Story and photos (except as noted) by Terry Shimabukuro
May 18, 2025
As I watched over seven kayaks waiting for their owners to return from the carpool to Pōkaʻī Bay I kept scanning the ocean for naiʻa, Hawaiian spinner dolphin, that frequent the leeward coast. I saw some splashes near the Kahe power plant discharge outlet and noticed that a tour boat stopped short of the outlet so I surmised that a pod might be there. I didn’t have my binoculars so I couldn’t confirm my sighting, but it gave me hope that they might cruise past us on our paddle.
Waiting for the carpool
With almost no shore break we all launched off the steep beach without incident. A light tailwind aided us as we began the journey up the coast. I paddled in close past Mermaid’s Cave to Kalanianaʻole Beach Park to show the group where we’d be launching from for the upcoming Summer Solstice Meet & Greet. A flotilla of six enjoyed peering into Nanakuli valley while stroking steadily through the calm water toward Puʻuʻohulu (Maʻili Point). The seventh kayaker, Norm, lagged behind a little as took the time to reel in a small uku (grey snapper).
Passing Nanakuli Valley
There was no surf at Maʻili Point so we rounded it close enough to see hikers up at the pink pillbox on top of the ridge. We took a short break at the point and let Norm catch up with us. We began the second half of the paddle and soon rendezvoused with Paul and Victoria who launched their tandem from Pōkaʻī. About a mile or so from our destination the wind direction changed and we now paddled into a headwind. The wind strength picked up as we got closer to Pōkaʻī turning the last mile into a real slog.
Paul and Victoria join us off of Maʻili Beach
The naiʻa never showed, but as we pulled into the bay a shark warning blasted over a loudspeaker. None of us saw the shark, but the ocean safety jet ski was zipping around the bay warning swimmers.
Norm pulled in last with a total of two uku and one omilu in his fish bag. He later told me that Ed Rhinelanderʻs spirit was with him on this paddle as he caught the fish on frozen oama that Ed had given him years ago.
We enjoyed a nice post-paddle picnic and congratulated Sandy on completing her circumnavigation of Oʻahu a few weeks earlier. Paul brought magnum of bubbly that he had been saving almost ten years waiting for someone to complete their holopuni. Unfortunately, there was no pop when uncorked and it was undrinkable. Luckily Sandy had her own bottle on ice and we properly toasted her accomplishment. Cheers!
Congratulations Sandy! Cheers! – photo by Mary Ann
Ruby and I pulled into a nearly empty parking lot at Kualoa Campground A to be greeted by a mama duck and her large brood of fluffy ducklings. We hoped that the sparse crowd meant that the large group campsite would be unoccupied for the weekend. Tim had arrived a little before us and he quickly dashed that hope as he told us that one of the park workers said it would be a full house with the Boy Scouts occupying the large group site. (They also told him that mama duck was named Aflac.) Oh well, at least the Boy Scouts would be quiet neighbors and we got a good parking spot.
Mama duck and ducklings – photo by Ruby
We quickly setup club HQ under a small beachside ironwood grove. With the steady beach erosion, as evidenced by several ironwood stumps below the high tide mark, I wondered how much longer this little grove would survive. We’d enjoy it’s shade at least one more year. An unfortunate confluence of club members on travel, a few battling colds and those turned off by a not-so-rosy weekend weather forecast resulted in a sparse number of campers. The Hui’s petroman and I watched a beautiful Saturday sunrise in relative solitude.
Friday setupPetroman greets the dawn
On Saturday, after the main gate opened, people began to slowly arrive for the paddle to Kahana. While breezy, the wind had dropped below advisory levels and seven paddlers showed up for the journey. Stan Dalbec was able to get our new club banner printed just in time for camp and he delivered it before paddling off. Mahalo for taking care of this Stan! Unfortunately for Stan his paddle was cut short by a nasty wave that dumped him and cracked his hull. I won’t go over the details in this story, but his experience validates our advice to always paddle with a buddy.
Our new club bannerPaul, Julie and Tim ready to paddle to Kahana – photo by Ruby
One of the reasons we held camp the weekend before Easter Sunday was to take advantage of the full moon. Norm was going to lead us on a Saturday twilight paddle around Mokoliʻi under the magical light of the full moon. Pakaʻa, the Hawaiian god of the wind, had other plans, however, as he summoned a strong, steady wind along with a thick cloud cover that lasted most of the afternoon and into the early evening so we had to abort the paddle. Pakaʻa might have been hanging out with the trickster Maui as the wind calmed back down soon after we finished dinner and the mahina began to play peek-a-boo.
