Long Beach Latte Site - February 2, 2008

Four of us set off on a fine Saturday morning to explore the Latte site above Long Beach. This is a fairly easy hike and I have always enjoyed it because of the variety of communities that we will walk through. You start the hike at a nice beach, climb a small cliff, walk through limestone forest and finally into secondary forest with large ironwood trees.

The hike starts at Long Beach (Unai Dankulo). This is one of the few beaches that you can find star sand at, but you have to look carefully. The picture below is of Long Beach facing north. On the right side of the picture, behind the coconut tree, you can see Saipan in the distance.
The trail starts near the southwest corner of the main beach (Long Beach is really a series of around 13 beaches). It is hard to find and you really have to know where to look to see the start of the trail. Below is picture of the trail just after it starts. It is completely covered by vines and overlapping weeds. You have to bend over a little when first entering the trail, but it soon opens up and is easy to follow.

The trail soon comes to a cliff. You want to go to the right at the cliff. As you follow the cliff, you will come to some steps that have been build into it. These steps were built by either the Marianas Visitor Authority (MVA) or the Historical Preservation Office (HPO). In the picture below Judy is standing on the steps about halfway up the cliff.

At the top of the cliff is a metal sign that gives information about the trail. This trail was setup by either MVA or HPO, for either a tourist or cultural attraction, maybe 8 or 10 years ago. Just to the right of this sign, about 100 to 150 feet away, is a series of large sinkholes. Sinkholes are occur when the top of a cave falls in.

These sinkholes are fairly deep. I would guess they are about 30 or 40 feet deep. The picture below show the first sinkhole. It shows a column and an opening that goes to the second sinkhole in this series.

Below are a picture of Mitch and Ikue looking into the second sinkhole.

The picture below give a better idea of the size of this sinkhole. From the large stalactite in the bottom right of the picture, the sinkhole must drop down another 20 or 30 feet. This sinkhole is a little deeper than the first one and connects to it.

After visiting the sinkholes, we returned to the first sign on the trail. The trail continues toward the west, trough a rocky area with a lot of pinnacles. Pinnacles are caused by differential erosion of the limestone. Some of the limestone is a little harder than the surrounding limestone. Because it is harder, it does not erode as fast as the surrounding limestone and protects the limestone under it from erosion. The picture below shows the trail, looking towards the cliff above Long Beach.

Some of the pinnacles can be quite large, as the one in the picture below.

Also in the limestone forest area are fairly large banyan (nunu) trees. The banyans in the Long Beach area do not get as large as some other areas on Tinian, because this beach is on the east side of Tinian and more exposed to typhoons. Below is Ikue near one of the larger banyans we found on our hike to the latte sites.
This trail is also used by coconut crab hunters. To hunt coconut crabs, a coconut, with a cut in the side of it that goes through the shell of the coconut, is placed on a stake. This attracts the coconut crabs from their hiding places. The coconut crab hunter comes back at night to see what each trap has attracted. Below is a coconut trap that has attracted some hermit crabs.

Along the trail, just after you leave the limestone forest, is another sinkhole. This one is not too deep and can be easily climbed down into. Below is Mitch taking a picture of the sinkhole, which has another coconut crab trap next too it.

As mentioned above, this trail has metal signs along it that explain different aspects of the Chamorro culture. Below are Ikue and Judy reading one of the signs while Mitch takes a picture of the small latte stones next to it.

When first approaching the sign, be careful and look under them. There might be boonie bee nests under them, as in the picture below. If you disturb a sign, you might get stung.
The signs are quite well done, as can be seen in the picture below, too bad the trail has fallen into disrepair.

Not all latter pillar stones are that tall. I have found that most are about 18 to 30 inches tall. As you follow the old trail, you will end up going by about four of these small pillar stone latte sites. In the picture below the latte pillar stones barely stick out of the weeds.

In the picture below is Mitch next to a latte pillar stone and its capstone.

Pictured below is my shoe, with the heel on the ground, pushing against a small latte pillar stone.
There are pinnacles that stick out of the ground that might look like a latte stone. So how do you know if you are at a latte stone site? The stones will be usually in two rows with at least four stones, or more, in each row. The stones will also be fairly evenly spaced apart. Of course, you need to be careful since some of the stones may be missing from a given site.

As we walked under the ironwood trees, Casuarina equisetifolia, the white terns would fly above us. These birds would follow us as we walked along.

One other animal that we encountered on this hike was the boonie bee, which is a common paper wasp from Asia. In the picture below is a large nest of them. Lucky for us there were not that many nest because of the rain the night before the hike.

