As many of my friends and family are aware, Hawaii is my favorite place on earth. Not that I have visited many exotic places in my life. As I look back I probably could have ventured to, say, Aruba, Tahiti, the Grand Cyclamens, etc. But, I kept going back to Hawaii … nine times in fact. I love the culture, the clothes or lack thereof, the food, the water, the sunshine, the creatures. I love the fact that upon arriving I take off my shoes and bra and never put them back on for the rest of the trip. Can you say flip flops and sarongs?
My first trip to the Islands happened the summer after my high school graduation. That trip was my present for making it through 12+ years of education. I had never flown in a plane. I had never been to somewhere with a different culture. I had never been off the West Coast. I was out of my mind with excitement.
In the ensuing years I traveled back there with family, friends, THE HUSBAND and kids. All of the trips were unique in their own way with very, very special memories. They never entailed a disaster until that one fateful trip on 2007 when three special girlfriends decided to ditch our husbands and landed on Kauai for nine beautiful sun-kissed days and nights.
Looking back I was probably as fit as I had been in 20 years. I was looking for adventure and found it, not necessarily in a good way. THE BEST FRIEND and I were bound and determined to hike several times during that trip and one of the places we researched were The Secret Tunnels. These structures were built in the past century to guide water to the sugar cane fields. They have since been abandoned. But, as the guide book says, there is one tunnel that ends up at a waterfall. Now, that’s the kind of adventure I was looking for.
THE BEST FRIEND and I packed our day packs with lunch, water bottles, a towel and swim suits, (no, it wasn’t the Miracle Suit) and went off in our rented Jeep to find our little slice of lagoon heaven. We opened the guide book and drove to the trail head where we parked. It was a smart thing to rent the Jeep as we had to drive over rutted roads and small streams.
We ditched the Jeep and started on what the guide book said would be a path. In reality it was only a suggestion of a path that quickly died out and left us with just jungle. But, the guide book gave us markers to look for and, being the adventurous girls we were, we bravely forged ahead.
A little info about this guide book. It’s called Kauai Revealed and is very comprehensive. It is written by a couple who actually live in Hawaii and they give the most honest reviews I have ever read. If a place is bad they will tell you. There is a book written for each of the islands and updated each year so you are getting the latest scoop. Since it’s blue, we just called it the blue book.
Back to the hike. We stepped on stones in creeks, plunged through bamboo thickets, swung around large trees and basically made our own trail. We were smart enough to set up small markers with rocks and twigs pointing the way we had come. We proceeded merrily on our way. THE BEST FRIEND was ahead at one point and I was bringing up the rear when I stepped in a mud puddle. Keep in mind it rains every day in Hawaii but in the spring it rains more. There were mud puddles all around us and the one I stepped in was very deep. As my hiking shoe plunged deeper, the mud was getting close to spilling over into my left shoe. Now, I don’t mind getting muddy but I didn’t want to have to hike the rest of the day with a shoe full. So, I yanked it out of the mud. Except it didn’t come out. The mud here was particularly thick and sticky and held onto my shoe with a vengeance. So much so that between the force of the mud and the force of my trying to yank it out I heard a snap. That’s not a sound you want to hear. This next part happened so fast it didn’t really register in my brain, but here is what I remember. I yanked, heard a snap, yanked some more, got my shoe out, looked down, noticed my left foot was now facing perpendicular to my leg. I guess I yelped when it snapped because THE BEST FRIEND stopped and turned around. I looked at her and said, “If you can just help me get my foot straight I can keep going.” At which point she said, “Sit down, sit down now.”
There you have it. In just a few short seconds I had not only dislocated my ankle but broken it also. I sat down as directed and that’s when it dawned on me that I was deep into Hawaiian territory, with no real trail, with a broken ankle and we were all alone. Oh, and no cell phone reception.
As I lied there, looking up into the trees, I realized something that terrified me. I was never getting out of the jungle. How could I? I couldn’t walk … no cell reception … all alone. I must have said this out loud because immediately THE BEST FRIEND said, “Oh, yes you will. I’m going to leave you as comfortable as I can and hike back out to where the phone will work.”
Now, I really don’t know how long we were hiking after leaving the car so I didn’t know how much time it would take her but we had no choice, so off she went. As she looked back at me I felt the need to reassure her I would be fine so I said, “I’ll be okay, I have the blue book.” The blue book? Did I really think having the blue book would somehow benefit me in my hour of need? Neither THE BEST FRIEND nor I ever figured out just what I was talking about.
I was stretched out on the ground, under a big tree, clutching the book, praying mightily and in pain. The throbbing sensations would ebb and flow. As I promised God everything I could think of to get me out of here, I know as sure as I’m here writing this He answered me. This came in the form of the sun. The sight I could see from my position were two large branches forming a V with the sky. When I was in the throws of the worst pain that V would cloud over and become dark with touches of sprinkles. When the pain subsided and I could catch my breath the sky in the V would break through and be blue and sunny. This was a great comfort to me as I knew God was sending that sunshine to give me hope.
Occasionally, as I went in and out of different pain thresholds I would call out, “Hellooooo.” Just hoping some other adventurous and foolish people were out looking for those blasted tunnels. But, alas, nothing, nada, not a word. I had no idea of how much time was going by but later THE BEST FRIEND told me it was probably close to 2 hours.
As time marched on the throbbing became stronger. I didn’t have the nerve to look down at my flopping foot and I remember praying harder and harder. Suddenly I heard a voice call to me and for a split second I thought maybe the Lord had decided to make an appearance. Turns out it was THE BEST FRIEND along with 5 muscular emergency medical techs come to rescue my sad self. They brought along with them a strange sort of contrivance shaped like a really big bread basket and a large wheel. Turns out they planned to hoist me in and wheel me out, over hill and dale, creek and bamboo forest. And that’s what they did. They also decided to serenade me with their rendition of “Climb Every Mountain.”
We made it to the trail head and they loaded me into the back of the Jeep. It seems we were so far in that the ambulance couldn’t make it that far. THE BEST FRIEND had to drive me out to where they waited. That was by far the worst part of the whole ordeal. The road was barely a road and we forded two different shallow streams. The relief I felt when they loaded me into the emergency vehicle was huge.
From there I went to the local hospital, got my ankle “relocated”, had surgery to fix the two fractures and spent the night. We flew home two days later and I lived to tell the tale. My lasting souvenirs from that trip are an 8 inch plate and multiple screws holding my distal tibia together along with one screw holding the tip of my fibula in place. They are still with me to this day. Not the adventure I had in mind but it does make for a good story. By the way, I never did read that book while lying flat on my back, although the EMT’s did ask us how we found ourselves on a trail that really wasn’t a trail. THE BEST FRIEND answered we were looking for the hidden tunnels described in the blue book. “Ah, the blue book”, they replied. “We’re very familiar with it. We get lots of customers that way.”
magicalmess 