super saturday part 1: stairway to heaven

ok, this hike is amazing! i blogged about it HERE  so sorry if this is kind of a repeat. but the haiku stairs (locally referred to stairway to heaven) is a stairway located in kaneohe that goes straight up the koolau mountain range. it is the most beautiful hike i have ever done on this island, and i have done a lot of hikes. this was my third time doing this one in particular, and i am still down to do it again. the view is unbeatable and it is so peaceful. there are 3,922 steps that take you 2,800 feet up a narrow and vertical cliff. now thats a great workout! by the end our legs were shaking uncontrollably and we had sore legs for a good four days afterwards.

to enter this hike you have to park in a residential neighborhood, walk down a paved road, trek through a bamboo forest (see in last picture), walk under the freeway overpass, and then you get to the trailhead past a fence. there you will see a huge metal staircase and that is where it all begins!

at the top of the mountain there is a bunker that was used during world war two (see in first picture) to send radio signals that enabled communication to other parts of the island, but specifically to US naval submarines as far as tokyo bay in japan. after the war in the mid 1950s, the staircase was replaced with metal steps and ramps and reopened to the public, then closed again in 1987, and later reopened after being reconstructed in 2003. good history lesson (wink).

currently stairway to heaven it is not open to the public and guarded, but hiked by many on a daily basis. the state still hasn't resolved its land usage rights. so to do this hike you start before the break of dawn to watch the fog clear and sun rise. it is a beauty.