Today we went to the Limahuli National Botanical Gardens. This is a special place because we have done a service project every year. The Hale (house) is this picture was our service project 2 years ago. We helped collect rocks on the beach (walked in between Julia Robert's house and Bette Midler's House to get to the beach). This year, like last year (I missed the hike last year due to an injury...see last year's Activity Day story), the students and professors went into the forest, weeded, and planted some plants. Over 1/2 of the plants that we plated were endangered species. Very cool.
This is Merlin, he is telling us about the endangered plants that we were planting. Uncle Muku 2 years ago (and Merlin here) told us about the ritual where Hawaiians would hike up a sacred mountain, light this plant, and throw it into the wind. It would sparkle and the wind would take it out at least a mile. People would try to catch it and would brand themselves with it. They are hoping that they can get enough of these plants back into the "wild" that they can begin the tradition again.
Walking into the forest with our plants.
Still walking...
Shelf Fungi on the way out. Really pretty.
We stopped at a river for lunch. Some of the students got in the river just down from me. This was an easier access. The cold water on my feet felt WONDERFUL!
Once we were done, we hiked up a hill to see a plant. Oh my. Another plant. But this is a highly endangered plant in the wild. Like ONE in the wild. This is the view from the hill of the gardens.
I earned a BIG ice cream. So yummy!
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