Full moon peeks out of the clouds
Conditions were just right for a nice campfire courtesy of Kelly and James. James, a Washington state transplant, had his first taste of fire-roasted papio that he caught right in front of camp an hour or so before. Ono!
The full moon came out for the campfire provided by Kelly and James
While the campers were sparse, we had a good turnout for Sundayʻs activities. About a dozen people attended Kevin and Joeʻs “Introduction to Kayaking” clinic. The clinic ended with a good session of kayak reentry practice on the water.
One of the nice things about Easter Camp is that several of our long-time members who no longer attend regular club paddles show up for the Sunday festivities. One of those members is Susan Girard who created our kayak paddle wielding petroglyph man logo in crayon on a t-shirt silk screen in 1983. Susan still looks forward to pumping up her inflatable to chase down Easter eggs.
Susan Girard is ready to hunt for eggs! – photo by TerryFind those eggs!
Around twenty boats scrambled on the water to hunt for floating Easter eggs. This was our inaugural hunt with decorated wooden eggs and there was a question of whether they would float high enough to be spotted from a kayak. The answer was a resounding, “Yes!”, as 119 or 120 eggs were recovered. As people filled their plates from the potluck buffet President Bill began awarding prizes. The club’s first president, Mark Rognstad, scooped up the golden egg and claimed a large dry bag for his prize. The silver and bronze eggs were found by my neighbor’s daughter and a friend. They received bonus chocolate Easter bunnies to go along with their kayak gear prizes.
Mark receiving the golden egg prize from BillSilver egg winnerThe bronze egg winner
Mahalo to Tim for leading the Kahana paddle and for scattering the eggs, Stan D. for getting our new banner made, bringing the paper goods and for providing a dramatic moment, Kelly and James for the warming campfire, Kevin and Joe for another excellent clinic, Bill for getting and distributing all the prizes, everyone who decorated wooden eggs, Sandy for signing in all the egg hunters, Ruby and Katrena for setting up the potluck, Katrena for bringing garbage bags and for storing the eggs for next year, everyone who brought tables and canopies and those who helped with cleanup and breakdown. A great team effort by all!
Featured photo by Kevin Ching, other photos as noted
February 2, 2025
A beautiful day was forecast for our first 2025 Meet & Greet, but torrential rain a few days before caused a couple of sewage spills upstream of the Ala Wai canal. There were also reports of other opala flowing into the canal. So, the concern for this event wasn’t the weather, but the water quality at the Magic Island canoe ramp where we planned to launch. There were no brown water advisories posted for the area, but Kevin sent me updates from his evening runs warning that the water looked dirty so Ruby and I went to Magic Island on Saturday to see for ourselves. I didn’t see any floating garbage patches in the channel and I could see the bottom in the area around the canoe ramp so I gave the go ahead to proceed as planned for Sunday with a caveat to those sensitive to water quality.
We arrived Sunday morning well before eight expecting the normal early morning crowd at Magic Island. Instead we ran into a crowded park road with a myriad of serious people carrying racing canoes to the lawn area around the canoe hale. It turned out that the Kanaka Ikaika Racing Association had a big canoe race scheduled that day with their starting line right in front of the canoe ramp! Auwe! This is one more thing we’ll have to check before planning paddles at popular beaches. Our participants had to hunt for the remaining parking spots so our launch time was delayed and we had to stage our kayaks on the bank next to the canoe ramp.
Canoe racers with our kayaks on the bank in the background – photo by Kanaka IkaikaPre-launch staging – photo by Mark
We had a good turnout of 18 kayakers in 15 kayaks, including six first-time club paddlers. Ruby, Hilda, and President Bill stayed ashore to hold our picnic spot. The races were well spaced out so except for the parking hassle and having to carry our kayaks down the bank instead of the ramp we were able to launch easily between races.
Sweep Mark Ling captured our flotilla going out the channelPaddling toward Leahi under a cloudless sky – photo by Terry
We paddled past a grounded sailboat outside of the Ala Wai harbor breakwater. Upon closer inspection, Mark uncovered the name of the boat, Oar-Gasm! Hmmm…did a distracted captain cause the grounding?
Grounded sailboat outside the breakwater – photo by MarkStern view of the grounded sailboat – photo by Mark
With near perfect conditions of full sun, warm air, light breeze and minimal swell, we cruised slowly past the resorts that prime our state’s economic engine. Kevin took the lead and our guests followed my instructions not to go past him. Other members were assigned a guest to escort and Mark swept making sure no one was left behind. The calm conditions allowed us to keep close together out and back.
