Huddled in the steerage of the Mauna Kea (one of the small steamers of the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company) with a score of Chinese, Japanese and Hawaiians, we left Honolulu for McGregor's Landing on the island of Maui to see the extinct volcano Haleakala. The trip was a night's journey and, as no sleeping accommodations are provided in the third-class of Hawaiian steamers, we bunked on the soft side of a coil of rope.
The ship arrived at McGregor's Landing about five o'clock in the morning and we went ashore feeling anything but rested after a most wearisome night. We made a bargain with a Chinese hack driver to carry us to Kahului, eight miles across the island. After breakfast we boarded a little narrow gauge train for Paia, a sugar plantation village a short distance up the coast on the slopes of Haleakala. We purchased a supply of provisions at the plantation store and were soon started on the twenty-mile climb to the top of the mountain. Haleakala is just over ten thousand feet in elevation and the trail to the summit ascends on an average of five hundred feet to the mile. A trip up Haleakala proved to be far from a pleasure jaunt.
The first part of our walk from Paia past the huge sugar factory lay through the great cane fields of the Maui Agricultural Company, the second largest plantation in the Hawaiian Islands. The cane was being harvested and the Japanese cutters were as busy as bees all about us.
About ten o'clock we reached the four-thousand-foot level. The cane fields began to disappear and our path wound its way among banana farms and taro patches. We helped ourselves to mangoes, papaias and guavas along the way. We ate our lunch at a Chinese store. The real climb began after midday. We left fertile fields and were soon following the trail across the middle slopes of the mountain. There were few trees and the sun shone down from a cloudless sky. Our gait was easily under the speed limit, only about two miles an hour. It was a hard stony road over which we had to travel.
As we ascended the view began to widen out on every side. We could look back over the cane fields to the Pacific and see the breakers rolling ashore. Above us towered the mountain, the summit now and again lost in a fleecy cloud. We almost forgot the hardships of the climb with such a picture before us.
Although the ascent from Paia to the top can be made in a single day, we decided to break the journey about half way, spend the night and start out refreshed for the last stretch. We stopped at Idlewilde and put up in the summer home of a Kahului friend. We made an early start. The trail was plainly marked with guide posts, each tenth of a mile. Idlewilde is eight miles by trail from the summit and the ascent from this point is over five thousand feet—seven hundred to the mile. The first three or four miles were comparatively easy, for we were fresh and the footing was good. About the fifth mile the real work began. The trail became steeper and steeper until it seemed straight up. We began to strike loose, volcanic dirt and sand. We passed the timber line and the stubby bushes with which the side of the mountain is covered afforded no protection from the sun. It was real mountain climbing—or just plain unadulterated work. The high altitude made frequent stops necessary for breathing spells. Our progress was slow. The last three miles took over three hours.
The view was magnificent. Forty miles of the Maui coast were spread out at our feet. To the south the island of Molokai loomed out of the sea. Two or three steamers were making their way through the Maui-Molokai channel towards Honolulu. The air was clear, almost Rocky Mountain clearness—an unusual condition for Hawaii.
A mile from the top we collected a large bunch of fire wood for use during the night. The wood probably weighed one hundred pounds—fifty pounds each. In a half an hour it had increased to four hundred pounds. We began to lighten our packs. We reached the summit with five pounds each. The last half mile took one hour. The air was rarefied and we had to stop every few hundred feet for breath. The trail, beside being much steeper than heretofore—if such a thing were possible—was covered with sand, causing us to slip back a foot for nearly every step we took.
Suddenly the view of the great crater burst upon us. It is a sight I shall never forget. We had reached the top of the trail and were walking along a low wall of rock towards the mountain house. We came to a break in the rock and in an instant Haleakala appeared before us.
Imagine a hole in the top of a mountain. Let this hole be twenty-seven miles around and from two to three thousand feet deep, the sides abruptly sloping. Scattered over the level floor of this hole, picture twenty extinct volcanic cones or craters, the smallest forty feet in height, the largest about a thousand. This, in brief, is Haleakala. The sight is a grand one to-day, with all the craters extinct. What must it have been a thousand years ago when, according to geologists, Haleakala was active and the great crater was one mass of flame and liquid rock?