D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
November
2008
New Mexico in an Ocean
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Imagine if you will, being somewhere in southern Grant County, standing amidst a sea of thigh-high, light-brown grass covered in seeds and swaying to a gentle breeze as you gaze over endless landscape broken by flood-made arroyos. Clumps of wild trees and scrub break up the sea.
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Now imagine that all of this is surrounded on three sides by vividly blue ocean, all the way to where the equally blue sky meets water. You now have a very tiny idea of what I experienced recently on my visit to the island of Molokai, Hawaii, a volcano-topped piece of land that measures 10 miles by 30 miles.
When my wife and our children went there, we didn't know what to expect. We knew little about Molokai, except that it offered fabulous hunting and fishing. That was exactly the same circumstance when we moved here to southern New Mexico just a little over 20 years ago. All I did know was that I didn't want to do the typical "tourista" things a person normally does when visiting our 50th state.
So I was pleasantly surprised when our 10-passenger plane flew over the west end of Molokai and I gazed down to see nothing but grown-over grassland cut by arroyos and dotted here and there with forests and two-track trails seemingly going nowhere. In two locations were tiny villages and a smattering of large estates identified by mansions and swimming pools.
The tiny plane soon landed ever so gently at an airport not so different from our own in Grant County. It was maybe three times bigger, but equally laid back and relaxed.
Our next endeavor was to rent a car and find our accommodations (Molokai Komohana B&B) for the next three days, located in one of the villages I'd spied from the air. The town, Muanaloa, is situated high on a hill overlooking everywhere else; it's about one-third the size of Hurley on a good day.
Once settling in at the first-rate B&B, I looked out from the wraparound porch to see open land all the way to the Pacific far below. Black Francolin wild game birds and strange-looking doves occasionally fed in the yard, emerging from the waist-high, light-brown sea of grass that bordered the home.
Molokai is basically two landscapes: The eastern end is dominated by the volcano that made the island and is covered in lush, green tropical forest. The west end where we stayed is arid semi-desert, dominated by a tall, flat mesa and land privately owned by Molokai Ranch Ltd, some 52,000 acres.
If you hanker for "outdoorsy" activities, this is the get-go place to be. Activities include hiking, kayaking, hunting, fishing, snorkeling, spear fishing, mountain biking, horseback riding and the famous mule-ride. This ride takes you on a very narrow trail down the world's highest sea cliffs to the famous leper colony, still in operation. By car, the highest speed limit anywhere is 45 mph; you can also rent a motor scooter to go everywhere, if that's your bag.
My wife, daughter and son-in-law opted to take the mule ride for one day. I chose to forego the mule ride because my back is still not recovered from a very long bear hunt via horseback a year ago. I decided to go exploring and hunting, though this time with neither gun nor hunting license, but carrying only a cheap, Wally World camera. (I wish I'd thought to bring a "real" camera with telephoto lens.)
After depositing the family and watching them ride off into the forest, I drove to a remote beach and took off into the waist-high grass and deep forest bordering the shoreline.
Because there are no snakes on the islands, I opted to wear shorts, T-shirt, socks and sneakers for my adventure; that was probably my biggest mistake of the trip. I soon discovered that the forest was made up of mesquite trees, some 30 to 50 feet tall and covered in wickedly sharp and vicious thorns just like our own mesquite. Soon my legs and arms were covered in a maze of cuts, scratches and blood! When I returned form my first trek, I also discovered that my sneaker soles were pierced with over two-dozen spikes, some an inch long.
But I took several such treks through the bush country. My goal was to stalk the various critters and get up close and personal, and I was successfully able to do so on both gray and black Francolin game birds, and both spotted and barred doves.
The grand prize, though, was to do several sneaks on 10 axis doe deer and one very nice buck! These deer were brought to the islands some 150 years ago and now number over 10,000. They are small, about the size of our Coues Whitetail deer, and covered with white spots much like a mule deer fawn when just born. The bucks sport antlers that look like elk antlers but are smaller in size.
Along with my hunting, I discovered several remote and wild beaches, one about three miles in length and a hundred yards wide. Another beach had no sand but was covered in black, volcanic boulders of one to three feet in diameter — truly wild!
Other than man, hawks, owls and tiny mongooses (they look like large ground squirrels), there are no predators to eat or hassle the critters here. And yet the wild game populations do not seem to be affecting anything and somehow the island controls their numbers. Maybe a lesson for us there.
Wild chickens are everywhere, and mongooses, too, which eat the chickens. Doves also abound, and you may encounter several varieties of pheasant, Gambel's quail, chukar, sand grouse, three varieties of Francolin, and Bamboo partridge.
One of my biggest thrills was coming across two large turkey gobblers with 12-inch beards. Turkey tracks were everywhere in the mesquite forests along the shoreline, and that too was one of my goals — to see some of my favorite bird.
The island also contains wild hogs and goats as well as a smattering of black buck, Barbary sheep (we have those) and African eland antelope. With the similar topography, I'm surprised they never imported our prairie pronghorn antelope.
This is a great place for New Mexicans to visit. You can probably spend a week exploring isolated beaches and shoreline — something we can't do here!
Our first night was spent on the three-mile beach, sharing it with only one other person who was 200 yards away. We watched an absolutely stunning sunset of oranges and browns — no air pollution!
Our last day was spent on the same beach as breakers thundered. I hiked and jogged it for over a mile, but alas, my 63-year-old legs and bare feet could not withstand the soft, deep sand, and I could go no farther.
I write about this because I believe that Molokai is a place that you fellow New Mexicans might like to visit. If so, I recommend contacting Tom and Karyl at (808) 552-2210 at their bed and breakfast or go on the web to www.vrbo.com/115564 The price is quite reasonable, the food delicious and plentiful and the hostess a peach of a dear!
As always keep the sun forever at your back, the wind forever in your face, and may the Forever God bless you too.
Larry Lightner writes Ramblin' Outdoors exclusively for Desert Exposure.