Hawaiian Islands weather details & Aloha paragraphs / November 11-12, 2009

November 11-12, 2009

Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Wednesday afternoon:

Lihue, Kauai –  77
Honolulu, Oahu – 83  
Kaneohe, Oahu – 79
Kaunakakai, Molokai – 78
Kahului, Maui – 83
Hilo, Hawaii – 84
Kailua-kona – 83

Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level around the state – and on the highest mountains…at 4pm Wednesday afternoon:

Kailua-kona – 82F
Hilo, Hawaii – 72

Haleakala Crater – 32    (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea summit – 34 (near 14,000 feet on the Big Island)

Precipitation Totals – The following numbers represent the largest precipitation totals (inches) during the last 24 hours on each of the major islands, as of Wednesday afternoon:

3.05 Mount Waialaele, Kauai
2.37 Oahu Forest NWR, Oahu
2.22 Molokai 
0.00 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
2.15 West Wailuaiki, Maui
0.84 Glenwood, Big Island

Marine Winds – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a very strong 1039 millibar high pressure system far to the north of the islands. Winds will be northeast, and locally strong and gusty, gradually becoming lighter from the southeast…then returning easterly trade winds this coming weekend.

Satellite and Radar Images: To view the cloud conditions we have here in Hawaii, please use the following satellite links, starting off with this Infrared Satellite Image of the islands to see all the clouds around the state during the day and night. This next image is one that gives close images of the islands only during the daytime hours, and is referred to as a Close-up visible image (not currently working). This next image shows a larger view of the Pacific…giving perspective to the wider ranging cloud patterns in the Pacific Ocean. Finally, here’s a Looping IR satellite image, making viewable the clouds around the islands 24 hours a day. To help you keep track of where any showers may be around the islands, here’s the latest animated radar image.

Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live webcam on the summit of near 14,000 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. The tallest peak on the island of Maui is the Haleakala Crater, which is near 10,000 feet in elevation. These two webcams are available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon rising just after sunset for an hour or two! Plus, during the nights and early mornings you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise too…depending upon weather conditions.

Tropical Cyclone activity in the eastern and central Pacific – Here’s the latest weather information coming out of the National Hurricane Center, covering the eastern north Pacific. You can find the latest tropical cyclone information for the central north Pacific (where Hawaii is located) by clicking on this link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center. Here’s a tracking map covering both the eastern and central Pacific Ocean. A satellite image, which shows the entire ocean area between Hawaii and the Mexican coast…can be found here.

Aloha Paragraphs

Low pressure aloft and at the surface, will keep our weather unstable through the next several days. The main concern is for locally heavy precipitation, as cold air aloft destabilizes the air mass surrounding the Hawaiian Islands. Cold air above, with warm moist air below, is a definite recipe for potential flooding rainfall. All the ingredients remain in place to bring off and on showers…some of which could be of the flooding variety. Some of these clouds may attain very high tops, which brings in the possibility of thunderstorms too. Speaking of high level, here’s a webcam view of Mauna Kea on the Big Island, which may see its first significant snowfall of the autumn season over the next several days.

The latest satellite imagery shows lots of rainy clouds around…mostly over the ocean at the time of this writing. The most active areas Wednesday evening were to the  north of all the islands. This IR satellite picture shows all the clouds, the closest of which were nearing the north shore of Kauai. Rainfall was generous over many areas of the Aloha state Tuesday night, although had backed off quite a bit during the day Wednesday. As mentioned above however, everything is still in place to produce more rainfall. A trough of low pressure will move through the state, from the west to the east, which will keep the overlying atmosphere shower prone going forward.

The latest computer models definitely show a rather prolonged period of off and on showers…some potentially heavy. Many areas around the state will get wet, although it will be hit and miss most of the time. At this point it’s difficult to know exactly when we might find completely dry weather returning to our islands. As the trough of low pressure, now over the Maui and Big Island end of the state moves west, rainfall will remain generous at times. Speaking of showers or rain, here’s a looping radar image, which will show us where the heavy precipitation is falling. As this trough moves through, and ends up to the west of the state, the our winds will come up from the southeast. This weekend our winds will turn back to easterly, likely carrying showers to the windward sides, keeping those areas at times soggy…although the leeward sides should begin to dry out then.

