Stairway to Heaven

Wow. So... this is going to be an attempt to put down in words an experience that quite possibly can only truly understood by living it. Nonetheless, I will do my best to record the adventure so that those of my friends and family with bad knees or an unwillingness to hike up 3,992 stairs from maybe 100 feet above sea level to 2,820. Yeah.

As you can see from the picture, there are a lot and they're steep. See the highway down there? That's where the trail started. Underneath the raised highway. Still not convinced it was hard? Well, now imagine that that hike has to be made at 4 in the morning (1) to avoid the security guard (who keeps people out because the stairs were officially closed due to excessive danger) and (2) to see the sunrise. Finally, to cap it all off, the stairs and handrails got wetter and wetter, and thus slicker and slicker, the higher we climbed. Anyway, now that you're thoroughly convinced that this was crazy, it's time to tell the story.
Well, my good friend Jeff Geddes is back in town for about ten days with his family. He was here last semester but didn't return as he's leaving on his mission in a couple of weeks. Nevertheless, as previously mentioned, he did come back to visit. Three factors convinced us to go on the hike: We've always wanted to do it, it was a three day weekend so Monday morning would be ideal, and we had access to cars as his family had rented two. The time was right, so we went for it.
Monday, 2:30 am. My alarm goes off. I gave myself a lot of time to get ready because I knew I'd be slow-moving. Showered, packed my camera and water, and walked over to Jeff's rental house.
3:20. Arrival and preeminent departure. We load up in the car drive back to the school, where we actually picked up a whole crew of people. Guess I could have stayed.
3:40. We leave campus crowded into the two cars. Not the most comfortable ride at any time of day, let alone at this unseemly hour.
4:20. Arrival at the drop-off spot in Kaneohe. Jeff's parents, who were SAINTS to drive us, wished us well and returned to Laie to catch some more sleep. We followed the well-worn trail around the stay-out fence and we were on our way. It was a small walk just to the trailhead and we enjoyed stumbling around inside a bamboo forest.
4:30. At long last, we saw our first stairs. They start literally directly under the highway in the picture above. We started up with a will, soon only pausing to gape in shock at the sheer intensity of the endeavor. I have never seen so many false peaks in my life... every time I thought things were about to level out, we crested a rise only to observe another near-vertical ascension of a hundred feet. This is about the point where I started to question my judgment in coming. Why did I wake up so early to torture myself?
4:40-5:15. I'm unsure of the exact time as my focus was more on staying alive than on keeping a captain's log, but somewhere in there we reached the first observation platform. We commenced rejoicing, despite being less than halfway. The following view could be seen:

10 minutes later. You guessed it: more stairs. I lagged behind a bit and changed from long pants (which had been suggested by a friend who had done it before) into shorts (suggested by common sense). I felt loads better but still was dragging a bit as I wasn't feeling well... excuses, excuses. I followed up last and had some good soul searching moments. Why am I doing this again? By now my fear of heights was setting in on top of the fatigue and was making a solid effort to just keep going. Then there was this great moment when the words of Thomas S. Monson came to my mind. It's a quote I have always loved and saved and turned out to be more than a little applicable. He said, "As priesthood holders, we may find that there are times in our lives when we falter, when we become weary or fatigued, or when we suffer a disappointment or a heartache. When that happens, I would hope that we will persevere with even greater effort toward our goal." I kept going.
5:35-5:55. I caught up and we reached the second platform, complete with some old military buildings put up for observation. We took a short break, enjoyed the view, then hit the last, slipperiest, steepest part of our journey.
6:11. The top! Absolutely astounding. Such a feeling of relief and triumph... the whole world was before us, though it was still dark. We relished in the euphoria of the moment but soon were huddling inside some other ruins, seeking shelter from the wind as we awaited the sunrise. I changed back into my long pants and sweater and silently blessed the friend who'd advised me to bring them along.
6:45. The most incredible sunrise of my life. Beyond description. Pictures are worth a thousand words, so here's some now.





7:40 Beautiful though it was, we eventually had to come back to earth. We left Heaven and redescended... in better light, it was easier to take pictures, though it feels impossible to take pictures that adequately express the scope of this adventure.


8:45 Back on solid ground, we vowed to never touch a stair again. It was hard, it was dangerous, it was terrifying. Sometimes you have to go through Hell to get to Heaven... but it's worth it.