Oxygen Depravation

Legend has it that the demi-god Maui, a fisherman, was out one day fishing. He had a very secret task given to him from the gods. As luck would have it a group of onlookers came around to see what all of the fuss was about. They were told to close their eyes and not to look for a magnificent event was in process and if any one else was to see Maui as he worked the spell would be broken.

For several hours they stood waiting but then one became impatient and opened his eyes. At the sight of this, the gods came down and snatched Maui's fishing hook and threw it into the sky. The hook became the tail of the constellation many know as Scorpio.

Maui was able to dredge up the Hawaiian islands by hooking into what was to become Mauna Kea, the highest point in Hawaii. If the onlooker has heeded the gods warning Maui would have brought up a new continent. But alas, as all great myths would have it, tragedy struck leaving us screwed out of a new continent forever.

My obsession with Mauna Kea started a few weeks before the trip. Enamored by the idea of going to a place far above the cloud line, to one of the best star gazing points in the whole world, I set my sights on the big hill. Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa are the two peaks that define the big island. Mauna Kea sits slightly higher then its sister peak at 13,796 feet.

We originally thought we would hike to the summit, however, after consulting my co-pilots, we decided to ditch the hike for the drive, which made for a much more leisurely day. While oxygen depravation is easier to deal with in a car, there is significantly less oxygen (-40%) at that altitude. The effect of having only 60% of my normal oxygen intake was similar to the feeling of walking around in a tub of jello. Everything was slow and difficult, but the world from that height is something that I have never experienced. Luminous and saturated, the colors were brighter and clearer then anything I have ever seen.

New snack pillows

The big bonus at the top of Hawaii is a series of observatories, which are responsible for some of the most important astronomical findings of our time. For example, we have now seen the planets the UFO's come from.

Neither words nor photos truly captures the magic of this place. Maybe it was the slightly hallucinatory affect from lack of air but everything was still, silent and glowing. We left the top and descended to 9,200 ft to watch the stars. I have been lucky enough to have a lot of stargazing under my belt, but never have I had the experience that I had that night. I saw the rings of saturn and a globular cluster, which looks like a huge star that has broken into a million shards of star glass. I saw a black hole, which looks like a big black hole. And I learned about Eta Carinae a star that may explode in our life time sending gamma rays and destroying life as we know it. (For the record the likelihood of that happening is pretty slim.)

Even at the top of the world they have port-o-potties

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung

My eager craft through footless halls of air....

Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue

I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace

Where never lark nor even eagle flew—

And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

- John Gillespie Magee Jr.