Waiʻanae Range (sometimes referred to as the Waianae Mountains) is the
eroded remains of an ancient shield volcano that comprises the western
half of the Hawaiian Island of Oʻahu. Its crest, at Kaʻala, is the
highest peak on Oʻahu at 4,025 feet (1,227 m).
Like the neighboring Koʻolau, the Waiʻanae Range is not a mountain
range in the sense most people are familiar with, as the mountain
range as a whole was created from a single volcano.
The oldest lava dated from the volcano are about 3.9 million years
old. About 3.2 million years ago, the volcano's activity changed, the
rate of eruption started to decrease and the composition of the lava
erupted from the volcano changed. The volcano is thought to have last
erupted about 2.5 million years ago.
When active, the Waiʻanae volcano's center of activity was at
present-day Lualualei Valley. Intense erosion on the western flank of
the mountain has destroyed much of those flanks. Thus, the mountain
today is much smaller than it was when the volcano was active.
Interestingly, while the western part of the mountain has been destroyed by erosion, the eastern part is still in a youthful stage of erosion. This is considered somewhat strange by some geologists since the western part of the volcano is on the leeward side of the island; thus, most rain falls on the eastern side of the volcano. Given this information, more erosion would be expected on the eastern portion of the mountain. One theory to explain this odd erosion pattern is that a large landslide cut away the western portion of the volcano. The faults from this huge landslide weakened the rock, making the western part of the mountain much more susceptible to erosion than the eastern side. (wikipedia.org)
This shot is from a bit back, there was a lot of rain on the island last night so I couldn't go shoot. This is from Keawa'ula Beach (Yokohama Beach) looking south over the Waiʻanae Range.
ani lynn, Felix Schmidt Photography, gable.mak, Olivier Henguelle, and 30 other people added this photo to their favorites.
View 4 more comments
Stephmaster 9 months ago | reply
wow, outstanding. nothing more to say...
hgviola ♫ 9 months ago | reply
in one word: phantastic!
ParveenM 9 months ago | reply
Amazing nature...!!!
Mark Payton 9 months ago | reply
Cool capture!