Standing on top of the world

Craig on the way up - about 10,000ft. elevation.  Looks like a moonscape!

The top of Mauna Kea with one of the telescopes = 13,700 ft.

One of the telescopes opened up finally

Craig and me at sunset

I love the sky in this photo

It's hard to believe that just 2 weeks ago I was on top of the world.  Literally.  With a parka.  And mittens.  And a cold wind in 32*.

And of all places, it was in Hawaii.

Seriously.

Our family did an excursion to the top of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii.  It was extraordinary standing at 13,000+ feet and watching the sun set.  It's an experience I doubt I'll ever see again - at least from that vantage point.

Believe it or not, Mauna Kea is the WORLD'S highest point. Yes, it's higher than Mt. Everest.  But the reason it's higher is because most of its elevation is below the surface of the ocean.  From the base, it's over 33,000 ft. tall! Amazingly, it used to be lush and densely forested until cattle was introduced and began foraging for food and destroyed all the lush vegetation.  Now the area looks like a moonscape and as a matter of fact, has been used for training astronauts for lunar landings.

This is the only plant like this on the island. It used to be everywhere until cattle was introduced and ate all but this plant.

Besides the sunset, the best part of the night was being able to see the rings around Saturn (we did a little star-gazing) and seeing a globular cluster (the last remains of a galaxy far, far away).  We had a wonderful guide who knew a lot of island history and lore which he generously shared with us.  If it weren't for the obnoxious couple who thought they knew everything and kept interrupting him, it would have been the perfect evening.  As a matter of fact, the wife in this couple ended up getting altitude sickness that required her to go on oxygen  until we could descend to 5000 ft.  Not a pretty picture.  Our guide made the most of it and Hawaii Forest and Trails offered us a generous refund of a portion of our trip.

2 of the telescopes that we could see from the bottom of Mauna Kea (see picture below)

The guide said that you can never tell who will end up with altitude sickness.  He said he's had elite athletes who were in amazing shape end up very sick and overweight obviously out-of-shape folks do just fine.  Guess you can't judge a book by it's cover.

The whole experience made me realize how big God is and how very small I am.  Just looking at the vast array of stars in the sky reminded me that God placed each and every one of them there and not only that, He knows their names.  (He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. Psalm 147:4)  hard for me to even fathom the number of stars - and so many we couldn't even see. Yet God sees every one of them.

The sunset colors were so spectacular that it made me want to cry.  The beauty was breath-taking.  I've never seen anything like it.  And sadly, the pictures I took didn't do the color palette justice.  But in my mind I've saved the mental picture of the overwhelming evening of beauty.

He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers.  He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in....Lift your eyes and look to the heavens:  Who created all of these?  He who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name.  Because of His great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.  Isaiah 40:22&26

Mauna Kea  from the bottom of the island - the small white domes are the telescopes