Fire Pau!

In the morning there were light drizzles on & off. With the relatively clear sky to the east we had some great anuenue (rainbow)! Hawaiian culture interprets the appearance of anuenue as a good omen.

A very different scene than on Sunday!

Yesterday, when we 1st deployed the "Park Closed" sign, it was after the peak of visitors to Lapakahi. Larger amounts of incoming traffic begins about 10 a.m. & goes through about 2 p.m. It peters out after that. Then the gate for incoming traffic is usually closed at 3:15 p.m. Because of the sign, the glut of visitors beginning at 10 a.m. did not happen today; we just had a trickle. But still had that same statement from tourists that they only had a couple more days of their vacation left. Auē!

Could we have made this any clearer?

I left at just after noon; I had already been there my usual 4 hours for Tuesdays. A couple hours later Dane texted; the fire chief said they would be closing up their operations at around 5 this evening. Now we are waiting to see when Parks management determines it is safe to let tourists return. Since both Tracy & I started coughing a lot & feeling stuff in our lungs after walking along the trails adjacent to the burned area, we feel they should give it a couple more days for more ash to be blown away. We shall see what happens. 

Hauʻoli lā Hānau e Jane!