The state remains full of NWS issued advisories and warnings Wednesday evening. We find an active flash flood watch for the entire state; a flood advisory for the Big Island; a gale warning over the offshore waters; a winter weather advisory for the summits on the Big Island; a small craft warning for winds over the Niihau and Kauai waters; a wind advisory over the islands of Niihau and Kauai; and finally high surf advisories and warnings for our east facing shores. We have to remember that we’re in the month of November, which sometimes does become rather stormy at times. November is one of the months of the year that qualify as part of the rainy season in our islands.

It’s partly cloudy here in Kula, Maui, as we approach the sunset hour. Despite all the low pressure surrounding the islands, we haven’t had all that much rain during the day Wednesday. The satellite image above shows lots of clouds to our north through northeast. The looping radar image however shows a lack of showers, or at least not many, generally falling over the ocean this evening. A trough of low pressure over Maui shows the counterclockwise air circulation over the islands. This trough will be moving westward, with moist southeast winds filling in behind it. This could conceivably carry volcanic haze up over the island chain with time. ~~~ I lazed around this morning, finally getting myself out the door and down to Baldwin Beach. It was really nice down there, with rising surf breaking on the outer reefs. I sat watching the people, and the clouds and ocean for quite a while, before finally jumping in the rough ocean. I went shopping, and then high-tailed it back home, where I’ve been lazing around again. I’m still tired from my three week travels in California. I have Thursday and Friday at work in Kihei, and then it will be the weekend. I’ll be back online early Thursday morning with your next new weather narrative. I hope you have a great Wednesday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.

By the way, if you left a response on this page lately, and don’t see it, and can’t see my reply back, please go to the Archived Narratives on the left hand side of this page. You will find yesterday’s page, and actually go back through over 1000 of the last narratives I’ve written. Be sure to click on View All on the top of the list, to see the entire list of replies and responses. If you have any trouble finding that, please let me know.

I’ll leave the details of my recent vacation up for one more day:

October 20-21 – Hi everyone, I made it, flew into the San Francisco airport, with its wet runways Monday night. The lady at the Kahului airport, Karen, moved my seat up from 46A to 16A, with endless leg room and a window…which was a great start to my trip. I took the Marin Airporter to my friend’s house, where I found homemade soup, toast and cheese waiting. She had a Pumpkin ale to wash that down with, before I went to bed. Yesterday we started off our day with a nice walk, breakfast, coffee, and watched Democracy Now with Amy Goodman on the television. Later in the day we took a nice long walk into Baltimore Canyon, filled with Redwood trees…and a nice running creek. Finished off the day with wine on the deck to sunset. I slept wonderfully last night, and woke early, ready to start off my second day of vacation. ~~~ Today, Wednesday, we started off with a nice walk, then back home for breakfast. Today’s longer hike was into Tennessee Valley, a great walk down to the ocean. We had a wonderful Mexican food late lunch, before going to Whole Foods for shopping. I love that market, which has everything that I enjoy eating. One of our old friends will join us for dinner this evening, with good conversations guaranteed! Having a fabulous trip so far, and then on Friday will fly down to Long Beach for almost a week with my parents and family. I’ll catch up with you again soon, hope you are doing well. Aloha, Glenn.

