Taking back Saturday

Hello everyone, it's the weekend!

My sister and I decided we wanted to go hiking at Schofield today after picking up her gear for a weekend run. I kept peeking around her to the west and seeing these angry rain clouds hovering at the exact range we wanted to hike but, stubborn as we are, we headed up to Schofield anyway and got poured on as we attempted to find the Pu'u Kaua trailhead.

Schofield has this road that actually cuts through the Waienae mountain range and our trail would have branched off to reach the third highest peak on Oahu. My sister and I ran all the way down Lyman Road and stopped at a road block. We took the immediate left afterward and explored a bit of the jungles in the valley before a sign posted on one pole read "No civilian POVs beyond this point." Makes sense. I could see the huge tracks of army vehicles churning up the mud through the woods.

So we flipped around and drove back down the road to explore another of the army training areas.

And ended at this terrifying area:

Silent Hill.

 I assume this is one of those training areas to practice shooting 'bad guys' in. The buildings were windowless, dirty, and silent. What's more, it was raining. I half-expected the Silent Hill sirens to start wailing and we would be those idiot first-slaughter civilians at the start of the movie.

Luckily for us, we ran into neither creature nor military police and we promptly headed to the base exchange for some grub. We poked around this interesting store and I spotted these cool shoes with spinal cords for heels. AWESOME!

A reflection of your back if you wear these shoes too long!

Part of the reason we dropped by the BX was to get my sister socks so we could go with our backup plan, bowling, since the opened sky decided to pour on our weekend. We secured socks and some other goodies for the evening and headed over to the bowling alley!

We've never bowled at Schofield before and, funnily enough, there really aren't too many public bowling alleys on the island. All the military bases seem to have alleys, but I can think of only one public set of lanes off base.

We played two games for about $12, none too shabby! It's been a long time since I've gone bowling and the subject cropped up at work yesterday. Not a bad indoor activity to do especially since we'd driven all the way up to the Barracks.

My sister did better on her second game and I did poorer, but I won overall.

After bowling, my sister and I spotted a craft shop directly across the street and popped in to see what kinds of things they made. They had pottery and ceramics, quilting, wood works, a nook for moms and tots to do art together; it was a neat place! The last time we had done any ceramic painting together was in Colorado at a pottery shop. We painted fairies!

Assorted finished ceramics toward the front of the craft building.

They had this small setup of free books, so I took the "Changelings" by Anne McCaffery and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough.

I snagged a free book today! The "Changelings" one seemed the most interesting of the selection and now I'll have something to remember the day by. To think, I wouldn't have scored this novel if we hadn't of gone exploring the army base.

The outdoor recreation building sign built into a canoe.

My sister wanted to check out the thrift store on base which can sometimes contain interesting finds, unfortunately, the thrift store was already closed by the time we got to it. I wanted to snap a shot of the sign in the canoe though and we ended up just checking out the outdoor recreation building. My sister suggested we ask after the hiking trails on base to the folks inside.

They told us that the Kolekole Pass was closed. Which meant all the branching trails were closed as well.

So instead we checked out what the rec had to offer. Rental equipment, base information, maps.

The Hawaiian Island chain on one wall of the outdoor recreation building.

Animal heads.

Feral pigs do roam free in the jungles of Hawaii, brought over by early seafarers. 

They had pigs, several feral goats, and an axis deer. There were roughly eight animals mounted around the room, which I found unusual. I can't think of anywhere else on Oahu that would have animal trophies. Either way, I wouldn't want to run into the pigs in the wild.

I love my maps. So when I came across this crooked, clunky map along one table, I paused to study it. The map displayed a number of famous surfing and beach spots around the world. I actually recognized a few!

This map contains all the famous surfing beach spots of the world. Hawaii sits to the far left and is very large by comparison to mainland continents.

So while we didn't get to go hiking today, I think my sibling and I did well with the cards we were dealt today. It was an adventure.

Happy Saturday.