The legend of Kahali’i Lovers has been passed down through generations past of Kahali’i, the land extending out of Onomea Bay in Papaikou. The story goes that one day the chief spotted sailing canoes headed towards land. The council feared an attack and decided to build a reef to protect their land and people. There was no time, and so the chief asked for two villagers to give their lives to protect the reef. A young woman and man agreed, the lovers of Kahali’i. That evening a decree was set that no one was to go out from sunset to sunrise. When the village awoke, they found the lovers to be gone, and in their place two large rocks guarded the entrance of the bay, attached to one another beneath the waves. It was announced that no canoe could now pass without permissions from the guardians.

The two rocks in Onomea serve as a Portal, in one sense to generations past who dwelled on this land, and in another to the bay itself.

I made this photograph at sunrise in July to capture the first light shining upon the rocks using a Nikon F100 with a Nikkor 80-200mm lens on Kodak Tri-X.