We placed this geocache way back in 2014 and it’s been a problem child ever since! But first some background info:
I had finished logging out all the trails west of Devil’s Rest and had finished brushing them out as well. Placing over a dozen geocaches with my friend Jeff in an attempt to get more folks up there hiking and putting some boots on the ground. Our boots on the ground idea worked great but some of the caches turned out to be tasty morsels for the local fauna, especially the El Tenedor del Diablo cache. Over the next three years four or five containers were destroyed but this was a minor inconvenience since I liked the area regularly and enjoyed going up there to fine tune the trails and keep the brush at bay.
Then came the Eagle Creek fire. The fire took out only two of my caches and damaged another one but what the Forest Service did was way worse! They destroyed at least half of the trails that had developed along the many old logging roads by putting up berms and ditches. To make matters worse, they cut down many hundreds of trees, perhaps as many as a couple of thousand and scattered them on the routes. This resulted in a major mess and for a while it looked like the entire trail system was gone for good. I despaired for some time and spent my efforts elsewhere but eventually decided to get to work on it. It’s taken almost eight years, but all the major trails are cleared and reroutes made where it was easier to build a new trail rather than fix the Forest Service damage. There are at least two other folks who have done work up there too and major kudos to both of them. Without their work, I might have given up on the project.
Here are a few photos of the damage before we started to work on it.
This section was one of the easier ones. A case of pick-up-sticks:
These next photos show more typical damage done by the Forest Service: This first section was near impossible.
In this area we had to give up and build a complete re-route:
Here’s Kelly wishing I’d find a real trail to hike.
This took some time, but the logs were smaller, so we were able to get it done.
In all, we cut over a thousand logs off of the routes and as of 2026 all the main trails have been restored and reroutes constructed to bypass sections that were too far gone.
Typical trail views in 2026:
I made a few signs, too. For this one I honored Basil Clark by using his devil design: Even after 40 years, Clark’s signs are still on some of the trees near DR.
Before the final sanding and finishing:
The Bullet Car sign was one of the first made and I didn’t put a sealant coat on it at first. It weathered badly.
Here it is after one refinishing and a couple more years of weather:
And finally, after a complete re-sanding and a better finish coat in May 2026:
Here is one of the She Devil signs before final finishing:
Here is how all my signs are now cured-by-heat: Sitting on top like this they get hit with as much as 200 degrees for a day or two.
I hope this final step helps them to last longer:
Back to the original story: The El Tenedor cache:
Along one of the original trails is a magnificent noble fir with three forks evenly spaced. A tree that long ago had its top broken off, refused to give up and persisted against so many odds. Sometime between 2017 and 2021 one of the tines broke off, but the tree is just as magnificent, with only two tines.
Here it is in April of 2014:
And the original from Romancing the Stone the movie I got the idea from. I think ours is much better!
Here is the tree in May of 2026:
The tree is 4′ 7″ in diameter and here’s Kel to model how big it is:
Here’s how I fixed the problem of the marauding critters. A steel cache container and a very secure chain. I went back a couple weeks later and the container had been moved from under the log, so whatever likes this cache is still at it!
Looking back at the rocks and logs that re-channeled the creek, it may be possible to remove this blockage and channel it back to where it belongs.
The water on the other side of this is a couple feet above the lower end of the blockage so this could change and re-route in the next high-water event.
Another view of the blockage with Paul for scale:
We hiked up the now-dry streambed. This was a raging creek bed for the past several years. Now dry since the two atmospheric rivers of Dec. 8/9 and 18/19
caused the creek to move to the west side of the canyon.
We discovered yet another washout that took a few dozen feet of trail: This washout looks like it could be fixed without too much difficulty? I think the long horizontal and bark less log was the edge of the trail.
In a couple of spots, we had to carve a passage through branches but finally made our way to good views of the rest of the canyon and the falls. as well as a good launching spot for the drone.
At least two and as much as six feet or more of this bank has eroded into the creek during the flood.
