Photo Friday – Kilauea lava entry into the ocean on Hawaii

IMG_3719

My first Photo Friday and Aloha Friday combined is almost in my back yard area of East Hawaii. Down the road, about an hours drive from my home in Orchidland to the end of the two lane highway is Kalapana, a small community wiped out by lava coming down from the hillsides of the still active volcano at Kilauea.

I woke up early ( I mean 4am) with some close friends to hike and witness live lava spilling out from lava tubes high up at Kilauea Volcano down into the ocean, and creating an amazing new black sand beach. The moment hot lava spills the cold Pacific, it spatters into fine particles of sand and rock, creating rich black sand particles that gets swept into various coves, and forming new beaches that appear and disappear with each new tide.

The stars were still bright along with a crescent moon that helped us climb and manuever areas of black lava rock – no marked trails but a bright red plume along the coastline marked our destination point. The hike was over two hours long in one direction with only our flashlights and illumination of the stars and moon to help traverse through mounds of smooth pahoehoe (rolling)rock and then very aa (sharp) rocks and formations.  Having done this a few times, I was able to guide our small group of adventurers over unpredictable lava formations and uneven elevations, slow and easy across more accessible and flatter terrain.

After a long hike in darkness, we were able to make it to the rugged shoreline and morning was about to approach. The dark skies turning dusky blue, making the rest of the hike easier and avoid the tricky areas along the coastline.

IMG_3691

Even though the morning was pretty cloudy, we were able to get a little sunrise with views over the cliff sides of the Puna coastline. I have to make another trip again to get a better sunrise experience. But turning back towards the lava entry into the ocean, we were awarded with amazing views of live lava.

IMG_3690

Pure lava, pouring out from the lava tubes directly into the ocean provided spectacular views. (So glad I carried a longer lens to capture these details from a distance)

IMG_3768

IMG_3726

IMG_3789

After seeing the amazing scenes unfold, we decided to hike back, the trip back was easier with daylight and the rougher areas were easily avoided.  Finding some interesting landmarks like the sign below gave a better perspective on how this area was still open and paved less than a year ago in 2012, and now it was inundated with new lava formations.

IMG_3797

I can never seem to come back here for inspiration and seeing things constantly change. It’s so amazing to see nature create and destroy at the same time beyond human timeframes.

To see more images of this hike, come and visit my flickr site at http://www.flickr.com/photos/12701042@N04/sets/72157633226478198/with/8642087038/

Merrie Monarch Parade – A beautiful parade to photograph in Hawaii.

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

One of the largest and most colorful parades to attend in Hawaii is the annual Merrie
Monarch Parade in Hilo, Hawaii. This beautiful parade caps a week-long
celebration of hula events all around Hilo and celebrates hula as the basis of
each participating entrant to the event. This year’s parade with over 170
participants was the largest number of groups active with the celebration.

Along with the usual bands, civic groups and clubs, the Merrie Monarch parade celebrates
everything surrounding the week long hula fest.  There is usually a variety of pageant queens including our own Miss Aloha hula contestant winner.
Then there is a contingent of this year’s Hawaiian royalty, kings, queens and other
historical members of the Hawaiian royal family who are chosen to be this year’s
royal court members.  The royal float contains live music performers serenading the court and is filled with fresh tropical flowers and exotic tropical plants.
All the floats are lavishly decorated with colorful flowers like orchids, gingers and
plumeria which are grown commercially for export and showcasing the abundance
of plant and tropical flowers grown on the island.  Many of the floats feature live performers
singing favorite Hawaiian tunes along with local dancing hula halaus (schools) dancing in perfect synch to the music.
A favorite of the audience are the local pa’u riders (parade horseback riders) with their extravagant outfits and vivid floral displays of leis and other adornments. Representing each island with their local official color and flower, each pa’u rider is an amazing sight to behold in the procession. Even the horse poop carriers and scoopers are creatively presented and fun to witness their vital task of pooper scooper tasks.

Even the paniolo men (cowboys) were handsomely presented with their horses in beautiful regalia to match the island colors and flowers.

 

At the tail end of each horse contingent are the pooper scoopers, this was actually one of the favorites at the parade, due to the unique and colorful presentations that were present at this parade. This one was my favorite with the pineapple princess representing Lanai.

Unique to the Hawaiian islands are contingents that celebrate local activities like the red hat ladies, marching bands, the taiko drummers, the local ukulele marching band and various dignitaries. It all makes for a unique blend of participants that creates a fun parade experience.
The Merrie Monarch parade celebrates hula and the entire community at its best and most welcomed Aloha.  Its a beautiful event to witness and photograph with each new contingent approaching and exciting events unfolding spontaneously.

