View from the Summit (Pu'u Ula'ula or Red Hill)

Continuing our trip to the top of Haleakala, on Thursday, Oct. 8th, once we broke through the clouds, we had some spectacular sights.

We first arrived at the upper Visitor Center at 9,740 ft. By then, it was closed so we couldn't go inside but we took pictures to show where we were.

Next, we drove a little further to the summit. Here, it really impressed upon us how high we were! (Some pictures had to be taken into the sun so aren't the best...) These shots are at the parking lot level.

Once parked, we still had a small walk to get to the very top -- 10,023 ft.

Here's some views looking down at the summit's parking lot from the small shelter at the top (shown in lower right picture).

We couldn't see land below the clouds, but the portion above the clouds would change rapidly as the clouds moved along. Here's some shots looking down toward the upper visitor center --where we took our picture at 9,740 ft. At times it was completely covered by clouds, but at other times it can be seen very well.

As well as the public area of the summit, there are the Haleakala Observatories -- informally called Science City. These are astronomy observatories owned by the Air Force and the University of Hawaii. They are not open to the public.

At one point, the clouds cleared well enough for us to actually see the Big Island. According to the national park sign shown here, that's 80 - 100 miles away!

Here's what we saw -- you can either agree or not, but I think the Big Island is there on the horizon!

We spoke to some people who said at times the Big Island can be seen much better than what we were seeing now, but we were impressed nonetheless.

Finally, here is something called Magnetic Peak. I guess it wreaks havoc with compasses but we didn't have one to try.

As the sun got lower, more people started arriving for the sunset. But, as you can see, there weren't really very many there with us.

Next post will show the sunset.