Here is a good overall view of the area via drone:
In this drone video, you can see how the creek veered to the west, veered back east and then back west again at about :06. There’s an even better view starting at :34. Those two areas where it went west are the exact spots where the trail was wiped out. Towards the end of the video, you can see where the viewpoint once was, now washed away. No sound, sorry.
October 5th turned out to be a wonderful day for a hike: 45 degrees at the TH when we started and it never got above about 60 all day. Here’s the view up the gorge at the end of the day.
The “Mystery” Bridge
Pascal, Kazuko, Chizuru and Keiko pose for a photo on the way to the giant cedar grove
Ragnar’s ship? Year 834. Probably not the first, but possibly a later one he buried Lagertha in? Close up of the year 834 ship Ragnar’s ship as found, before cleaning up and some preservation work. Original Viking axes
(This includes photos and notes from both the 2007 trip and also another attempt in 2009)
I set off for Maui a couple of days after Thanksgiving, 2007 and made plans to do some hiking and exploring on the Valley Isle. After five different hikes I was ready for something more interesting and challenging: In researching remote and difficult locations I came upon some information about a plateau high on the north face of the West Maui Mountains called Eke Crater. I found only one trail guidebook (Maui Trailblazer by Jerry and Janine Sprout) that even mentioned Eke, and the description was daunting: “With some 30 feet of rainfall each year. You can’t walk there – too far and too dangerous, with tangles of greenery, muddy rockslides, and lava tubes ready to slurp up a wayward hiker. ….Foliage presents a defeating obstacle and rain at this point would be downright demoralizing.”
Here’s an aerial photo I stole off the web: This originally appeared in the Hawaiian Airlines Magazine, Hana Hou: This is bigger than it looks: It’s a quarter mile wide at the top!
Here’s another photo showing the rare silver swords, unique to Hawaii and these particular ones unique to just the Eke Crater area and possibly also in the Pu’u Kukui area as well:
Well, rain was at hand since the storm that has drenched the Pacific NW for the past several days had its origin deep in the tropics and Maui got it first! (At least it was Warm rain!) Further investigation revealed even more interesting information about Eke: One source talked about ancient ruins and even a sundial that long predated the ancient Hawaiians and suggested that this was a relic of the lost civilization of Mu, fabled to have been lost as much at 50,000 years ago somewhere in the vast Pacific Ocean. Another source stated that Eke Crater was considered by early Hawaiians to be Heaven’s gate, the doorway from this world to the next.
Legends have lived down through the millennia of lost worlds and lost civilizations such as Atlantis, Lemuria, Mu, Cibola and many more. Some stories have turned out to be true such as the lost city and civilization of Troy, a legend for over two thousand years until the city was found in the 1870’s. Others, such as Cibola and Lemuria, probably were never based in fact and few still give them any credence. A thing often in common with such legends is that the city or civilizations have sunk into the sea or that the actual location is simply unknown. This site, however, is known, albeit extremely difficult to get to!
An adventurer who actually made it to Eke Crater over a hundred and twenty years ago said “It rises abruptly from the mountain side several hundred feet in height with its sides spangled with silver swords and shining grasses. It is so situated with all its sides higher than the surrounding land that it has received no debris from the wash of the mountain and therefore has its thirty pits still open and apparently bottomless.
“I ascended it the first time early one morning after a still and cloudless night and found columns of steam like smoke rising from seven of these pits. It was the warm breath of these volcanic throats turning into vapor in the cold upper air. The cavernous depths of this crater evidently form vast reservoirs, not now for molten rock, but for water to supply the neighboring valleys. The chief parts of the streams of Honokohau, Kahakuloa, and Waihee gush forth from its sides and base.”
With tales like these, how could I not give it a try!?
I should note: It would be unwise to trek beyond the last of the hog fences I encountered due to the possibility of introducing weed seeds or other seeds from your boots or clothing that might eventually sully this pristine area. Also, there are many rare and indigenous plants etc. that you might crush or otherwise disturb. Lastly, you could get killed by falling into a vegetation covered pit or lava tube or fall off a cliff hidden in foliage. No one would likely ever find you since the feral hogs would get you long before any rescuers could. Cell phones don’t work here, either. That being said – enjoy!