Thanks for visiting and viewing this posting, hopefully next year you may come and visit Hilo to experience this exciting festival and parade live and in person.

To see more photographs on this event, please visit this flickr site for more images.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12701042@N04/sets/72157633210534314/

©Noel Morata, All rights
reserved

 

Merrie Monarch Festival in Hilo, Hawaii

I didn’t have to travel far for my first inspiration travel posts, there are so many beautiful and amazing places to visit in all the Hawaii islands including the Big Island where I live part of the time.  Living in East Hawaii is filled with wonderful and exciting adventures especially right after Easter when the Merrie Monarch hula festival begins. Hilo town comes alive with this world wide hula venue. The festival covers everything and anything focused on the beautiful hula dance, demonstrations, competitions and various events celebrating the hula.

Every day is set with amazing hula performances at different venues around Hilo town and many hula halau (hula schools) coming from all over the world converge to enjoy, compete and perform in the festivities. You will see some of the best hula performances in the world at this week long celebration of hula.

Its a perfect opportunity for a photographer to attend a celebration like this because it happens only at certain times of the year or at limited timeframes.  Also, it brings out the best moments to photograph the daily activites, local costumes, street life, human interaction or portraiture, specialty or local food, and many other activities occuring at these venues.  Inspiration can happen at any moment during the festivities and you can capture a dynamic photograph by just walking down the street, visiting some arts  venue or participating in some of the main festival programs.

The first day of peformances starts on Easter Sunday and is a called the Ho’olaule’a (Hawaiian celebration or event). The event features well known local hula halau (hula schools) from Hawaii Island and is a favorite event with local audiences. Usually the auditorium is packed with audience members supporting their favorite hula halau with loud cheers and whistles. The energy level and spirit of Aloha is alive with the hula dancing along with audience participation.

Many hula halau include young keiki (children) dancing in their age groups and hula performances are encouraged at all ages from young to old. But the keiki hula performances are very popular and fun to watch at the Ho’olaule’a show.

Traditional hula dancing known as hula kahiko is a very popular dance to see and experience. Not only are the costumes handmade, but also their adornments, leis and musical instruments are hand done for each specific performance. Every part of a dance and costume is presented with authentic details with time consuming practise and performance. This is to present a hula dance to the audience so they can experience an authenthic and ancient hula performance.

 

The modern dance style called hula Auana is also popular with colorful outfits and a beautiful and expressive flowing style. Most hulas dances are typically done in this modern style of dance with popular Hawaiian music performed with an ukulele, guitar and base guitar combination and singers complementing the dance.

 

 

Here are a few more performance highlights of last night’s event.

The Merrie Monarch Ho’olaulea hula performances in Hilo are just the start of a week long celebration of hula dancing at its finest. The rest of the week comprises of beautiful hula demonstrations, crafts fairs, singing competitions, various competitive dance performances and a colorful parade with the champions of the hula events.

To view more images of this event, please visit my flickr site below

http://www.flickr.com/photos/12701042@N04/sets/72157633140716967/with/8610627747/

A hui hou (until we meet again) – hopefully at another beautiful hula performance at the Merrie Monarch festival in Hilo.

Welcome to Travel Photo Discovery

IMG_1171

Welcome to my first blog post to Travel Photo Discovery. My name is Noel Morata and I am an artist, writer and photographer based on Hawaii island and also part time in San Francisco. Living in two beautiful and lively areas, I can’t ask for anything more in a living situation but for some reason, I’m always drawn to go outside my own box and explore.  There’s always been something in me pushing to go out explore and discover new places and foods, people and culture, drawing so much personal inspiration and joy from these new journeys.

Always one to keep journals and notes of my travels,  one of the main objectives was to start a travel photo and adventure site to share some of my travel discoveries, observations and truly experience something unique in these new destinations. My main interest in travel photography tends to gravitate towards photojournalism, editorial, photo essays, landscape studies, portraiture and almost everything in the photographic genre that capitivates one to explore and to have a full experience. Adventure travel is also another way to experience each country and place in a different dimension and I’m always looking out for the next thrill.

I hope to impart some travel knowledge and photography tips as I learn and discover how to bring out the best in each place in its culture, architecture, food and lifestyle of each destination.  I hope to visit many local places closeby on Hawaii island and the other neighbor islands and hopefully I will be able to also visit far flung destinations still on my bucket list of future travels.

Many of my travel, stock and personal imagery is located on my flickr page, please go visit my site when you have the timeframe.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/12701042@N04/collections/

Also my main portfolio website is http://noelmorata.photoshelter.com/

I love comments to my posts, please don’t hesitate to contact me for any question or reason, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

Thank you meanwhile for visiting this site.