Mal's Experiences : September's Hikes!

I did so many hikes in September I basically lived outside. And now that Ava is on the island I want to show her all the beautiful places and explore them with her! We went to Dead Man's catwalk one afternoon with Stacy, Sam, Aysia, and Kadee. And it was deathly hot. I don't think I have ever sweated as much as I did on this hike. It was dry, hot, and muggy. Also, this hike is illegal and we didn't want to get caught by any neighbors or anything so we hiked around the mountain to get to the top. We were hiking through prickly thorns and dried-up bushes. We drank all our water in the first 30 minutes. There are several lookout points from this hike so were able to see Diamond Head at one point and the East side! I mean look at the color of that water? On the way down we saw a chameleon in a tree. Look how cute?! We all took turns holding and playing with him. What a cutie!

I'm guessing this hike is called Dead Man's Cat Walk because you could easily walk off the cliff and die. We didn't however. Since it was so hot Aysia and I rode in the back of Sams's truck on the way home.

We hiked to Sacred Falls for Ava's 19th Birthday! We went after work and got back just as the sun was setting. We had a huge crowd come to celebrate Ava. Ava is everything good in the world. I have pushed her out of her comfort zone and she is doing it all with a great attitude! As we were hiking on the trail we passed a local family who just killed a pig. They were dragging it back to eat I guess. It was all bloody and covered in bugs. One of the kids was sitting on it while the family was pulling it. Ava hates dead things. I think I saw her gagging in the corner. Besides the rotten pig, I would say our hike to Sacred Falls was pretty grand. One other story about Ava. One day we were driving to Laie and we saw a tortoise on the side of the road. He was crawling right towards traffic and I knew he would get hit if he walked just a little bit further. So I pulled over and picked him up. I wasn't sure what to do with him so Ava Facetimed Sam. He told us to put him in the back of the car and drive him home till we found the owner. We were laughing so hard. We put it in the yard and told Laurie and Hank about it. Next thing we know Hank is in the hard spraying him off with the hose. We about lost it in laughter. The kids at the preschool sure loved watching him while they were playing at recess. I was pretty sad when the owner came to grab him.

We went on another campout one weekend in September! We decided on the Sunset Pillbox! That way we could wake up to a beautiful sunrise. We left when it was pitch black so were all scrambling up the hill in the dark. Stacy brought her outdoor movie projector. We watched a scary movie that night under the stars. We woke up the next morning to thousands of ants circling us. We left out our strawberry belts out...

We headed up to Sunset Pill Box later that week to actually watch the sunset! We had Sarah and Anna join us who we met a few days earlier at a waffle party. This was one of their first hikes on Oahu! I always love watching people experience the beauty of Oahu for the first time. They are hilarious twins who get along with Ava and me really well. I swear we had the same childhood! Gavin also tagged along. We met him on Sunday at a spaghetti Come Follow Me Night he hosted. He was a trooper to sit in the car with a bunch of girls! We had to get a picture of our Chacos because that's why we originally went hiking in the first place. I saw them on his porch and said let's hike in our Chacos!