“We both grew up here.” Kunane said as he took a good look around. “Over there, that fallen tree has been there since I was boy. For as long as I can remember. And that cave to the west,” he said pointing to a dark spot on the cliff face, ” we use to build fires there in the summer.”
I just listened as I tired to take it all in. Kunane and Jolene had told me earlier that few people had ever actually been down here and I believe it. After an hour drive along the island cost we finally came to a large coffee bean plantation with the road winding to the left and then to the right every 25 yards or so. “”Take this next left” he would say, “But don’t get to close to the edge of the cliff. Once, my uncle went over it and rolled his jeep all the way to the bottom.” My fingers gripped the wheel until my knuckles turned white as we crept onward. Finally we arrived to a small gate with a rusted padlock on it. Kunane jumped out and after dialing an age old combination of numbers popped the lock off and swung the gate wide open. The journey continued, taking us down a steep incline and I could feel any rock larger than a tennis ball scraping the under carriage of the car. “What the hell, its just a rental.” I thought as we bounced and splashed our way down the mountain side. I often wondered if we would ever make it back up in my tiny Corolla. At this point it appeared highly unlikely. After what seemed like an eternity, and on the edge of being car sick we finally rounded a small bend in the red dirt road and came into a clearing with a tiny shack. A weathered hammock hung between two towering Palm trees framing the most beautiful ocean in the world. We had arrived. Sort of.
After carefully selecting a few lenses I threw my gear bag over my shoulder and joined Kunane and Jolene on a small path that lead up to the rocky ocean coastline. It was a team effort and after nearly losing my shoes on several different occasions and my gear bag on one particularly scary occasion we made the final assent to the point where the cliff face levels out high above the crashing waves below.
Jolene’s voice jolted me back to the present. “This land has been in our families for generations. All the way back to our great grandparents. There has always been a question as to which family it actually belongs to.”
I could tell right away by the tightening of her voice that this was an extremely sensitive subject between them both. “Well, today, this land belongs to you both. Today its yours and yours alone.” I said as I headed to the fallen tree that Kunane had pointed out earlier.
This was the most beautiful place I had ever stood. No question there. The blue Pacific threw itself against a million years of lava rock creating the only black sand beach I had ever seen in with my own eyes. Black as night I tell you. I reached down and took a hand full and then ever so slowly let it slip between my fingers allowing it to fall and find it’s new home on the shore. Then I dug my toes into the sand and closed my eyes and imaged how fierce the molten rock must have been as it spilled from the center of the earth and into the ocean millions of years ago creating these amazing black formations all around us. And then I thought about how it wasn’t necessarily the weight of the waves or the force of them that turned solid rock to black sand. It was the shear commitment of them. A subtle reminder that patience and diligence paired with a committed heart can bring any mountain to its knees. May this be a reminder to them as they face the rest of the lives together. May this be a reminder to us all.