Waiakeakua Pools - June 12, 2011 

I've been trying to prepare for the Waiakeakua pools for a while now. I've already found Manoa Falls, Aihualama Falls, & Naniuapo Falls in Manoa Valley.  

I headed towards Manoa Valley at 8:00 am. Trail directions to Waiakeakua are a little sketchy. It appears that the bloggers and website hosts who know where Waiakeakua is, keep it a secret. The recurring hint is Pu'u Pia. I've been to Puu Pia once already, and did not see a sub trail. I needed more clues to find the trail to Waiakeakua Falls. I looked in the Puu Pia section of Stuart Ball's book, The Hiker's Guide to Oahu and there was a clue. The topo map shows that when the Puu Pia trail takes a U turn, the Waiakeakua stream appears at the same time. Since Puu Pia is at about 500 feet of elevation, one would think that getting to Waiakeakua stream would require descending down the mountain to the valley floor. This was my plan. 1) Go onto Puu Pia 2) When the trail takes an obvious U turn look for a sub trail 3) Descend down the mountain to the valley floor 4) Follow the stream till the waterfall appears. In theory, it sounds like a good plan. 

I parked on East Manoa Road next to the cemetery just like last time. You can actually park on Alani Drive, but it would block the right lane, so it's up to you. I just don't feel comfortable doing that, but residents in the area do it. On foot, you walk up Alani Drive till it ends, and Woodlawn Drive starts. You enter the driveway of what appears to be someone's house. After the driveway, a dirt road appears and the trail starts. About 2 minutes into the trail, there are two signs. One says Puu Pia trail, the other one says Kolowalu trail. The Kolowalu trail takes you to the starting point of the Mount Olympus trail, which I did last week. I've actually seen the starting point and ending point of the Kolowalu trail, but haven't even hiked the trail yet. Funny. 

There were passing showers in Manoa, I assume as always. Everytime, I've gone hiking in Manoa, it's been raining. I purposely do that to experience the full effect of the waterfalls. I put my plan into effect. I walked onto Puu Pia for about 20 minutes and the U turn became obvious. I saw a faint trail going downhill. It looked steep, I hesitated, upon further inspection, it wasn't too bad. I started going downhill and slipped on my ass about 4 or 5 times. It was muddy as hell. I held on to branches and roots on the way down. I say the descent was at least 300 feet. It was like trying to find Kalauao Falls on the Aiea Loop trail. After slipping and sliding for about 10 minutes, I ended up at the bottom of the mountain and at Waiakeakua stream. Oh boy, the trail looks familiar. The trail appears to go left and right, that is definitely going to confuse me, so I gathered about 15 mountain apples nearby and made a pile to indicate where to ascend the mountain on the way back. I just hoped that a pig or another animal wouldn't eat the apples. There was also a faint red ribbon in the area and wooden poles to aid as indicators. 

I made my trek upstream. Boy did this trail look familiar. About 5 minutes later I saw a waterfall. Ahh, it's the unknown falls I found when doing the Naniuapo falls hike in April 2011. This trail must start on Haukulu Road. Bingo. An A-Ha moment. Excited, I increased my pace and in about 25 minutes the trail ended at a bunch of rocks. 

This must be it, I thought. There were cascading waterfalls, culminating with a 20 foot waterfall at the end. I started rock hopping. It was sort of difficult. The rocks were big, smooth, & slippery. But, with all this hiking recently, my climbing skills have gotten better. I was able to do it. I eventually worked my way to the 20 foot waterfall. From all the pictures I saw and blogs I've read, I knew there was a 50 foot waterfall above the 20 foot waterfall. I looked around for a rope.  To be continued...