Eileen and Barry pass the Hilton Hawaiian Village – photo by TerryOur guests pause outside the Outrigger Reef to capture a memory – photo by TerryKevin leads us past the Halekulani and Sheraton – photo by Terry
While kamaʻaina tend to shun the concrete jungle of Waikiki, paddling the shoreline under these picturesque conditions helped me understand why tourists continue to flock here. We paddled almost to Kuhio Beach where we gathered so that Kevin could take the group photo at the top of this story. We then turned around and headed back to Magic Island.
Admiring the pink palace before returning to Magic Island – photo by Terry
There was a lot of traffic when we got back to the Ala Wai channel with canoe racers sprinting to the finish line, pleasure boats leaving the harbor and several teenagers in little sailboats that sailed right onto the race course. We stayed to edges of the channel and made it safely back to shore.
After stowing our gear, we gathered at the picnic site and enjoyed an ono lunch. I’m not sure if it was the beautiful weather, the bountiful potluck spread or our sparkling personalities, but we signed up a record five new members at this Meet & Greet! Welcome to the club Barry, Clarice, Kim, Sarah and Angie!
This is our second Magic Island Meet & Greet and we’ve had a car key incident both times. The first time, a key was accidentally left in the car door key slot which invited someone to take the car. Luckily, the joy rider left the car in the Ala Moana shopping center parking lot and it was quickly recovered. This time, a member lost their car key. Stan Dalbec graciously drove the member home to retrieve their spare. Perhaps we need to add a car key check to our paddle leader checklist.
Long-time club member and my good friend Edmund (Ed) Rhinelander passed away suddenly and unexpectedly on December 16, 2024 on the eve of the club Christmas party. The shocking news of his death spread quickly through the club as he was well loved and admired by many. Ed and I joined the club around the same time, back near the turn of the century (I feel ancient phrasing it that way). His welcoming and generous nature drew people to him. He could walk up to a stranger on the beach and within minutes they’d be talking like they were old friends. We became friends immediately. In addition to kayaking we shared common backgrounds in fishing, camping, beer drinking, football and growing up local.
We were also both ardent members of the do-it-yourself club, reluctant to pay others for something we could do ourselves. An electrician by profession, Ed was a Jack of all trades, but not a master of none. He was a master of many. He constantly surprised me with the ability to do so many things and do them well. Unlike my DIY skills that rely heavily on YouTube, Ed’s skills came from life experience. Befriending and learning from other craftsmen, he practiced until he got it right and those skills became second nature.
One memorable project that he undertook began when he inherited a used Hobie Mirage Drive, the pedaling system for Hobie fishing kayaks. He didn’t own a Hobie kayak and already had more kayaks than he could use so he decided to mount it in a fiberglass Cuda that he had previously modified for sailing. He studied the Hobies to understand what made them work and then he took a saw to his Cuda. It took him longer than he planned and several iterations to the drive mounting, but he finished it. I went with him on its maiden voyage and it worked beautifully! Rock solid pedaling and smooth steering.
One of the few areas where Ed lacked skills was in the digital realm. I don’t think it’s because he wasn’t capable, but he probably tried computers back when they crashed frequently and software wasn’t user-friendly. He didn’t have the patience for that so he left it for others to do. That might be one of the reasons he married Lois because she was proficient with email. He stuck with a simple flip-phone until he was forced to get a smartphone for foreign travel with post-COVID tracking requirements. I was pleasantly surprised when I received my first text from him. He seemed quite proud. And then he discovered emojis!
If asked to choose one person you’d want to be stranded with on a desert island you couldn’t go wrong picking Ed. Sure, he wasn’t much to look at in a swimsuit, but you would survive and probably live pretty comfortably. One of Ed’s favorite TV shows was “Survivor”. I don’t watch reality shows so I never watched an episode with him, but I assume that he constantly critiqued the participants the same way that he yelled advice to the coaches of the football games on TV (I’ve seen that).
Through his network of friends and contacts he often learned about a cache of used material or equipment that was about to be thrown away. No landfill for those items, he would give them a second life. He also had an eye for spotting discarded “treasures” along the side of the road, much to Lois’s chagrin. He was upcycling before it became fashionable.