October 22-23 Hi again, I had a fabulous day yesterday, starting off with the traditional early walk, this time down to a marsh, under low clouds and fog. Had a couple of eggs that we had bought at a local farmers market, along with potatoes, and toast for breakfast…and of course espresso too. We watched Democracy Now on TV, which is something my friend Linda enjoys most mornings. I like the program, but sometimes feel a little bogged down with all the stuff going on in the world, of which…I’d prefer not to know so much about. We ended up at Tennessee Valley again, walking all the way down to the ocean, where there was an active high surf advisory along the coast. The waves were large and powerful. We took off our shoes, and ran around some on the sand. Being more experienced in such conditions, I was the one responsible for telling Linda when to run back, so we didn’t get wet. We drove back to her house, for another wine and sunset, end to the day. ~~~ Today is Friday, and I took the Marin Airporter down to the San Francisco airport, for a short one hour flight down to Long Beach. My Mom picked me up, and I ended up visiting with her and my Dad during the afternoon. My brother Steve flies in from Texas just after 6pm, and I’ll go pick him up. I’m sure this will be a great family reunion, I’ll come back and let you know what’s going on in a couple of days. Aloha, Glenn

October 24-28 Good morning, it’s been a while since I’ve had a chance to sit down and write a few words. The reason…work! Oh yeah, my brother and I have been working our way through a long list of things to do at my parents house. He and I start off our days around 630am, jumping in my Mom’s car, and cruizing over to the coffee place my brother likes to get a cup of coffee to go. Then, it’s over to the donut shop that he picks up pasteries for my parents, and yes…I’ve been indulging some too. We then check the list, go to the store and buy building materials and stuff, and come back for a day of work. He and I are both used to working, so it’s good that we have something to do. At night we all sit around the living room, eating our dinners on TV trays, watching Monday night football, or whatever’s on that particular evening. ~~~ Since I last wrote we had a big family reunion at my sisters daughters house, which was fun. Since my brother and I leave tomorrow, we’re having everyone over again today. This morning Steve and I drove up to the top of Signal Hill and watched the sun rise over the mountains surrounding the LA basin. We’ll be finishing up our work this morning, before everyone comes over for lunch. ~~~ Steve flies back to Texas Thursday, and I fly up to San Francisco…where my good friend Bob will pick me up, then driving up to Linda’s house in Marin County. Bob and I take off up the coast from there, where we’ve rented a place right on a bluff over looking the ocean…located between Gualala and Point Arena. This rental has an outdoor hot tub overlooking the ocean, along with a big stone fireplace, which will be a treat. I’ll catch up with you at some point over the next week or so. Be well until then, Aloha, Glenn.

October 29-November 3 I had a great time being with my Mom, Dad, two sisters, and brother in southern California. I love each of them, and enjoyed our time together. Wow, the best of the best, that’s how I could describe the time between when I last wrote…and now!  I flew back up to Marin from Long Beach, and my best friend Bob picked me up, and from there the word fun kicked in big time. The first evening we went out to eat at a place in Larkspur called Left Bank, which served up good eats. The next morning we started off the day early by hiking through the Tennessee Valley, a nice valley down to the ocean. Later that morning Bob and I jumped in his Toyota Prius and headed north on Highway 101. We headed towards the coast by getting off in Cotati, and driving to Sebastopol. Bob and I both went to Sonoma State University in that general area, where we were deeply involved in Geography and Meteorology. We sat around in the warm sun outside the Whole Foods store there, and enjoyed seeing the people walking by. Someone saw the T-shirt I was wearing, which said Hana, Maui on it, which often triggered conversations about the islands. We took the drive out through Guerneville to Jenner, following alongside the Russian River. We finally made it to our vacation rental called Moonstar, which was absolutely perfect! 

~~~ Bob had one entire side of this great house, while I took up residence in the other. I was always the first one up in the morning, getting out to the hot tub well before sunrise. It happened to be full moon while we were visiting Moonstar, which was so cool. At any rate, we headed north for breakfast in Point Arena that first morning, after which we drove north to the Russian Gulch for a long hike. This area winds through old growth Redwood stands, ending up at a waterfall. While we were stopped there, admiring the beauty, two women walked up, one of which worked and lived in the nearby town of Mendocino, while the other lived in Novato. What could have been a brief hello in passing, turned out to be nearly an hour long in depth conversation about such things as what does Being Here Now mean? This day happened to be Halloween, and we had found out about a dance in Point Arena that night. Bob and I both love to dance, and to drink a couple of shots of vodka to loosen ourselves up properly before hand…which we did. The music was great, with lots of folks to dance with on the nice size floor. Upon returning to Moonstar at night, we almost always took a hot tub, and went over the fine details of the day.

