Mauna Kea- need suggestions

[dr_j]

Hiked it a few years back (July 2013). I spent the night before in Volcano, near the NP, which is around 4000 feet up. That's about as much altitude adjustment you're going to be able to get in Hawaii.

I left my car at the visitors center, and it's around 7 miles one-way up to the top, the path is pretty well marked, and is fairly close to the road. By 14er standards, it's not a difficult hike. The steepest part is at the start.

Weather? There are telescopes at the top, so you are generally going to get fine, clear weather, a bit chilly. Then again, you're at 13800 feet. You're likely to climb through a layer of clouds and fog before things clear up around 12000 feet.

Getting back down is a bit trickier, if you time it right, you might be able to hitch a ride down.

The scenery is pretty amazing, it's really like the moon or Mars up there. I made a brief blog entry about it:

https://shredworld.wordpress.com/2013/0 ... ea-hawaii/.

[Scott P]

It's not too terribly hard to get to Hawaii from Maui, but I would need a rental car to drop me off at the "trailhead" I think.

As someone mentioned, several car rental companies (still) forbid travel on the (paved!) Saddle Road. They even claim that a 4X4 is required to get to the Mauna Kea trailhead.

If you want to be legal, Avis now allows travel on the Saddle Road. Budget does too, but won't let you drive to Ka Lae.

For some reason, rental car agreements (at least officially) are stricter (ridiculously so) in Hawaii then any other place I know. Of course many people drive the Saddle Road (or even to the summit of Mauna Kea) in a rental car anyway. After signing our agreement, we even found out that we weren't even supposed to park at any trailheads (of course we did anyway). Camping was forbidden too and after the fact we found out that they even considered "camping" to be in the cabins of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

[TravelingMatt]

As someone mentioned, several car rental companies (still) forbid travel on the (paved!) Saddle Road.

This stopped being true some 5-10 years ago. I took a Hertz car up to the MK trailhead in 2010 and was never told, or saw any printed material stating, that it was forbidden.

The gravel portion of the road up to Mauna Kea is still verboten by everyone I believe, although it's well graded and passable in any car.

[Gabriel]

After reading about all the restrictions involved with driving up Mauna Kea I drove a rental Mustang convertible to the summit without a problem.

Have fun,

G

[Scott P]

I took a Hertz car up to the MK trailhead in 2010 and was never told, or saw any printed material stating, that it was forbidden.

Take this with a grain of salt, but a quick check says that Thrifty, Hertz, Dollar, and Enterprize will allow rental car drivers to drive to the Mauna Kea Visitor Center/Mauna Kea Trailhead. Avis and Budget now allow the Saddle Road, but not driving to the visitor center. Alamo allows neither.

[Shasta Locales]

We were there in December 2014. The Saddle Road is now the Daniel Inouye Highway, 3 lanes wide for much of it, and there are no restrictions by rental companies that I saw, although did not check every single one. It's pretty comparable to any new highway on the mainland.

To get up TH is a bit uphill, and the 4X4 Jeep we rented struggled with the altitude more than anything. But we saw plenty of other rental vehicles up above, and the locals drive up to the summit (and will happily give rides back down if you don't want to hike). We were kind of glad for the ride as thick fog moved in pretty quickly and the temperature dropped quite a bit with it.

[RobertKay]

If you are a bicycle guy, then think about riding up. My understanding is that riding from the beach to the summit is the biggest vertical gain you can do on a bike (at least without riding hundreds or thousands of miles in the Andes or Himalaya. I did it last October and had a great day. You can rent high-end bikes in Hawaii. I used my road bike and had a friend in a chase vehicle (rental car) carry the bike up the gravel section while I walked it. The ride back down is super cool!

I tried to embed my Youtube video but apparently I'm not smart enough! Take a look at it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yBpxS2ChGo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[youtubevideo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yBpxS2ChGo[/youtubevideo]

[Runix]

I did the hike in January and I personally wouldn't recommend it (nor would my brother). I thought it was a pretty boring hike that just felt like it dragged on forever. I don't think I've ever not recommended a hike either.

I definitely suggest going to the top as the view is amazing and the observatories are pretty cool. If you are dead set on hiking it, I hope you have more fun than we did, but if you just want to go to the top, I recommend driving and finding a hike somewhere like Waipio Valley.

[highlandvillager]

Hike it at night. There is a reason the observatory was built there. The view of the night sky is amazing. I hiked it solo in late April via the Humu'ula trail starting from the visitor center around 2 or 3 am. Should have started earlier to be on the summit by sunrise. Saw several shooting stars and had enough moonlight / starlight that I never turned on my headlamp. It was chilly going up, but warmed quickly after sunrise. I was back in Waikoloa Village by lunch time.

Don't worry about the rental car. National told me not to drive on the Saddle Road, but I made two trips to Mauna Kea (the first for an acclimation hike) and a trip to the east side of the island and back over that road without any issues. Their concern is probably for the narrow, curvy, hilly portions of the road on the west side, but as long as you drive cautiously or approach from the Hilo side, no worries.

[esskay1000]

Hike it at night - great advice. Forgot to mention that I did that too and the bonus I got was that I arrived at the summit just as the Sun was getting ready to come up, so the telescopes that were operating that night started to close. I got to watch the huge doors on the famous Keck telescopes - at the time the most powerful in the world - close. It was awesome