distort our personalities.

I have never thought of the Baobab tree as a weed or comparing it with Nazis. Looking deeper, the comparison made a lot of sense, knowing that Saint-Exupéry fought in World War II against the Nazis, and that the Nazis were still rising to power when The Little Prince was written.

Infact, I have walked past the tree essentially every day of my last 3 years in Honolulu. Ala Moana park, where I go for a walk all the time, have several baobab trees. I looked up for information about the baobab tree on the internet, and also bought a couple of books about it from the local library.

The Baobab tree in Ala Moana park

Baobab trees at Ala Moana Park

I am sharing some of the information I found, along with pictures of the trees in Ala Moana park and some from Public Domain.

Baobab is the common name for each of the nine species of tree in the genus Adansonia. (named in honor of French botanist Michel Adanson)

Other names include boab, boaboa, tabaldi, bottle tree, upside-down tree, and monkey bread tree.

Baobab trees reflect the “succeed-at-all-cost “aspect of nature's handiwork very clearly as they have evolved to survive in sun-soaked plains of Africa, Madagascar and Australia, where rainfall is a rarity. Other areas they are found are India, Ceylon, and Hawaii.

All Baobabs are deciduous trees ranging in height from 5 to 20 meters. The trunk circumference can exceed 85 feet and carbon dating indicates that they may live to be 3,000 years old.

A very fat Baobab Tree

The tree is certainly very different from any other. The trunk is smooth and shiny, not at all like the bark of other trees, and it is pinkish grey or sometimes copper coloured. When bare of leaves, the spreading branches of the Baobab look like roots sticking up into the air, rather as if it had been planted upside-down.

Sunrise over a bunch of Baobab trees in Africa

While stripping the bark from the lower trunk of most trees usually leads to their death, baobabs not only survive this common practice, but they regenerate new bark.

Baobabs are known to store up to 100.000 liters of water in their trunks – which is why elephants, eland and other animals chew the bark during dry seasons.

In areas with good rainfall, like Florida and Hawaii, the African baobab develops more foliage and retains it most of the year. The glossy, moisture-hoarding leaves are arranged in clusters composed of five leaflets that grow from the same point.

leaves of the baobab tree

An old Baobab tree can create its own ecosystem, as it supports the life of countless creatures, from the largest of mammals to the thousands of tiny creatures scurrying in and out of its crevices. Birds nest in its branches; baboons devour the fruit; bush babies and fruit bats drink the nectar and pollinate the flowers, and elephants have been known to chop down and consume a whole tree.

Flowers and Fruit

The Baobab tree has large whitish flowers which open at night. They are 6 inches in diameter and keep dangling on lengthy stems; with snow-white petals that curl back to reveal masses of more than 1600 red stamens.

A wilted flower of the tree

The flowers open at night and are mostly pollinated by bats and moths.

They bear fruits that are as unique as the tree.

The 6-inch to 10-inch-long fruits are covered with fuzz, and are hanging on long stem, which make them look like deceased rodents strung up by their tails, giving rise to another of the baobab's common names: dead rat tree.

fruit and flower of the baobab tree

The fruit, which grows up to a foot long, contains tartaric acid and vitamin C and can either be sucked, or soaked in water to make a refreshing drink.

Uses

Fiber from the bark is used to make rope, baskets, cloth, musical instrument strings, and waterproof hats. Fresh baobab leaves provide an edible vegetable similar to spinach which is also used medicinally to treat kidney and bladder disease, asthma, insect bites, and several other maladies.

The tasty and nutritious fruits and seeds of several species are sought after, while pollen from the African and Australian baobabs is mixed with water to make glue.

Cream of tartar (a cooking ingredient) was originally produced from the acidic baobab seed pulp, but is now mainly sourced as a by-product from the wine-making process.

Baobab can be used as medicine. Fruit facilitates digestion, reduces fever and improves function of nervous system.

The large trunks (the largest circumference on record is 47m) have been or are used as jails, post offices and bush pubs, amongst other creative uses.

Compounds isolated from the bark are used for the manufacture of soap, glue and rubber.

Baobab tree is also known as "tree of life" because it provides shelter, water and food and can be used for many other purposes.Baobab can survive more than 3 thousand years in the wild. In the Disney movie “”Lion King”, Rafiki and Simba often hung around the tree of life?

Unfortunately, baobab is on the list of endangered plants due to accelerated habitat loss (as a result of increased agriculture).

Legends associated with the tree

Many Africans have another story to tell. Baobab tree was unhappy with its looks from the time it was created by God. It was whiny and yelled at God all the time for being partial and making it unattractive. One day God, fed up of his baseless complaints, came back to Earth. He pulled it from the ground, turned it over, and replanted it upside down. With his mouth now buried in the ground, baobab couldn’t complain anymore.