~~~ The next day, well, it was yet another stunningly beautiful day, as they all were, with glorious sunshine, and not much wind on the ocean. The day started off, at least for me, as the last stars gave way to the gradually lightening of the morning sky. When Bob got up, one thing lead to another, like coffee to an early morning cocktail before the sun even rose! Under general circumstances, having a drink before sunrise would never happen, no way, never. But, we were deep into nature, and somehow things just turned that way, and by the way, was so much fun to watch the ocean, which was right below the bluff this house sat on, surrounded by nine full acres of coastal environment. We watched all the sea birds flying by, the full moon slipping into the ocean, sometimes listening to the Moody Blues, or Neil Young on the stereo, with the speakers out the windows towards the hot tub, sometimes loud! We headed up highway 1 again, all the way up to the small town of Mendocino. We took a right off the highway into the Big River State Park, where we were amazed at how pristine it was. We hiked up through the forest on a nice trail, and then took a sharp right down a cliff to the flood plain below. There were stands of Redwood, Douglas Fir, and a few others lining the river. We spent several hours out in the sun just talking about life in all directions. We then went into Mendocino and had lunch, before driving back south to our place. We ended up at a great restaurant called St. Orres, near our Moonstar for dinner. We sat by the fireplace out front enjoying a glass of wine, and somehow we eventually began talking to these two women who were hanging out too. We ended up talking for several hours with them, inviting them to have dinner with us at our table. We talked about everything under the sun, I mean the full November moon! 

~~~ This brought us up to our last full day on the coast, and by then we were a bit tired, after all the long hikes, early and late hours, and to some extent partying. After all the same activities as the day before before sunrise and after, and having a nice breakfast, we headed out for what we thought would be a short walk. As things sometimes turn out, this short jaunt, turned out to be a long hike down the coast, along the entire nine acres of our ocean front property. It was totally fun to just have the time to explore, to sit and ponder the beauty, and of course have another long talk about nature, weather, spirituality, and likely women…knowing Bob and I. This last morning started off in the hot tub, admiring the huge ocean, and lots of waves breaking on the rocks right there in front. We drove north, stopping off in Point Arena at the co-op, saying goodbye to a old friend of mine who owns the store, Peter. We drove north and then east to the small town of Boonville, in the lovely wine grape growing Anderson Valley…known best for its Pinot Noir. We stopped at our favorite vineyard, called Goldeneye, and sat out in the courtyard soaking in the beauty of the grape vines, in their splendid green, yellow, and red leaves…on an exceptionally sunny and abnormally warm day. We tasted some of the wine, and got talking to one of the lady wine servers there, named Jeana, not exactly sure of the spelling. The three of us hit it off so well we ended spending almost three hours there speaking about everything wine, and our own lives too. Bob works for the County of Sacramento, in the area of Geographical Information Systems (GIF), and teaches at San Francisco State College, and two other colleges in the central Valley. He has been accepted to teach classes at UC Davis too, and has applied to Berkeley as well. Jeana lived with her husband and three kids on 40 acres on a ridge above Boonville. Their place is powered by the sun exclusively, and is country living at its finest. Me, well, you know what I do already. We then drove south to Linda’s house in Marin, and sat out on her deck and shared a bottle of red wine, before taking a good walk, and then back for dinner. 