The most obvious example of this is the steep hillside garden behind their house that he terraced by creating retaining walls out of used tires. I’m pretty sure that he didn’t get a structural engineer’s stamp of approval, but I would put money down that the retaining walls last at least as long as the house. Ed spent a good part of his retirement working in that garden and it’s the last thing that he worked on. He had come back to the house after working up on the hill in the morning. Lois found him sitting on a folding chair on the front deck looking like he was asleep with one shoe off and the other half off. Attempts to revive him by Lois and Glenn and later the EMS were unsuccessful.
Like many of us, Ed hoped that he would die before losing the ability to take care of himself and that his death would be quick and painless. He got his wish, but he left us too soon and we didn’t get to say goodbye. Ed had planned to grow old with Lois in the home that they built together. Preparing for the day when they had reduced mobility, they built a wheelchair ramp on the side of the house and installed a front door wide enough for a large wheelchair. Ed’s best friend commented, ironically, that Ed’s only ride on the ramp was on the gurney to the mortuary’s van.
Those of us that paddled with Ed, especially the ones that went on kayak expeditions with him, undoubtedly gained some wisdom from him that made us better kayakers, fishermen, campers, cooks or people. We grieve along with Lois, Kelly, James and the rest of his family. We didn’t get to say goodbye, but he left us with many cherished memories. Aloha my friend. A hui hou.
This year’s Christmas Party took on a somber note with the sudden passing of long-time member Ed Rhinelander the day before the event. Ed loved a good party and while we missed his radiant smile, infectious laugh and amusing stories we consoled ourselves with memories of the good times we shared with him. Event organizer Eileen directed her elves to transform the almost 100-year-old HTMC clubhouse into a festive setting for all to enjoy. Early arrivals enjoyed ono pupus and purchased stylish club t-shirts.
Outside the HTMC clubhouseMarie, Stan and Alan peruse the club T-shirts
Incoming club president Bill Murphy led about 40 members and guests in a moment of silence for Ed and introduced new club members. Beth gave a multi-denominational blessing and hungry attendees swarmed the bountiful buffet. Except for Peggy’s perfectly roasted turkey and Beth’s expertly sliced ham this was a pure bring-whatever potluck and it was great to see members respond with a delectable assortment of healthy grain dishes.
Potluck buffet
Diners spread out over the brightly decorated tables under the covered lanai to enjoy their meals, catch up with old friends and make new ones.
Peter should look happier surrounded by the lovely Marie, Susan, Paula and EileenKimberly flashes the shaka with first-time party goers Mary Ann, Jled, Teresa and AlanNorm, Tim and Stan enjoy the festivitiesPeggy wonders what kind of silly face her husband’s making. What do their wedding photos look like?
Rusty Lillico, one of the club’s founding members, created the club’s website over twenty years ago. With no prior training, Rusty taught himself the basics of web design and put together a simple, but effective website to publicize the club activities. Back then, there was no social media so unless you knew a club member or happened upon a club paddle the website was your portal to the club. Many of our most active members discovered the club through Rusty’s website. We presented Rusty with a custom plaque made by club member Elliott Wong to thank him for his many years of dedicated service as webmaster .
Rusty receives his webmaster recognition plaque
Katrena organized the photo and video contest and efficiently tallied the votes to keep our activities on schedule. Kevin showed off his camera skills winning both the photo contest and claiming the Peebles’ Award. He also won the video clip category. Chalsa had the second place photo and Ruby and I tied for third. My capture of Norm’s Coptic Easter campfire kanikapila earned a video clip second place. Sandy and I collaborated on a Crash and Burn video that garnered the first place video award. Kevin produced the #2 video documenting the Windbag Regatta.
Katrena presents Kevin with a laser cut Hui logo box for his first place photoChalsa’s second place photoRuby and Terry’s third place photos
In addition to making the one-of-a-kind plaque for Rusty, Elliott donated prizes showcasing his mastery of other skills with his laser cutter. Contact him if you would like to purchase similar or other custom made items.
Laser etched logo water bottle
The elusive Elliott Wong from 2014Laser cut box with the Hui logo
Norm and Mary Ann led the group in the joyful singing of Christmas carols. Kimberly directed the “white elephant like” gift exchange where stealing was allowed and, in fact, encouraged. No one came to blows.
Norm and Mary Ann lead the carolingKimberly leads the gift exchange (the kayak was a prop, not a gift!)Happy party goers!
Mahalo to Eileen for expertly organizing our year-end event and to all who helped with setup and cleanup. We look forward to another year of great paddles!
