Big Island: Akaka Falls & Mauna Kea Observatory-by Vlad- On the east side of Big Island is the city of Hilo. One of the two main cities - the other being Kona - on the largest Hawaiian island, it is also home to recently inducted UFC Hall of Famer, BJ Penn. Hoping to randomly run into a living legend, we checked out the town's farmer's market for local food and goods. I really enjoyed the musicians' performances while Edyta did a bit of windowless window shopping. We stumbled upon a café and were pleasantly surprised by their bagels. Hawaii is not the first place you'd associate with bagels, especially as a New Yorker, but this little gem was not far off from Murray's and other quality NYC bagel shops. Overall, Hilo provided the cool, laid back vibe that coincides with Hawaiian culture. From Hilo, we headed north to Akaka Falls for a short hike and to take in some natural beauty. After a short 20 min paved path hike through a rainforest and small bamboo park, we arrived at the Big Island's second largest waterfall by height (420 ft). It's a shame we weren't there a few days earlier, on March 20th to be exact, as we could have run into another celeb with ties to Hawaii: The Rock. Oh well, perhaps next time. One of the big attractions for me on the Big Island was the Mauna Kea Observatory, an astronomical research facility located atop a dormant volcano. Aside from being 9,200 ft above sea level, a unique phenomenon occurs here to make this an ideal spot for scientists and star gazers. The summit of Mauna Kea is positioned above where water vapor settles, so clouds rarely interrupt astronomers' vision. On top of that, there's very little light pollution as the nearest towns are 1-2h drive away. Imagine crystal clear skies all year long. There's only a handful of places like that on Earth. We arrived at Mauna Kea in the late afternoon, so we had the opportunity to take a short hike to one of the nearby peaks and enjoy the sunset. One thing I quickly forgot was how thin the air was this high up. It reminded me of when we hiked Haleakala Crater (10,000 ft) on Maui a few years back. As I was dealing with shortness of breath, and an elevated heart rate, Edyta was trying to stay awake as the low air pressure made her very sleepy. She also thinks her judgement was clouded as we messed up our timing and almost missed the sunset. Once the sun fully set, we got to look through the 8 or so telescopes they set up for visitors to enjoy (free of charge). Because of the alignment of the planets, we were able to see faint images of Venus, Jupiter (including its famous red spot) and an HD image of the moon. While the telescopes we got to use were smaller and mobile, higher up on the mountain were 12 massive telescopes (owned by Caltech, Subaru, University of Hawaii, as well as some countries like Canada, France etc.) that researchers use to do science stuff. These telescopes have not come without controversy as some locals have protested their existence in favor of the preservation and protection of their sacred land. We saw a handful of peaceful protesters that provided information to visitors. However, protests got a little more heated as recent as April 2015 when hundreds of individuals protested the proposed Thirty Meter (diameter) Telescope. This lead to multiple arrests. Some celebrities with local ties, such as Jason Mamoa (Khal Drogo from Game of Thrones) support this cause. After about an hour or star gazing, we started to get cold so we made our way down the mountain for the long ride home. Another fun day in Hawaii.
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