The Hawai’ian Island Chain – notice the connection between the islands. When you zoom out far enough to see the entire Pacific Rim, you can tell that Hawai’i is located more or less right at the center of the so-called “Ring of Fire”, the volcanic and seismic activity that runs from Japan to Alaska to the U.S. West Coast (St. Andreas fault, etc.). Some people believe that this configuration makes the Hawai’ian Islands one of a handful of energetic power centers of the planet.

The “Big Island” of Hawai’i – you can see the lava flow patterns from past eruptions of Mouna Loa, Mouna Kea, and Kilauea. The greenish “collar” of areas south of “Captain Cook” towards South Point, and from there back up toward the Kilauea Volcano, contain many of the Macadamia Nut farms of the Island. That’s where the Mac Nuts you may enjoy (chocolate covered or not :) are coming from! Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, standing both near 13,800 feet, sometimes have snow caps at the top!

The Kilauea Volcano caldera and Halem’auma’u pit crater – standing inside of the caldera is an awe-inspiring sight to behold in the truest sense of the word. If you take the time to hike from the Volcano House at the top of the rim down through the caldera to the Halema’uma’u pit crater (thought to be the home of the Hawai’ian Goddess Pele), you will see a wide variety of lava formations and colors. All throughout there are steam and sulfur vents, the sulfur becoming most intense near Halema’uma’u. In the last year, there have actually been several small yet spectacular lava “fountain” erruptions at Halema’uma’u.

South Point, the southernmost point in any U.S. State! – the bars, restaurants, etc. in the nearby towns and hamlets love to lay claim to their very own “Southernmost [xyz] in the U.S.” fame.

Pu’uhonua O Honaunau – City of Refuge – the satellite image shows the layout of these sacred grounds, which are now a National Park. In the center, you can see the large lava rock platform built behind the “Kane Stone”, a large, oblong lava boulder (similar to Stonehenge type rocks). You can see the outline of the massive lava rock wall to the east and south.

Almost directly due east you can make out a small white “break” in the wall which is actually a ceremonial entrance. At the northernmost tip of the wall you can make out another black square, which is a smaller platform with a traditional grass hut for offerings and other ceremonial uses, surrounded by a wood fence and a good number of exquisite Tikis (wood sculpture totems).

In ancient times Honaunau represented a form of sanctuary from the Kapu (“Taboo”) System, in that anyone would be safe from persecution and almost certain death once inside the walls, regardless of their infraction. There, they would live and work for years, while also working on a personal journey of atonement and forgiveness under the guidance of the Kahuna in charge of the sanctuary.

It is noteworthy that the safe boundary of the grounds existed only by convention and agreement, as none of the outer or inner walls, regardless of size, could hold back a determined attacker. The walls must thus be seen as mostly symbolic, they were literally “walls in the mind”… ceremonial and spiritual in nature.

Keauhou, Hawai’i – “Spiritual shelter persisting though time” – The “Outrigger Keauhou Beach Resort” hotel – built around and among sacred and historical grounds, among them King Kalākaua’s Vacation Home and Bathing Pond, the Fish God lava rock monument, the Ali’i (Royalty) Birthing Pond, and several Heiau (Temple) ruins toward the ocean shoreline. The adjoining property to the South has a number of important Heiau ruins as well, which are currently being restored and made part of a cultural center and public park.

Long had called Huna a “psycho-religious structure”, and he wasn’t that far off, except that Huna as a spiritual philosophy must be seen as religiously neutral, with the focus being more on the psychological side of things. In fact, the Hawai’ians had developed, many centuries before Freud and others, a sophisticated view of the human mind as composed of several distinct partitions, including an Unconscious Mind (the “Unihipili” or “little creature”, or as we would say in today’s parlance “the inner child”).

Some of the examples of the ancient Hawai’ians level of understanding include insights into psycho-somatic illness, as well as the formalized “deprogramming” of warriors returning to normal life after battle.

For a brief glimpse of the historical background, it is instructive to read descriptions of the state of Hawai’ian society before the arrival of the Westerners: When Captain Cook and his men landed in 1778, and were soon followed by more white men and finally the missionaries (around 1810), the Islands contained a population much larger than what might be surmised from today’s population patterns (estimates range from 250,000 to as high as 800,000).

And this large society, with a well developed system of political rule and agriculture, was virtually free of both physical disease as well as mental illness. Unfortunately, these populations were subsequently decimated to about 40,000 by the diseases that were brought by Cook’s men and their successors.