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Moloka\u2019i, like much of Hawaii, has a problem with invasive deer. The Hawaiian Islands themselves are a case study in the fragile nature of island ecosystems \u2013 ecosystems that are particularly prone to invasive species.<\/p>\n
Deer, pigs, plants, and umpteen other non-native plants and animals have seriously altered the state of many Hawaiian islands.<\/p>\n
Of course, there are plenty of haoles (white people) on Moloka\u2019i too, which many locals see as invasive species in and of themselves. Much of the island\u2019s land on is owned by a small handful of white people.<\/p>\n
My (white) friends, Bart and his girlfriend Al, were working for one of these white-owned ranches on Moloka\u2019i when they invited me to visit them for a week.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Moloka\u2019i offers the illusion of paradise, but wildness is its true foundation. The temperature is often comfortable, but the sun beats down with a fierce intensity. The sea is blue, but the waves pound with a ferocity I haven\u2019t encountered elsewhere<\/a>. They land on rocks and reef breaks.<\/p>\n The remaining population of the US leper colony<\/a> lives on a spit beneath the world\u2019s highest sea cliffs.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I grew up body-surfing in North Carolina and there are many places left that I have yet\u00a0to surf. However, I will be surprised if I ever surf waves as heavy as those in Hawaii.<\/p>\n Bart warned me about the waves. I am a strong swimmer<\/a> and doubted him, but he was right.<\/p>\n The waves in Hawaii have a longer period than most\u2013 they are drawn out more, meaning there is more space in between each one. This allows the waves to build up momentum, and they land heavily.<\/p>\n We surfed my first day on Moloka\u2019i; we surfed almost every day. The surfing was amazing, but certainly not the relatively carefree experience I knew from home.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n On a Saturday, we drove an hour and a half out to the western side of the island. Humpback whales breached in between us and O\u2019ahu. Sharks swam somewhere in the blue.<\/p>\n Getting past the first break was a challenge. The waves were so steep. And when they landed on you, it felt like someone dropping a weight on you.<\/p>\n It knocked you down.<\/p>\n The waves were so steep and heavy that you just couldn\u2019t get caught in the break. And they landed on variety of rocks and sand.<\/p>\n It pummeled you, it exhausted you.<\/p>\n When we took surfing breaks, we went for long rock scrambles up and down the coast.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Towards the end of the day we drove back to attend a charity dinner.<\/p>\n I rode shotgun and had turned to tell Bart something when<\/p>\n A buck, aimed like a missile, broke its neck and the windshield of our truck.<\/p>\n Trucks are a precious commodity on a small island like Moloka\u2019i \u2013 you can sell one for much more than you could get on the mainland.<\/p>\n Bart’s truck was ruined for resale.<\/p>\n Meat is a precious commodity too, but we were too shaken to stop and grab the meat \u2013 something others teased us about it when they heard the story.<\/p>\n We bailed on dinner.<\/p>\n Later that night, Bart told stories of living out there, on the agricultural edge of the jungle.<\/p>\n I remembered sitting in a bar in Hope, Alaska, with a friend who is gone now, and hearing locals tell me stories from the North Slope<\/a>.<\/p>\n Bart mentioned that even after living on the island for a year, he and Al hadn\u2019t truly been accepted by the local population. It seems to happen only if you marry a local.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I hacked and hacked and cut and finally destroyed a tiny patch of invasive jungle. The machete slashed through vines, but fewer\u00a0over\u00a0time. Bart\u2019s dog Koa kept trying to jump ahead of our flashing machetes.<\/p>\n We had gone for a walk up into the mountains. Our road had morphed into a pig trail. After 300 yards of clearing, we ran into a cliff and paused for lunch.<\/p>\n The creeping fog carried cold with it.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Bart says that people in this particular community don\u2019t believe in buying things that come from the earth. It\u2019s more of a bartering and giving system, where a lot of meat is exchanged for vegetables or fruits.<\/p>\n Two guys had caught a tuna. They planned to fly out the next day, so we cooked it up and had a party.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I walked down a spider choked path (Moloka\u2019i has a truly astounding number of spiders, all non-venomous) to the beach. Hump-backed whales breached and frothed between us and Maui.<\/p>\n The snorkeling was fine- lots of fish, but lots of bleaching too.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Bart\u2019s friend Trent showed up not too long after me. Bart and Trent knew each other from sailing across the Pacific, and I had once spent a week with Bart at Trent\u2019s house in Mission Beach, surfing.<\/p>\n We celebrate Trent\u2019s arrival by surfing all day. Point breaks, reef breaks, back to point breaks. I tried my best to be brave and keep up.<\/p>\n I followed their surfing advice and finally saw why some of my friends think surfing is better than kayaking. When a wave puts you down gently, it\u2019s a pretty great feeling.<\/p>\n I also spent a lot of time underwater \u2013 including a few times that I was pretty ready to surface, but couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Some of the simple amenities of the ranch were pretty astonishing. An outdoor shower overlooked flowering trees to views of Maui across the straight.<\/p>\n A truly tropical array of birds would wake us at dawn each morning.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n On our last full day, Bart and I walked up some few thousand vertical feet into the cloud forest. We started at a heiau \u2013 a sacred temple.<\/p>\n Apparently, pre-contact, island natives would carry stones up and over the ridiculously steep precipice from the beach to the temple (part of the same formation as the world\u2019s tallest sea cliffs).<\/p>\n It was pretty astonishing to leave our place of relatively little rain and reach one of constant precipitation\u00a0with a relatively short walk.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>