For now all I'm going to say about Secrete Site Too, is that I first found it w/my buddy Mike something like 25-30 years ago. Very similar to our finding what to now I have been just calling Secrete Site. It's in Wai`anae Valley. More about it later. Around 8:30 Mike, Gene and I piled into my trusty multi colored truck for the short ride up to the forest reserve gate. The plan for today was to show Gene and Mike the location of the Punanaula Heiau. Years ago Mike and looked for it and never found it. The last few years I was teaching at Wai`anae High School the Hawaiian Studies class under the direction of Kumu Linda Galano and one of the State archeologists were working on the site clearing brush that hid it for years. It was with them that I first saw the heiau. After Kumu Galano left Wai`anae for the Big Island the program began to suffer and students no longer go to the site.
Some time last year I decided to try to find it again. The trail used by the students to get to the heiau was totally overgrown and I had to "bust brush" to get to it. On the way in and out I marked the trail w/ribbons but did no clearing. Today we found the year old ribbons still in place. The trail was not used by hunters, but the whole area has cattle tracks and cow paddies along the way. Looks like the rancher has not fixed his fence. Pictures to follow.
When we came to the first stream valley to cross we found it dry. Thanks to the BWS drilling wells in 1991 this stream along with many others in the valley dried up. On the bank above the stream is a water tunnel, tunnel #16 dug by the Wai`anae Sugar Plantation.
The entrance is pretty much blocked by erosion but one could enter and Mike took this picture of Gene coming out of the tunnel. He went in about 100 feet. Research says the tunnel is 297 feet long and at one time produced as much as 21,000 gallons a day. It is now dry thanks to the BWS.
In the stream there was this one strange boulder. You can see it's color is different from the others in the picture. It is of much denser rock, and there is not another like it in sight.
