Today was one of those unexpected surprises. You know the ones you get when you think it's all over and then the most beautiful surprise happens to you. Our flight was two hours later than Misti and James' so after sending them to the airport, we decided to just drive around to the closest beach on the map - Mo'omomi beach. We were also eager to get there because it was on the northwest side of the island - the only part of the island we hadn't explored. There wasn't even a paved road there so we went off-roading. Something we'd wanted to do since we rented our Jeep Cherokee. So off we went. Yee-ha! We discovered that the most beautiful places on this island are only accessible by off-roading.
The journey there was rough. Our Jeep was put to the ultimate off roading test as we drove to a max of 5m/hr along this deeply rutted red dirt road. At times, we held out breath as we were bumped and thrown around our chairs, hoping that we wouldn't get stuck in the next deep rut. It was scary yet exciting. We never got to the beach because we ran out of time and totally underestimated the amount of time it would take us to get to it on a dirt road.
The completely untouched barren coastline left us speechless. It was like seeing a place that had not been touched or changed in 10,000 years.It's jagged rock coast jutting out into the rough seas; the raw massive lava rocks strewn all over the place, the dry stony double lined drive path; the only sign of life being patches of unkept succulents mushrooming here and there; absolutely no sign of human existence; a place in complete abandonment of luxury; beauty in its most ancient raw form. Its hard to describe. I've never been in a place that looked so uninhabitable and yet it mesmerized. I left Molokai having a huge appreciation for a simpler lifestyle. In spite of the imminent development constantly taking over all the most pristine sites around the rest of the world, perhaps Molokai can be the refuge for those who long for the days of old where the beauty of the ancient rugged natural terrains are allowed to to thrive in silence, away from destructive human existence.
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| our Jeep was covered in red dirt from hood to tire from the off roading |
We passed a bunch of tell-tale signs of the anti-development sentiment of the landowners as we passed the ranches leading to the beach.
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| No 400ft Vacant Hotels with a red X on windmills |
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| Dead birds + Fish = Broken Culture |
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| Windmill = Scam |
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| Moomomi NOT for Sale...Priceless |
Most of us in my generation are never satisfied with what we have. We are engulfed by our society's consumerism. More is always better. Usually, disregarding the older way of life as a lower standard of living. In my life, I’ve always been searching for more – more achievement, more places to go, more things to see, more money. I'm glad we made this trip out here. It made me slow down; to stop and look back; to be thankful for the simple life; for the way life used to be. And perhaps it wasn't so bad. It was good.
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