3922 Steps and 5 Miles

On Saturday we hiked Stairway to Heaven and then ran in the annual Father's Day Tie and Boxers Hash. The "stairway" is a set of 3922 steel steps built into the side of the Pali that lead straight up the mountain to a lookout 2800 feet up. It was originally built by the coast guard to maintain a radio antenna on top of the mountain but fell into disrepair and was turned over to the government in 1987. In 2003 the county spent $875,000 to rebuild the staircase but because the county doesn't want the liability of a 2800 foot vertical staircase it is closed and illegal to hike the trail. The trail is guarded during the daytime to prevent hikers from climbing it so you have to arrive before the guard gets there at sunrise. There is no official access to the trailhead and in order to find it I had to solicit a map from a friend that had instructions such as "climb over the barbed wire face," "turn into the forest at the fallen down spray-painted sign," and "walk past the lead pipes then turn right to enter the bamboo forest." It felt like a map to Oz.









Ryan, one of my co-interns, went with Ariel and me. We woke up at 5am and got to the base of the stairs after hiking through the bamboo forest (400 feet beneath Highway H3 in the picture) at about 5:40.



The hike is called Stairway to Heaven because the peak is almost always hidden by the clouds. You hike right into them on your way to the summit.

As you can imagine, the views were spectacular.



Afterward we went home and took a nap before the annual Father's Day Tie and Boxers Hash, a 5 mile bushwhacking run through the same mountains.



By the time we got home the 12 steps up to our bedroom seemed more daunting than the 3922 that morning.