~~~ We all got up early Wednesday morning, wanting to fit in one more hike, this time back to Tennessee Valley. We had to get back early so Bob could get cleaned up, fed, coffee’d, and ready for the drive back to Sacramento to begin work at noon. He taught that evening, so it was going to be a long day for h. Linda and I will be doing some stuff, but to tell you the truth, I feel like I need to recouperate a little. This time with Bob, which we do every year, was as I mentioned before, the best of the best, and is probably what I look forward to doing the most of anything that I do in a typical year. I really couldn’t write about everything, as I would have needed twice the space, although now that I think of it, spotting that coyote out in a field along highway 1 was great too…once we got the binoculars on him. So, I’m going to go out on the deck now, and wait for Linda to get back home. I need to go get a new cell phone battery charger, which I accidently left up north. I’ll get back online at least once or twice more before flying back to Maui, and trust that all of you are enjoying yourselves! Be well my friends, Aloha, Glenn.

November 4-6 Picking up the story again, Wednesday afternoon the weather began to look like rain…which finally began later in the day. I stayed home and relaxed, although finally got out to rake all the leaves off the grass before the light rains began. We, Linda and I also mowed the lawns, I grabbed a bottle of wine from the cellar, and we made dinner together. Dinner consisted of Miso soup, with tofu, bock choy, and noodles. We were tired after that, and sat watching a little television, before I went to bed early, to catch up on some much needed sleep. Thursday morning, we headed out on a new walk, taking in the sights along the way. Breakfast consisted of fruit salad, oatmeal, and coffee…along with a previously purchased fancy pastry from the shopping center. Linda took off for yoga, and I retired to reading on the deck, in the nice warm sunshine. We took a drive to San Rafael, to one of the best farmers markets in the area. When we got home, we had a quick java boost, before driving over to Tennessee Valley, with leftover drizzle in the air…but we were determined. Linda suggest a route in the valley that she hadn’t hiked in over 10 years. Along the way we saw four big wild turkeys, which mesmerized me. Further up the trail, we saw a Western Blue Bird, a Mule deer with a large rack of antlers…then we began looking for a Bobcat in the late afternoon sunshine, punctuated by a lovely a rainbow. We didn’t see a cat, but ended up spotting a coyote…which was a major treat! Just after enjoying the coyote company, a Great Horned Owl began hooting in the nearby forest as we were leaving. The day seemed to warrant the opening of a 375ML bottle of 2006 Anderson Valley Goldeneye Pinot Noir, which was delicious. We then cooked a grass fed ribeye steak, plated with small yukon gold potatoes, a salad, and tiny steamed brussel sprouts, sprinkled with grated cheese. Later in the evening, we turned on her computer and watched youtube video’s. 

~~~ Friday morning we started off early by walking along a marsh creek, where we saw about 25 Great Egrets and Snowy Egrets, and a Coopers Hawk…don’t forget that Linda is a birder! We came back for an oatmeal breakfast, watched Democracy Now with Amy Goodman on the television. I called a friend who used to work at the Pacific Disaster Center on Maui, who now works in downtown San Francisco. Linda dropped me off at the Ferry building, and I ferried to San Francisco, with a heavy drizzle falling. I got a window seat and immediately started talking with a gentleman who pulled in across from me. We chatted through the entire voyage across the bay about this and that. We docked, and I was astonished by the crowds of people, and the level of loud talking surrounding me. I found a reasonably quiet nook, and called my friend Jeff Logan on the cell phone, who walked from his office, and met me. We hadn’t seen each other in many years, so it was great to catch up some while having a Thai lunch together. We then went to his office, called CustomWeather, Inc. where I met many of his fellow workers. We spent about two hours there, which was great, looking out of his office windows at all the people walking by below, and the surrounding tall buildings. Then we took the bus from SF across the Golden Gate Bridge, to Larkspur, near Corte Madre and San Rafael. We met his wife Melle at a restaurant called Benissimo, where we had a nice Italian dinner and a glass of red wine. Later, after dinner and great conversation, we headed over to a place where meditation was taking place, along with a talk by a man named David. Afterwards we went to Jeff and Melle’s place for Chamomile tea. They both have Harley Davidson motorcycles, and showed me a great slide show of their travels to the Sierra Nevada mountains, and the canyon-lands of Utah. It was a very long day, and I was pooped when I got back to Linda’s at around 1130pm. I heard Linda get in past midnight, after her Tango dance evening in San Francisco.

November 7-8 Saturday was rather a low key day, at least through most of the morning into the early afternoon hours. Linda and I got invited over to some friend’s house for dinner and a glass of wine. We drove part way, and then walked the rest of the way. There were five lovely ladies at this dinner party, which was especially enjoyable for me! We all knew each other, although I did meet one new friend. This person was driving one of the ladies to the SF airport, for a long flight to Sri Lanka, where she will be teaching yoga for the next five months. My friends Jeff and Mele, who live nearby had called me earlier in the day and invited me to go to see a new film with them. They picked me up, and we went to see the new Michael Jackson film called This Is It. This film was excellent, especially because I have admired MJ’s music and dancing skills from way back. A couple of their lady friends had saved us a seat, which was fortunate, as the theatre was totally packed. I loved the film, and hope to see it again when I get back to Maui. The five of us then went to a restaurant/bar nearby, and sat around raving about the film over a glass of wine. All of the above would have generally made for a good day, but no, we weren’t quite through yet. We all went over to one of the ladies house for more fun, which turned out to be dancing in her front room to MJ video’s. I’m not sure where she got these long playing video’s, but they were excellent. Jeff and Mele drove me back to Linda’s after all this, and I slipped under the warm down comforter on my big bed, which felt so good!