Finally we arrived at the large latte site that is a little over a third of a mile from where the trail starts. In the picture below is one of the tall latte pillar stones that still is standing. It is about six feet tall and covered in vines.

Below is Ikue and Judy next to the same stone as pictured above. This picture give you an idea of the size of these stones at the major latte site at Long Beach.

The capstones at this latte site are fairly large as you can tell from the picture below. Mitch is just getting ready to step over a fallen pillar stone with the capstone to her left.

One of the stones is slowly being overgrown with a banyan tree as can be seen in the picture below. Most likely this tree will slowly destroy this pillar stone with time.

Ikue is a professional photographer, and she was fascinated with the hermit crabs on the coconut crab traps. She spent a lot time trying to get a good picture of one and I hope she did.

As we entered the limestone forest, on our return, I happened to spot a land crab in the leaf litter. It blended in real well with its surroundings as you can see in the picture below.

After taking pictures of the crab, someone asked if it was alive or not, because of how still it sat. I said it was most likely alive and put the tip of my machete next to it. As I did this, the crab suddenly became very active, raising its claws to defend itself. Every one hurried to turn their cameras back on, but the crab started to head toward a rock very quickly. I got the picture below just as it went around a tree, next to the rock it was heading towards to hide under.

Finally we arrived back at the beach, and spent some time enjoying it and taking pictures. The picture below is again toward the north, like the first picture in this posting. Just around the point, on the left side of picture, the beach continues. Notice that there are now more clouds then there was earlier in the morning.

The picture is taken from about the same place as the photograph above. It shows Long Beach toward the south. Just past the rocks at the south end of this beach is another smaller beach.

The video below gives a 360 degree view of Long Beach.

In the wall at the south end of Long Beach are two Japanese bunkers from World War II. The picture below shows the one nearest the ocean. It is now full of rocks and sand, and is impossible to get into.

The second bunker, pictured below, is more inland and behind some trees. Again, it is full of sand and rocks, and impossible to enter.

One of the traditonal stops on the Long Beach hikes is to look at the petroglyphs in a cave nearby. In the picture below Judy is entering the cave with the petroglyps.

In the picture below Ikue is looking at the petroglyphs. The one that sort of looks like a tunna facing up is modern, and most likely less then twelve years old. It was done by one of my former students. Please, if you visit this cave, don't damage this site anymore than it already is.

In the back of this cave is a room that has some neat cave structures. You have to walk over some loose rocks to get to this room. The picture below is taken through the mouth of the room, toward where the petroglyphs are located.

This is a fairly easy hike, and I do recommend this hike if you want a little adventure, but not too much adventure. You should have a guide to find the large latte stone site, but you can find the smaller sites by following the flags that mark the old cultural trail. If you have a GPS, the coordinates to the large latte site are N 15 degrees and 02.313 minutes, and E 145 degrees and 38.741 minutes.

I would like to thank Judy for the additional pictures used in this posting.

As for the boonie bee count, it was zero. We did see some very large nests, and even a few small ones with one or two bees on them, but no one walked into any of the nests.

The next hike will be on Saturday, February 9. We will be going back to the Mt. Lasu are to explore the cliff line from the Shinto Shrine toward the northwest. We will visit the old Japanese radar and the window cave (see the January 28 hike). After the window cave, I really don't know what we will find. We will meet at 8 AM at Grace Christian School.

Everyone Is Welcome On These Hikes.

February 2008 Hikes

The following are the hikes for February. I am starting to run out of ideas, so if anyone has any place they would like to explore, let me know, please.

As always, all hikes meet at 8 AM at Grace Christian School on Saturday.

February 2, Saturday - Hike to the Latte site above Long Beach. This is one of the Latte sites on Tinian. On this hike we will visit sinkholes, short latte stones, and the main latte site. This will be an easy hike through tangantangan secondary forest. Be prepared for boonie bees.

February 9, Saturday - Mt. Lasu upper cliff line. We will drive to the Shinto Shrine at the top of Mt. Lasu. From here we will drop down below the cliff and follow it to the north and west. We will see the old Japanese radar and window cave on this hike (see the January 26 hike for pictures). After visiting the window cave, we will continue to explore the cliff line pass where I have been before. Depending on the time we finish or the group's desires, we may explore the foundations for the old U.S. Navy hospital.

February 16, Saturday - Marpo Valley Hike. We will explore an old Japanese train station near the asphalt plant in Marpo Valley. This is one of the best preserved stations I know of from this period. From here we will continue north until we reach the back road to the airport. I am not sure what we will find pass the railroad station.

