2003 … Welcomed to the Jungle
It took about a week to windingly make it up the coast and arrive at the beginning of my journey’s final destination: the head of the Pololu Valley Trail – the path that supposedly led straight to my presumed end-goal: Waipio Valley. The journey up to that point had been regularly sprinkled with one “minor miracle” after another, and as such I was feeling super confident at having made it that far; a hyper-confidence that inspired me to ignore all the warnings that many a Hawaiian had given me over the previous few days (about how dangerous the final leg of my journey was, and about how even native residents have gotten lost and died in the very same wilderness I was intending to traverse) and discard all of my food and all of my water before setting forth down the mountain-jungle path …
“Like all vain men, he had moments of unreasonable confidence.” ~ Warren Eyster
“There is a devastatingly large gap between humble faith and arrogant certainty.” ~ anonymous