Eke Crater looming out of the mists, 4,500 feet high and 10 miles away in this photo from the main road:
I carefully plotted the coordinates of the start of the trek into my GPS and saw that the maps showed 4WD roads leading about half of the way, and then a trail aptly named Eke Crater Trail for the remainder. I’ve done long grueling hikes into the Hawaiian jungles so had a pretty good idea of what to expect and to say the least, did not expect to find much of a trail. With no guidebook action and the daunting descriptions found online, probably very few if any Hawaiians or Hawaii visitors hiked this trail often enough to keep it open. My guess was correct. I had hoped to find at least a couple of miles of serviceable road to take care of some of the hot, humid lower elevations of the route but it was not to be: I found a locked gate just a few hundred feet off the main highway at a hunter check station. A sign stated that the gate was open weekends for 4WD only. As it turned out, they meant what they said about 4WD only and I soon found that even if the gate was open, I could not have gotten more than about a half mile up the road in my 2WD rental car anyway. So, the start of my journey was at 350’ elevation, it was 80 degrees plus, and the humidity felt close to 100%, (though in reality, was only in the 80% range.) There is no shade for the first few miles, so the sun beats down relentlessly.
At the gate, 350′ elevation: I loved that “Driz-a-bone” hat from Australia: I lost it in Jan. 2013 on a epic off-trail trek to the high point of Molokai while coming back in total darkness with a rapidly fading flashlight.
I walked the easily hikeable 4WD road for 1.5 miles and came to a permanently closed gate. From here on out it was a bushwhack of varying intensity from difficult to extremely difficult. I pushed on, buoyed by the occasional glimpses of my distant quarry through the ever-changing clouds.
Eroded landscape at the start of the trek:
A deeply eroded section of road about a mile in.
Looking back along the ridge we hiked:
Telephoto shot of Eke from the road/trail:
One of the gates, I think this is the second one, but I don’t remember for sure:
I came to another fence at the 3.7-mile point and yet another at 4.3 miles in. It appeared that there once was a rough 4WD road all the way to this last fence, but it appeared to have not been used or maintained for decades. Looking back along the route:
At the third fence, I found this ominous sign that said snares were in use beyond this point to control feral pigs! I was careful where I stepped for the rest of the hike!! Being careful was of no avail, as I was snared three times and once, the snare caught me so abruptly, I fell flat on my face.
After a few more hours of difficult struggle through dense brush I uncountered yet another fence. Here the Eke Trail must have continued beyond this fourth fence, but it was clear that no one had come this way for many, many years and the way was completely blocked by a dense mixture of shrubs, ferns and low trees. I battled my way to the edge of a fifty foot drop off and could see where a trail must have once been. The tread was still there but was now completely choked with head high, dense ferns. I’ve shwacked through this kind vegetation before and know full well that forward progress in this kind of jungle is measured in the yards per hour not the miles per hour so, reluctantly, had to retreat at least for the duration of this particular visit to Maui.
Wind-sculpted vegetation on the windward side of the ridge:
Final turn-around: Here the route drops abruptly about 50′ and I could see a trail tread under and between the heavily encroaching foliage, but I knew there was no way to finish this trek in the time remaining, if at all. Picture taken Feb. 7th, 2009.
It was forecast to be a scorching hot day, 100 in town which meant probably 90 up on Larch Mt. so I got somewhat of an early start. Leaving the house at 7:40 got me to the snow gate on the Larch Mt. Rd. at 8:40 and that’s early for me. I drove in on the 1520 road a few hundred feet and parked and geared up for a short hike.
First, I headed down the Bridge trail and cleared a few small logs off Eric’s new route to Coronary. Then it was back up the Bridge trail to neaten it up a bit. As I passed the lower end of the “bike” route to the Bridge trail, I decided to do a little clean up since I had some extra time and lots of battery. I wasn’t expecting the swarm of little bees that came out of one of the logs! They staged a coordinated kamikaze attack and hit me three times simultaneously. Damn, those little buggers pack a punch! One even got me through my T-shirt. I got out of the area as fast as I could, uttering a few choice words in the process. I was reminded once again that no good deed goes unpunished: That side trail, I think, was made by mountain bikers so clearing it wasn’t going to help me but help the bikers. And I haven’t been on a bike in years!
