Saddle Road, Hawaii

4205 meters of cinder

Before the arrival of European sailors and missionary Christians, who infected the Hawaiian people with syphilis and Christianity, the highest point on Hawaii's Big Island was a very sacred place.

Mauna Kea was not a just a mountain, but the very "belly button" of Hawaii - the first born child of Sky Father and Earth Mother.


Nowadays it's more well known for being the world's highest mountain (measured from its base - the floor of the Pacific) and its exceptionally clear skies.

Geologists peer down through overlapping cinder cones for the ancient crater. Astonomers come from all over the world to see the stars.



I drove to the top of Mauna Kea in a white Ford motor car and ate lunch at the peak from a plastic tupperware pot.

And was blown away.



By the infinite horizon, the thin crisp air and the endless barren volcanic cinder which marks the umbilical scar of the world.

Sand. Honokohau Beach, Hawaii

Photographer: Matthieu