Vog & Pork over the Pali

Back in the late 1700s, the Pali lookout was the site of a gruesome battle in Hawaiian history. During the battle, Kamehameha's forces pushed their opponents up the cliff until hundreds fell off the ledge to their deaths. Some believe that the vog (volcanic fog) that has been so problematic recently (causing shortness of breath, migraines, etc.) is really the angry spirits of natives that were forced to jump off the mountain.

The first road through the area was built in the mid-1800s, and was was used as the main road to get over the mountains into Honolulu until the new highway was constructed in the 20th century.

The old Pali road is one of our favorite hikes; it's now a derelict, overgrown wreck winding around the mountain, though there are places where you can still see the guardrails and original cobblestones. As you can imagine, lots of ghost stories are associated with the abandoned road that leads to the Pali lookout.



One is that you should never carry pork over the Pali. If you try to take pork or any other pig product over the mountains terrible things have been known to happen (i.e. brakes on cars stop working, the road becomes slippery and dangerous). Sometimes when we hike with Paddy I get nervous because she can look rather piggish to the untrained eye.

The warning not to carry pork over the pali seems especially strange because the mountains are overrun with wild pigs. In fact, the last time we hiked the road I ran into such a pig. Upon meeting each other the pig and I had the same reaction: we squealed loudly and ran in the other direction.

Anyway, there's really no point to this blog post. I just wanted to share that picture of vog on Old Pali Road.