Arriving back at the car, I unloaded the saw and accessories and hiked another 2/10 mile down the road to where the main event for the day awaited: An unexplored skid road. I hoped for an easy–to-follow line but it was not to be. The area was heavily vegetated, littered with downed trees and the devils club was particularly lush. I knew my quarry was there from studying the LIDAR map, but I could not find any trace of it. I must be off track, and in this kind of terrain, the skid road could be just a couple dozen feet away and would be hard to spot. Zig-zagging, I found it and was able to follow it to the previously discovered rails.
Devil’s club, my favorite:
The view looking up the skid road once I found it: you can see why It was hard to find this thing!
Farther down the line, here is a section that had logs at right angles to the pull direction to ease friction. All you can see is the depressions in the ground
where the logs once lay.
It turned out the previously discovered rails were uphill from the line and in between, lo and behold, more relics! Another rail, some cable and lots more hardware.
A light duty rail with some serious rust. I think it says, “ILLINOIS 31 LBS”. I couldn’t make out the rest.
Another unknown artifact. For scale, the nail plate is about an inch thick and about a foot in diameter.
After some documentation, I headed back in a wide circle to the Bridge trail. It was getting hotter by the minute but not nearly as bad as the folks in town were dealing with.
This was only 2.3 miles and about 500’ EG so a light day and wonderful new finds. I can’t wait to go back and see what else is there.
Another fun day in the woods with Matt, Linda, Warren, Tom, Jim and Archie (Matt’s Golden retriever). Tom, Jim and Warren carried Tom’s new bridge the mile and a half up the trail to install it as an add-on over an old slippery wooden bridge making it much safer for hikers. Tom tacked some non-slip expanded metal grating on the length of this 2 x 12 inch, 12-foot-long treated board, his third bridge project for this area. Way to go, Tom!!
Warren, Matt and I headed farther up the trail to take out a couple of trees freshly fallen and also to clear the Two Chiefs ridge shortcut trail. Warren got to work on grading a switchback route to the start of the ridge while Matt and I continued up the ridge removing small logs and branches along the way. We continued past the ridge and worked to clear more of a two-foot diameter log I’d cut partially off the trail a couple of months ago. Linda arrived later and helped Warren with the new trail work.
Here’s that “smaller” log when Craig Gwydir and I encountered it on Jan. 26th:
And when I went back to take it out Feb. 11th. (below)
On April 9th Matt and I removed a six-foot section so there’s room enough for most any SAR vehicle to pass if needed.
The battery was running down after that, so we went back to fetch another one that Warren carried up for me. Eventually, Matt, Warren, Linda and Archie gathered at The Twins and went to work.
The Twins when Craig and I first got there in January – Craig gets naming credit for The Twins: Note the clippers in Craig’s hand “Uh, Don, how is this going to work!?”
Here’s Archie, inspecting the job at hand:
We worked on the bigger, top log until the battery ran out but still needed a bit more power to get the log to fall. Matt went back to get the not-quite-used-up previous battery and Warren came back with him to help.
We finally (after a considerable group effort) got a four-foot section cut out of the log, thus improving the passage and called it a day. This log is over 26″ diameter so is at the very limit for my little saw, but it got ‘er done! We will finish opening up the passage later, but it is much easier to get through now.
Here’s a short video of the new ridge trail: The Ridge Shortcut on the Two Chief’s trail. The shortcut saves nearly a mile and about 130′ elevation gain if using it both ways. It’s much more fun, too.
7 hours 45 minutes on the trail today, 6.9 miles, 1520′ elevation gain.
Update: Matt and I returned on April 22nd and cut a clear path out of the two logs. We wanted to cut the path wider but were out of time and out of battery. Maybe later!
