HALEAKALA
As a part of a larger trip to three of the islands in the state of Hawai’i, we visited Maui and the magical, otherworldly Haleakala, National Park. Haleakala literally means “house of the sun” and it’s sunrise viewings are so popular that you need a ticketed viewing reservation to go to the summit for it. After taking a very tiny plane from Big Island to Maui, we gathered provisions and headed up, above the cloud line, to the visitors center. Once we conferred with a park ranger, we were off for our epic hiking adventure, thirteen miles through the crater, starting on the Sliding Sands Trail. This one way trail requires you hitchhike from a parking area to the summit and work your way all the way back down. After waiting and waiting in the line for a hitch, we met some new friends who we drove up to the summit and hiked with for the whole day. Through sliding sands, craggy desert, fields of gold, and mountains of ferns, the landscape of Haleakala left us all stunned!
Haleakala National Park is on the traditional and stolen land of the Ko Hawai’i Pae’aina people.
Listen while you look! These buttons will link you to the podcast episode(s) for this park and gallery.
