Hike Day

On Saturday, we went on a hike in Moanalua Valley. This is an old estate which had been passed from various owners until the state recently acquired it to maintain as a state hiking path. The early part of the path, where we hiked, was an old carriage road from the late 1800s and so the path was smooth and wide and easy for the kids to walk. All along the road there were old landscaping plants gone wild for 100 years. It was really quite beautiful walking along the old road.

There were a couple of side trails which led to where old houses had once stood. It is amazing that in 100 years time you could not see any indication other than the stairs and the fireplace hearth that there had been a house there. The jungle had reclaimed the space for its own. I especially liked the stairway that had been overgrown with bushes (below). It was kind of cool to crawl up through there and it was a little adventure for the kids.

Along the road there were also seven stone bridges crossing a small creek. From what I read online, each of the bridges were handcrafted by Italian masons in the late 1800s. The kids enjoyed throwing rocks in the small pools that remained under the bridges. In the winter, there is probably a sizeable stream running under these, but it was pretty dry when we hiked through.
We found a little side trail that went out to a nice valley overlook...
Our hiking book had said there was a petroglyph covered rock along the side of the trail. We missed it on the way out, but finally found it on the hike back. I wish I knew about it, but it is an ancient carved rock, you can see some of the figures carved on it in the pictures.

Some pretty flowers I came across, possibly wild ginger or heliconia just looking at the foliage.
Best part of all, on the way out we tried out a couple of the huge vines that hang down from the trees, turns out they are pretty strong. The kids had a fun time swinging on them, I even took a couple rides on one.

I'd love to hike further in on this trail sometime. If we take a stroller, we can get quite a bit further in on the trail without the kids wearing out. They probably hiked 2 to 2.5 miles on this one, Cole got carried quite a bit. It was definitely a fun hike.