~~~ Today is my last full day of vacation, so that I’m right at the tail-end of my time away from the islands. Linda and I just hung around through the morning, having another wonderful breakfast together. I love sitting out on her deck watching all the birds while I sip on my coffee each morning. We had a mutual friend stop over during the afternoon, who had just flown in from Australia. His girlfriend had just picked him up from the airport in SF, and they were on their way home to Santa Rosa. Shortly thereafter Linda and I took off for a long walk out in nature. I wish I could tell you where we went, but unfortunately I didn’t catch the name of this place. I would ask Linda, but she’s out Tango dancing again this evening. I do know however that it was along the slopes of Mount Tamalpais, which are exceptionally beautiful. We ended up stopping by one of Linda’s friends on the way home, who lives in a small canyon. His name is Nick, and he served Linda a small glass of red wine, while we went out in his back yard and observed all the birds that frequent that area. Nick has all kinds of bird feeders placed in the trees surrounding his house, so there is a marvelous number of bird species that were flitting around like crazy. They were busy talking about birds, and using their binoculars to take closer looks. We made it back to Linda’s, where I retired to the back deck with a glass of red wine myself. This particular bottle, which I got out of the cellar, was a very nice Atascadero Creek 2002 Sonoma County Green Valley, Pinot Noir from Railroad Vineyard. I’m sitting here now, after watching the sunset, and snipping the most incredibly fragrant red rose in Linda’s yard!

~~~ I’m waiting for Linda to get home, so had some time to write these last two paragraphs. We’ll have dinner together, probably watch some television, and then it will be time to gear up on Monday, for the flight back to Kahului, Maui. One of my neighbors is picking me up from the airport at around 5pm, leading into Tuesday…my first day back to work. This will be the last sharing that I will be doing before slipping back into my regular routine Tuesday. I hope you have enjoyed reading about my vacation as much as I have enjoyed using these writings as sort of a journal. By the way, we have some potentially heavy rains coming to the Hawaiian Islands around Wednesday and Thursday, with possible flooding and maybe even a thunderstorm or two! I’ll catch up with you either Monday evening, or certainly by early Tuesday morning. Be well until then, Aloha for now…Glenn.

November 9 Hi everyone, I’m home here in Kula, Maui, and it’s so warm in Hawaii…at least compared to northern California. I have more to say, but my neighbors have invited me for dinner, as I have no food, and need to shop soon. When I turned my computer on I found it to be not working properly. This of course leaves me high and dry in terms of updating this website, at least at home. I’m using my neighbors right now, and hopefully I’ll have mine fixed soon. I should be able to get on another computer again Tuesday, so will be back online then. Be well, Aloha, Glenn.