As our time in Maui wound down, there were a few Suzanne-things that we had failed to accomplish. The morning cruise had taken care of two of them; we saw the turtles, and, on the way back to the harbor we had an escort of dolphins, so, Suzanne had another check mark on her list. The last item was driving up to the summit of Haleakala. Suzanne would have preferred a sunrise visit, but, that just never fit into our schedule. Instead, we drove up for sunset after the cruise.
The drive, much like the Road to Hana, was full of switchbacks and sharp curves. Quite a trip.
Our first stop was at the Leleiwi Overlook, 8840 feet above sea level.
The first of the Iphone panoramas; this one was on the trail to the Leleiwi Overlook, I’m looking North.
Headed further up the mountain to the Kalahuku overlook next. The summit is at 9324 ft above sea level
You can see Mauna Koa and Mauna Loa on the big island from way up here.
The second of the Iphone Panoramas from the Kalahuku Overlook.
This is the third Iphone Panorama; from the summit, elevation 10,003 ft. I’ll note that I probably dove 8 feet down at times while snorkeling, so, my delta in elevation for Thursday is about 10,011 feet.
The cloud cover really picked up today; between the weather and the ‘vog’, the volcanic hot air blowing over from the Big Island. While it would have sucked down below, it looked incredible from up here. I took a lot of video at sunset, and we’ll see how that came out later.
The sun set directly between two of the observatory buildings at the summit….I had to zoom way in for this photo
And a few pictures of the sunset over the clouds as we drove back down the mountain.
