No more Volcano bombing
Oct 08, 2007 · 04:31 PM · permalink
One of the fun tourist activities in Hawaii is to take a bus up Haleakala, and zoom back down. No more of that for a while as the Park Service has had to suspend the activity in light of recent accidents and 3 deaths.
When we climbed Haleakala, we’d mock each of those downhill bombers with either a
The locals told of us of daily crashes — that road is absolutely thrilling to descend, but I’d not recommend it for someone without good biking skills. I’m sure the accident rate wasn’t helped by the hot dogging guides.
I totally agree with the shut down by the park service. That road down the Volcano on Maui is really steep, to much for novices on cruiser bikes! I live on Oahu, and fully support that decision. I can’t believe they let them do it for so long!
My wife did it a few years back and it freaked her out. She was shocked at the people that took the vans up the hill with her - certainly not people you’d want to let loose on a wild downhill. I’m surprised they can do it in the states with all the liability. Mexico - sure, states…hrmmm….
And a clarification above to my comment. Any cyclists death is a concern and a tragedy. I suspect that because it’s a tour, there’s an expectation of safety. I’ve ridden it, and a windy, steep, volcano road is not particularly safe. We also saw hot-dogging guides, described above. 90K downhill trips a year is a lot.
My family did the Haleakala downhill back in the 80’s with one of the original outfits (Cruiser Bob?) on the big Schwinn cruisers with drum brakes. No helmets and rain poncho available if wanted. It was great! The tour guide did yank 1 guy back into the van because he could not steer straight at altitude and found his way into a lava field (a bit hungover combined with 10K feet).
Sorry to hear about the deaths. Just got too popular I guess.
Who knew they hold a race UP the mountain? The guy who won rode a 12lb bike - nice. Jon Vaughters holds the course record apparently.
Yes and we rode most of that course — it’s brutal. The switchbacks are the longest ever.
I’ve ridden up three times and down once. The up times we’re by myself and much more enjoyable. My family drops me off in the morning and meets me at the top a few (OK 3.5) hours later. They usually pass me at around 6 - 7K elevation when I really could use a little encouragement. Each time I’ve been happy to put my bike in the car and drive down.
The one time I rode down was with one of the tour companies. I did it because I was with my 67-year-old father-in-law and 16-year-old niece. Not being regular cyclists they had a good time. But it was too restrictive for me. I didn’t want to bomb it but you couldn’t get into any kind of rhythm when the leader keeps it under 15mph and slows through the apex of every glorious switch-back.
Some of those cruiser bikes are scary. The bike I was issued needed work. The headset was completely lose and making turns in the parking lot sketchy. I gave a quick inspection to the bikes my family were on and found 2 more loose headsets and a loose handle-bar (stem). I think the only thing they check are the brakes.
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