One gigantic baobab in Zambia is said to be haunted by a ghostly python. Before the white man came, a large python lived in the hollow trunk and was worshipped by the local natives. When they prayed for rain, fine crops and good hunting, the python answered their prayers. The first white hunter shot the python and this event led to disastrous consequences. On still nights the natives claim to hear a continuous hissing sound from the old tree.

Along the Limpopo, it is believed that when a young boy is washed in water used to soak baobab bark, he will grow up into a big man. Certain tribes in the Transvaal wash baby boys in water soaked in the bark of a baobab. Then, like the tree, they will grow up mighty and strong.

Baobabs in Hawaii

In Hawaii, the first baobab tree was planted in 1891 by the first graduating class from Kamehameha Boys School. Queen Lili‘uokalani attended the graduation ceremony and watched as the 14 graduating senior boys planted the tree on the original KSB campus which surrounded the Bishop Museum.

The original Kamehameha Schools campus was where Bishop Museum stands today, and the original chapel was near Farrington High School.

On May 10, 1930 the Baobab Tree was moved to the new campus up the hill, the replanting witnessed by class of 1891 alumni at tending their Kamehameha Schools reunion.

There are other baobab trees in Hawai‘i. One of the most famous is at Queens Medical Center. Dr. William Hillebrand, Queens’s first physician and noted botanist, worked with Queen Emma to create beautiful gardens.

The tree has the status of “exceptional” meaning it has historical value or is a good example of a species.

These trees cannot be pruned, moved, or disturbed in any way without a special permit from the City and County.

Baobab trees can live up to thousands of years. People say when they die, they collapse into a heap of mushy, hairy pulp that burns, OR it turns into dust that gets blown away by the wind only to create new baobab trees!!

Children folklore on baobab

Many books have been written on baobab trees, most are children picture books.Here are few that are most common.

Tree of Life: The World of the African Baobab (Tree Tales) is written and illustrated by Barbara Bash. The baobab tree survives in a harsh environment and is leafless for most of the year. In fact, legend says that the tree was planted upside down. From this beginning, Bash relates the story the life cycle of the tree and all the creatures that depend on it. The watercolors are beautiful.

http://www.amazon.com/Tree-Life-World-African-Baobab/dp/1578050863

A lyrical, poetic, and informative look at life on the African Plain, and the lives which surround the Baobob tree. This is dialogue that begs to be read aloud - in front of a class or in front of a fire. This is text matched in magic by exquisite and realistic illustrations of wildlife and weather, seasons and survival. A book to listen to, pour over, and to read and reread.

http://www.amazon.com/Childrens-Books-Around-World-Africa/dp/1929132778/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1449020081&sr=1-1&keywords=this+is+the+tree

`A Tree Is Growing` by Arthur Dorros and illustrated by S.D. Schindler is suitable for a range of audiences. It follows an oak tree through the seasons. Along the way are interesting sidebars of other species. Did you know that baobab trees store water in their trunks and actually swell up? The paper is dark and the illustrations are not the bright primary colors associated with picture books, but are very lifelike.

http://www.amazon.com/Tree-Growing-Arthur-Dorros/dp/0590453009/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1449019958&sr=1-1&keywords=A+Tree+Is+Growing+by+Arthur+Dorros

The Golden Baobab Tree (by Nkiacha Atemnkeng)

The golden baobab tree is where village elders go to discuss traditional matters with their leader, Chief Foretia Nkengasong. It is also where children go to listen to stories. On this day, the children of Letia gather under the tree to listen to the famous storyteller, Uncle Jimi Solanke, who has come to the village at the invitation of the chief.

http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Baobab-Tree-Atemnkeng-Nkiacha/dp/1941221009/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1449020386&sr=1-1&keywords=the+golden+baobab

References:

1. Shmoop Editorial Team. (2008, November 11). The Baobabs in The Little Prince. Retrieved December 1, 2015, from http://www.shmoop.com/little-prince/baobabs-symbol.html

2. http://blogs.ksbe.edu/wifarias/files/2012/08/THE-BAOBAB-TREE.pdf

3. http://www.krugerpark.co.za/africa_baobab.html

4. http://www.theledger.com/article/20090807/COLUMNISTS/908075002?p=1&tc=pg&tc=ar

5. http://africageographic.com/blog/9-fascinating-baobab-tree-facts/

6. http://www.softschools.com/facts/plants/baobab_facts/1097/

7. http://kinooze.com/mysterious-magical-tree/

8. http://www.amazon.com/Tree-Life-World-African-Baobab/dp/1578050863

9. http://www.africabookclub.com/?shopp_product=the-golden-baobab-tree-by-nkiacha-atemnkeng

10. http://www.amazon.com/Childrens-Books-Around-World-Africa/dp/1929132778

11. http://www.amazon.com/Under-Baobab-Tree-Julie-Stiegemeyer/dp/0310725615