Wednesday, Feb 22nd, 2006 by
Andy |
3 Comments
Filed under:
Hiking,
Weather
I usually publish sunny-weather pictures on this blog, so I thought I’d show you what the rain looks like on Kaua’i. Both of these are from our lanai (covered porch), you’ll recognize the street light from the sunrise photos.
In the neighbor’s yard above, you can see the pink flower-stalks of several mango trees in bloom, the wind-tattered leaves of banana trees, and two branches of our papaya tree in the foreground. The mangos started blooming after the last big rain at the end of January, so we should have another good year for mangos if the rain keeps up another month.
After the rain stopped, I walked up the street to look at Nounou mountain (the Sleeping Giant). A few wispy clouds were still caught up there:
Notice to hikers: all trails on the east side, north shore, and in Kokee will be seriously wet and muddy for the next two weeks. With the winter rains, count on mud puddles until the end of April. During rainy periods, avoid crossing any rivers on hikes, most notably the Waimea river, Hanakapiai stream, and the Wailua river at the start of the infamous Tunnel hike.
The end of last year was very dry and January still had below average rainfall, but February is looking better with 3.3 inches (8.5 cm) at our house yesterday alone. Drought is a serious issue on a small island where surface water runs off quickly and aquifers aren’t that big. Having to water the garden to keep it green takes time and makes the water bill more expensive, so we welcome the regular rains.
The newspaper often reports on big storms, today showing a photo of Wailua falls at high volume. I always forget the waterfalls have spectacular volume for about half a day after storms, though the flood waters are all brown. However, the newspaper did get some of their numbers wrong, claiming less than two inches (5cm) of rain fell on Waialeale last year. In fact, only the month of December saw 1.67 inches (4cm) on Waialeale, its driest month on record, but its 2005 total was still 343.82 inches (8.73 meters), which is 81 percent of normal.
) plastered on many public signs around Kauai. I wondered what it was until I finally saw one of their shirts with the logo and their name. Volcom is a designer of surf, skate, and snow[board] clothes (and stickers), and from their website, I learned that they call their logo the Volcom Stone. While not really Hawaiian in inspiration, I think the angular contrasting shape echoes some of the native tapa cloth designs and revival Hawaiian tatoos that appeal to locals.
