The chart-topping runs are the ones you literally cannot run on, where your stride becomes a walk then a stupor as you ogle over your surroundings. You never really know when those are coming though.
John and I did not know. We were just happy to feel light beneath the weight of our packless backs after two days of packing 11 miles into Kalalau Beach with my moms. I was surprised my shapeless socks and Saucony Peregrines still worked for running, leadened with water and mud.
We followed Kalalau Trail back, the same one we'd hiked in on the afternoon before. Barreling waves to our left, tarp-topped camps to our right, and earthy smelling "locals" passing towards the front. Eventually, sandy beaches gave way to rounded lava rock shores. As we climbed out of the beach camp, we looked over our shoulders to the spired cliffs that buttress our home for the next two days.
The new trail veered up canyon to our right, no more than a mile from camp. We climbed up valley, passing smooth barked eucalyptus trees and bamboo forests. Mud always intermixed with ancient terraces bolstered with those rounded lava rocks, now coated with neon moss bright still beneath a thick canopy.
The only person we saw the whole outting, which ended up being around 2.5 hours, was one woman. Young, a little older than me, and far too clean to have been out there more than the morning. She definitely could not have been out during the downpour we endured in our moat-lined tents for 13 hours the night before. Her hair was wrapped in a small turban and she carried a bushel of chard in one hand.
"What are you picking?" John asked after breif casualties.
"Oh it's from the community garden. Is that where you're headed?"
We had plans to go to the "big pool" but we were next informed by this apparition to turn left at the cut guava tree after the second river crossing.
"Do you know what a guava tree is?"
I admitted no, was descriptively informed, and as we headed out of this conversation on our way, she called out, "have fun running around out there."
The left turn after the cut guava tree was inconspicuous for 50 yards, then an obvious foot path. We dipped down a few more terraces and suddenly the canopy opened up, prefaced with a sign warning tourists not to pick unripe fruit. This garden is filled with taro paddies, squashes, orachard trees, and the tickling trickling sound of irrigated water from the adjacent creek. Breathtaking and obviously maintained in the constantly growing foothills of the world's rainiest place. But the trail was not run out, so we continued its course through the garden.
We crossed the creek and followed the footpath up the slope to another terrace. This one different, huge. Most noteable were a handful of old 15 foot-diameter trees evenly dispersed around the large pad, as if delineating rooms or compartments of some ancient family's dwelling. We found ourselves tiptoeing around this old landing. We could see, if not feel, what it would be like to live here. Life here. And not just the life of modern day hippies, but ghostly life as if walking through the coleseum.
A little freaked out, we decided to start backtracking. We headed down to the creek we last crossed, but instead of crossing, followed the path up alongside the creek. It began to rain, the double rain consistent of densely vegetated landscapes. One drop from the sky, two drops from slapped plants. Our path petered out alongside a pool. The big pool? Swollen from the previous night's rain. Maybe, but probably not. We briefly strategizd under the cover of the Na Pali coast's giant bromeliads, then headed back down to seek the trail that would finally lead us to the big pool.
We crossed some creeks and terraces only vaguely familiar until we finally reached the garden. But with a sinking feeling, I creepily realized this was a different garden. This one with an orchard tree sagging from grapefruit, shading a colorful Bhuddist shrine. We had felt lost for awhile, and John had already asked if I was fucking with him, but you can't admit to being lost in a valley where all streams lead to the ocean.
All we could do was follow whatever trail we were on down. Who knows how long those little footpaths have been there. Trodenned by bare feet of history's ghosts, a labyrinth remain of an ancient civilization. Dense tropical vegetation made the place feel huge, except for the brief glimpses of humbling canyon walls through the overstory.
Down we ran, looking for anything familiar, until we passed the cut down guava tree. We passed it coming down the main trail. A complete, tidy loop. A time warp, into an 800-year-old civilization and back out into modern paradise. Gratefully it had stopped raining, and releived to know where we were again, we stopped to explore a few more terraces, then continued down the trail.
"Have fun running around out there." Was she a dream? We ran back down through the same tree tunnel, marked by its whorled branches, we had run up hours before. This time, we understood it to be an entrance.
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| The Kalalau Trail on Kaua'i is 11 miles one way, with one 2-, 0.5-, and 2-mile out and backs at miles 2, 6 and 10. Check mark them all. |
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| The trail can sometimes be hairy, especially if you catch it in the rain. .  |
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| A special time! Living carefree, all things damp. |
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| Camp! |
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| The waves were straight from my reoccuring nightmares of shores sloped so steeply, waves would suck you out and toss you up before you realized where the sand went. Except it was heaven. "The most random wave pool," our camp neighbours Neil and Chelsea called it. |
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| I only heard one account of flesh-eating bacteria in the water. Skin dips so worth it. |
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| Boardrun on the impressively extensive boardwalks in the Alakai Swamp, located on the flat-topped ridge 4,000 + feet above Kalalau Valey. 8.2 miles that day, plus 4 hours of waiting in the windy sun for my mas to do the same hike. It would only be appropriate that John and I get our most epically dehydrated a stone's throw away from the wettest place in the world, depending on the year. |
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| The understory at the Alakai Swamp. |
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| From tallest to shortest: John, me, MK and Vicky. They are though mamas. |
