Moto Adventure : Mauna Kea Summit
A few weeks ago I a guy that I've been meeting up with and going for motorcycle rides asked if I would be up for seeing if the bikes would make it up Mauna Kea. I immediately said Yes. Since being out on this island I have always wanted to rip up the desolate landscape of Mauna Kea. Since I've owned my two Yamahas, there has been a lot of protests and drama that was to do with the TMT (Thirty Meter Telescope) Project, which unfortunately had shut down access to Mauna Kea Road. Well, that recently settled down and the gov. opened up the road again. They do have a guard that will only allow a certain amount of people up at a time etc... But we went for it.
This adventure started with a fuel up at Costco. Then we ripped through the upper highway area towards saddle road. Dan had just done a modification to his carburetor and also put some bad gas in his bike. We quickly learned after fueling up that this was going to pose a problem. The modification was an adjustable mixture screw, which allows you to adjust the mixture at a higher altitude, ultimately making his carbureted bike to make it to the wildly almost 14,000-foot summit. Off and on his bike would sputter and cut out. Causing us to stop and fiddle, shake the bike to try and mix the bad gas with the good. But to no help, it kept going. We eventually just decided to keep going, even though at certain points he had to ride slowly on the median just to keep his bike running.
The ride up was awesome. Of course, we had to stop at the visitor's center for about 30 minutes to get acclimated for the altitude. Dan showed me some off-road trails on a map that he had been on. Makes me want to get a dirtbike. Once we got clearance from the guard to go up we were on our way. He did take our license plates down for some reason. Maybe just incase we go plummeting to our demise off the side of the gravel road. My FZ8 has quite a bit of torque, so on the dirt road, I felt like a rally racer. The rear end was swinging out from each side and throwing up a plume of dirt and rocks. If I remember right, the last time I was up to the summit of Mauna Kea was in 2016 when I had my Honda CRV.
This was the perfect day to go on this adventure. Open, Clear blue sky. Nobody on the road, and nobody at the observatory. Here are some pictures. Video to come soon.
Moto Adventure: Pink Moon 2020
Camera Update
After a few months without a camera I decided to make some moves. Here's a little story and update about my camera situation.
Arrow Ahead?
I've been thinking a lot about what Arrow Ahead is...
After years of having the concept come to mind, the experience gained in life, losses/gains... what is it all about? What is the vision? What does it stand for? What do I stand for?
If God really gave me this vision for a platform or message, what am I doing with it. How is it pushing forward? And in all reality, I've realized that the vision has been diluted. It has been squandered on secondary life occurrences. Materialism, human relationship, livelihood, security... and I don't want that. If this IS supposed to be some kind of platform to encourage and share a message it needs to start fresh again. I need to start fresh again.
Sometimes we are given a path and the enemy comes to obstruct the path by placing a stumbling block in between. I've realized how many stumbling blocks are placed in an individuals life. How many people struggle with distraction, destruction, hurt, even personal sabotage... But in the end God uses it for the greater good for the purpose he has set out.
I don't exactly know what's coming and in reality no body really does. But there is always a hope. A hope that the little deeds accomplished, even as futile and painful as it seems. Those seeds will grow and bare fruit. All flowers in time bend towards the Son.
Setting goals is an important part of moving forward in life. I've realized that some of my goals have been accomplished with little documentation. That needs to change. My new goal is to document as much as possible with each project that I am working on and share it. So from here on out I'm going to do my best to keep this site updated with what is taking place whether it is through video, writing or just a picture.
Here's to fresh starts
1st Anniversary : Video
This took a little longer than I had hoped, But I finally got it done over the weekend. I recorded a song called "Why?" Acoustically and clashed the footage from out South Point trip to it.
The full song will be available soon on sound cloud to listen to.
1st Year Anniversary
May 11th, 2019. Was our first year of marriage completed. There has been a a lot of great moments, plans made, goals reached and most of all dreams achieved and future dreams written down. Over the weekend we celebrated by packing up our F150, otherwise known as the "Big Blue B-52" and headed South for some grand adventures on the ocean. All the way down at SouthPoint near the town of Naalehu, we found refuge on a 60 foot cliffside. The roaring ocean waves beneath and awesome swaying silver and gold grass in the sun all around us.
With our large three man kayak on top of the truck rack we were able to get some paddling in and see some cool sites from the ocean. We even saw a shark or two not too far from us. One of the huge accomplishments for Annika was jumping off the SouthPoint cliffs, which are about 50 feet high to the water. She finally took the leap, and she loved it. We setup camp in the truck bed with our tent and air mattress. There is literally 0 light pollution out there and we watched the Milky Way pass over through the night. Dining in luxury with our Colman propane grill was awesome too... Nothin' like waking up and making some bacon and eggs with the rising sunlight and cool blue sea swirling around throughout the view.
Pictures Below - Video to come Soon.
Full Circle Utah : April 2019
One day the wife and I were driving back home after work and we received a FaceTime call from her parents. They seemed very excited to talk with us and see what we are up to. Their main topic of discussion was taking a trip out to Utah to visit and going skiing with the family.
A trip to Utah was not in sight at all. But an incredible offer and after some thought we called them back up and told them we would love to. A few weeks later we were on the plane for a quick weekend trip in the snow.
