To first-time visitors, the leeward side of the Big Island (the Kohala Coast) is surprisingly dry and barren,
unlike the windward side, which is very wet and lush with tropical vegetation. On this wintery day, I was
standing by the upper road that leads from Waimea to Hawi, which provides gorgeous views of the coast below.
The wind speed on that particular day was enormous and very chilly (by Hawaiian standards). My fingers were
literally frozen and I had to lean on my tripod and camera to keep it from shaking. When one realizes that just
hundreds of feet below, it was balmy by the coast and that I had just had a great swim at the Mauna Kea Beach Resort,
the extremes in weather patterns on the Big Island of Hawaii can be confounding. Here, a lonely dry tree provides
an interesting silhouette to an otherwise barren land.