Waipio: Zig Zag Trail

On Saturday we did one of my favorite adventures of the whole trip.  We drove down into Waipio, then across the ricer, and up the zig zag trail and over a few gulches to a little pool.  It was a hard hike, very steep, very hot, but the views were amazing and the difficulty made it that much more fun.  The river was harder to cross than we thought it would be.  Slippery rocks and deeper than we thought.  Made me think of "can't go over it, can't go under it, oh no, we've got to go through it.":

But we made it across and put our shoes back on and continued:

At the bottom of the trailhead:

 Great view of Hiilawe, which appeared to be a trickle:

 It was a LOT of UP, UP, and then more UP:

At the top it flattened out considerably and we were in shade and it became a lot easier:

 For a second we were worried this was the pool:

 But we continued on and finally made it to our destination where some swam and all ate:

 What goes up, must come down. (I think I prefer up.  I got some serious blisters on the down.  Fortunately Rob was prepared with bandaids and moleskin) Clara was amazing.  She fell and hopped up over and over.  Didn't seem to mind.  She wasn't whiny at all.  Maybe it was the golden coin Papa promised her if she did the whole thing without complaining.  She earned her coin.:

 At last we were back down and it was just one more river crossing:

 Anders and I picked the easiest way which is down near the beach, slippery but not as bad.  Everyone else tried to find an easier way, but failed.  Some just gave up and swam (Clara).  Papa and Lucy really struggled to find a good spot and didn't really succeed.  While they picked their way across the boys and Clara enjoyed a nice swim.:

Excellent day!