by Casey Fukuda
The road to the top is boasted as the highest elevation gain in the shortest distance in the world. My trip meter read 39 miles from my door to the summit. I left my house at 6:25pm and arrived at the top at 7:35, one hour and 10 minutes later. About half way up, Science City glows in the distance. I was on the "yellow brick road" winding ever closer to the "City of Oz."
The switchbacks take you through every terrain and climate imaginable. At the bottom, you start out in a tropical land of lush greenery, palms, coconut trees and humid, warm temperatures. At about 2000 feet, there are beautiful proteas, bird of paradise and plumeria trees, which seem to grow wild. The temperature has dropped a few degrees, but you still feel the warmth of the tropics. At 4,000 feet, thick groves of eucalyptus crop up and dot the land. I noticed them giving off their unique smell, just like the ones in the bay area. What appears to be oak trees are also present. The hillside is lush with tall green grasses and bright red, fertile dirt occasionally showing through areas where something is not growing. A little further up the mountain, tall stands of pine trees and deer brush, mix with short hearty ground cover. The weather has turned. The sky is overcast and the temperature is cool, about 68 degrees at 5 to 6,000 feet. I drive through the clouds (fog) wondering if it will be clear higher up.
Shortly before the 7,000-foot elevation, the clouds break and a beautiful blue sky opens up above. Soon I arrive at the park entrance and headquarters. There is a parking lot there, but a couple of high-pressure sodium lamps light the building at night. There are no longer any trees, only brush on the ground. Red and dark gray volcanic rocks and boulders define the landscape. Vegetation is getting sparse. There are 11 miles to go to the summit. The switchbacks continue to zigzag along the mountainside. The tops of the clouds throw violent wisps of fog back and forth, spinning and churning up, down and around in all directions. It reminds me of those sped up video shots of cloud formations, except this wasn't a video and the very quick movement of the clouds was real time. So un-real!
At about 9,000 feet, my car is now a couple of thousand feet above the tops of the clouds. Sheer cliffs border the downhill side of the road. The ocean on both sides of the island is easily seen in a single glance. It feels like I am in a plane, soaring above the island, except I'm in my car. Now, you can only see volcanic rock. Just like the timberline in the Sierra Nevada, almost nothing grows up here. Off in the distance, a single Silver Sword plant grows out of the Martian like ground. It appears to be a short (2 feet high), round, succulent, with spear-like leaves. Upon close inspection there are silver hairs all over the plant. I'm told, the hairs reflect the intense sun allowing the plant to survive under such harsh conditions. The plant blooms a beautiful plume once after about 10 years and then dies. To me, that sounds like some prehistoric plant life cycle. It is clearly the only vegetation that lives at 10,000 feet.
The domes of Science City reflect the orange sunset. My knees feel weak and wobbly from the altitude looking down on the island. The summit parking lot sits in a small bowl. There is a flight of 60 stairs leading up to an observation building. Its hexagonal shape has large windows on five sides. From inside you have views in all but one direction. The great Haleakala Crater to the east, the big island of Hawaii to the south and the ridge of the summit bowl to the north. It's clear as a bell but the wind is blowing fiercely. The temperature outside the car is a cold 48 degrees.
I place my car in the parking lot as strategically as possible to block the wind. It' blowing a constant 15 to 20 miles per hour with gusts up to 30. Far less than ideal conditions for observing, but the sky is very clear and the stars beckon. I start to set up my scope when a tour bus pulls up a few spaces down. To my surprise, it is full of Japanese tourists. The driver starts to set up a telescope tripod. He sees me and notices that I am setting up a telescope too. Quickly, he loads up his van and moves way over to the other side of the parking lot. I feel a little strange. It would have been nice to observe with some other people, even with non-English speaking Japanese tourists, but the fact that views through my scope would have been free must have been the reason for their hasty retreat. It's better they moved. Throughout the night, their guide points to the sky with one of those "one million candle power" flashlights. He used that as his green laser pointer. Talk about a violation of a person's night vision. If this would have been a TAC observing night, he would have been lynched, or at least tossed over the edge of the precipice, but that's a different story.
As darkness comes, I finish polar aligning my rig. I look up at the "little dipper." All seven stars are easily visible, no averted vision required. As a matter of fact, I do not recognize the Polaris region. There are many 4th and 5th (maybe even dimmer) magnitude stars I don't ever remember seeing naked eye before.
My first target is comet Neat. I plug in the coordinates and slew over to Lynx. The finder view looks like a classic comet with a medium length tail. The telescope view has too much power and the only thing visible is a bright nucleus. My 9 x 50 binoculars have the best view of the comet.
The wind is really blowing my scope around. There will be no high power views that night. The 35 panoptic stays in the telescope for most of the night. I'm anxious to see the Omega Centauri cluster. What an astronomical object that is. I've said many times that I could stare at the Orion Nebula for hours. The same can be said for Omega Centauri. The depth of the view is incredible. So many individual stars take my breath away. I wish I had taken poetry in college, because my words cannot describe the view of that object from up there. Is it true that Omega Centauri is the remnants of galaxy's core whose outer stars have been devoured by our own Milky Way? Leonard T, please correct me if I am wrong.
M84, M86, M87, M88 and Markarian's Chain of galaxies are next. My scope slews to that patch of the sky between Virgo and Coma Berenices. I look up to where the telescope is pointing. The constellations all seem different. There are so many more stars it is difficult to make out the constellations as I remember them. As a matter of fact, I can't remember seeing any stars in Coma Berenices naked eye before.
The chain of galaxies, starting with M84 and M86 are quite visible. NGC4387, between M84 & 86 is visible without averted vision. I believe that galaxy is a mag 12. I know for a fact I have never seen a mag 12 object in my telescope without averted vision. I am truly amazed at the sky. Too bad the wind made high power viewing impossible. Manually slewing up the chain, I count at least 6 galaxies before I get to the bright pair NGC4435 & NGC4438. At least 5 more galaxies present themselves before I get to that small empty patch near M88. Marek showed me Markarians Chain last year at MB. That view was great. This view was unbelievable.
My next target, M51, was one of the best views all night. There was unmistakable spiral arm structure surrounding the large galaxy. With averted vision, I could make out lanes between the arms. Wow!
The rest of the evening is taken up with observations of popular eye candy. M104, NGC4565, M3, M13, M81 & M82 were their usual great selves except more so. What an evening. Comets & galaxies like you wouldn't believe.
I've given my self a new goal: Haleakala summit, clear skies, no wind and no moon. Something tells me I'll need some luck to get perfect conditions up there. But then again, maybe those conditions happen more often than I think. I sure hope so.
At about 10PM, I looked around and noticed that the few straggler cars and the Japanese tour bus had vacated the premises. I was alone in the lot. It's funny how the mind starts to work in those circumstances. I realized how lonely it was up there at 10,000 feet, on and island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I didn't get spooked, I just really missed Marek C, James T, Leonard T, Bob J, Peter M, Dennis S, Albert H, Pete S, Phil T, Phil C, Rodney H, Jeff C, Michael S, Lance B, Kevin R, Kevin S, Nick and Mei Fong and the rest of the MB regulars. One day I'll find another amateur astronomer on the island and we'll start our own group. Or maybe one of you will join me in paradise?
Posted on sf-bay-tac May 28, 2004 08:53:33 PT
Converted by report.pm 1.1 Jul 12, 2004 20:42:54 PT