Explorin' the Kuamoo-Nounou Trail

I was house and dog sitting up in the Wailua Homestead which is located up Kuamoo Rd past the hauntingly dilapidated remains of the Coconut Palms Hotel and the beautiful Opaekaa Falls. The house was a block away from the Kuamoo-Nounou Trailhead which is about a half mile past Opaekaa Falls and wraps along the lower slopes of Nounou Mountain known also as the "Sleeping Giant". I woke up early stuffed the last of my Spam Musubi in my pocket and hit the trail to see what I could find. The trail starts across near the intesection of Kuamoo Rd and Melia St and goes past several homes on the left and a fenced off field to the right. I passed a couple Lilikoi vines (Yellow Passion Fruit.) and found these two Lilikoi fruits on the ground so gathered them up to eat later.



After crossing a wooden bridge the trail veered left into a thick grove of trees, ferns and all kinds of other tropical foliage and fauna. The trail was very uneven with lots of exposed roots and plenty of mosquitos looking for breakfast. When I stopped to take photos I had to move fast or get munched. I guess I walked about a mile or so up the trail which was still damp and slippery from the rain the night before when I came across a couple covered park benches that had a great veiw of Wai'ale'ale, Kalepa Ridge, Lihue Basin and the Makaleha Mountains.

I was going to turnaround at this point but something in me decide to push on further up the trail. Well I am gald I did because check this out! After rounding the bend about another quarter mile up the path I came across this giant bamboo plant.

There were several large canes about 8' long and 3" in diameter lying on the floor. I went after the big daddy that had fallen and was wedged between the bamboo and some branches in another tree. After 5 minutes of getting nowhere trying to bust it loose from the vegetative stranglehold and getting drilled by the damn mosquitos, I settled for one of the bamboo canes that was easy pickin'. I choose a fairly straight one, banged it on the ground to knock out any spiders, lizards or centipedes that might of been living in it. I stopped at the picnic area to eat my musubi and lilikoi then headed back down the trail with my bounty. The bamboo was a choice score and made a great addition to my new Tiki room back at the shop. So on this lil excursion I got two yellow passion fruits, a jumbo piece of 'boo and a nice veiw. Not bad considering it was now only 8:30 in the morn.