Never being inside Diamond Head Crater before I had absolutely no idea
where the tunnel was! So I surfed on over to Wing Ng's website how posted
alternative ways to get to the crater rim. Of course trying to follow his directions
was another matter. It took me about 45 minutes of searching for a ridgeline to
climb before I finally worked my way to a narrow concrete path that worked it's way close
to the top.Once I obtained the crater rim (east of the peak) I headed
counter-clockwise. The views are really nice from up there! Especially when
the surf it breaking huge like it was that day! Surf is definately up!
The only tricky section is right after Fort DeRussey. The ridge line thins out
and becomes quite steep. Not really "fall-you-die" but more like
"fall-you-break-bones". There were some graded sections but after I tried
to follow those and lost my line a few times I decided to just stick with the ridgeline.
At the peak (Pu'u Leahi) is a huge bunker. I'm told this is actually the way
you're supposed to get up to the rim. I tried going down but after about 5 minutes
of heading down in pitch black I decided to abandon that idea.
Working my way back down was yet another event! I decided to try to go down a
different way. It took me three dead-ends before I decided to work my way back to
that concrete path.
Date: July 5, 1998
Time Duration: 1hour (if you do it the conventional way)
Difficulty: Green (unless you have a fear of heights)
Danger: Black (the SW rim)
Notes: I would not try to blaze my own trail on this mountain again. Not
only did it add almost two hours to my time, but I felt bad with every step that eroded
away more of the mountain.