February 23, Saturday - Hunt for the Latte site near the Tinian Shrine by Carolinas Heights. We will try to find the latte site again near the Shinto Shrine above Carolinas Heights. We tried to find it last month but were not successful (see the January 5th hike). I hope that we avoid the pandanus and most of the cliff's on this hike.

Everyone is welcome to join us on these hikes.
Just meet at Grace Christian School and be prepared to hike.

Long Beach Jungle Hike - December 15, 2007

On December 15th, three of us set off to Long Beach to walk either the beaches or the jungle. I have done all of the beaches at Long Beach before, but it was a long time ago. There were 13 beaches the last time I did it. As we looked at the water, there was a consensus to hike in the jungle. I really did want to do the beaches, maybe another time.

So I drove back to where the petroglyphs cave is located. There is a ridge line located next to the cave that has a lot of interesting rocks and limestone forest. So after cutting a walking stick for Judy, we were off into the jungle.
We saw several depressions, where it looked like the top of caves had collapsed in. Finally we came to a depression with what looked like the remains of a cave formation on one side. In the picture below you can see Judy walking over the collapsed ceiling of the cave toward the cave formation.

The cave formation open up to a large cave. In the picture below, you can see Judy walking into the entrance of the cave. The entrance formed a shelf above the cave, with a very large room below the shelf.

In the picture below is Ariuka taking a picture of the room below the shelf we are standing on. the room below must have been 20 or more feet below us and looked way to difficult to get down to without a rope.

Below is a picture of me looking down into the cave. In the bottom of the cave was a lot of wood and some bottles. Most likely there have been there since World War II. It also looked like the cave went down to another level. There really was no way to tell how deep this cave goes without climbing down into it. Maybe another day.

Here, in the picture below, are Ariuka and me taking a picture of paipai (Guamia mariannae) berries. Paipai is only found in the Mariana Islands. Most likely its scientific name was derived from being found in the Mariana Islands - Guamia, Guam - mariannae, Marianas. This a understory tree found in limestone forest. It is slow growing tree that has very hard wood.

Here is a picture of the paipai berries.

As we walked in the jungle, we would cross from limestone forest to secondary forest consisting of tangantangan (Leucaena leucocephala) trees. As we entered the secondary forest we were on the look out for boonie bees, since they are more common here. These bees are the most dangerous thing you will meet in the forest. I have just read that they were most likely introduced to the Mariana Islands during the Japanese period. They seem to be a common paper wasp (Polistes olivaceus click this link will open a pdf file) from Asia.

As we walked in the secondary forest, we found a few of the nests on vines growing through the trees, as in the picture below. As the dry season progress, the bees start to move more into the limestone forest area and build nests.

In the picture below, if you look carefully, you can see rocks that stick up out of the ground into the jungle. It is fairly common on Tinian to see rocks sticking up out of the ground. This is caused by differential erosion. One piece of limestone may resist erosion a little bit more than the surround limestone. This harder limestone protects the rock below it, and the surrounding limestone is worn away, thus forming a pinnacle. Pinnacles, sinkholes, and caverns are common in Karst landscapes (which is found in large areas of eroded limestone like on Tinian).

As we walked through the jungle, I decided it was to time to find a way out. Looking at my GPS, I noticed that there was a road to the east of us (I had plotted the road from an earlier hike to Masalok). So we were off to find the road. Finally, we came out of the jungle into a clearing by the road. Below are Judy and Ariuka leaving the jungle finally!

Below is a picture of the road, with Ariuka taking a picture of Judy taking a picture of her, that leads back to Long Beach and my truck.

As we walked back to the truck, Judy was a little disappointed that we didn't see any artifacts or historical sites. Ariuka suggested that I show Judy the petroglyphs in the cave next to the truck. We had visited this cave on the hike to Masalok last week. In the picture below you can see my flashlight pointing at some stick figures made by the ancient Chamorros more then 400 years ago.

As we sat in the cave, looking at the petroglyphs, the battery compartment of Ariuka's camera open, dropping the batteries into the loose rocks. The great battery hunt was on! In the below you can see Ariuka and me looking for the batteries.

Judy was taking pictures of the us as we looked for the batteries. She happened to notice a flash of light near my foot. If you look carefully, two rock below my foot, you will see one of the batteries from Ariuka's camera.
Only two of the four rechargeable batteries were found in our hunt. After the hunt, we left the cave and head back to the truck to go home.

As for the boonie bee count, it was only one, me of course. After all of the stings I have had, I am still not used to it. If you want to hear some loud and strong words, just be around me when I get stung.

The next hike will be to the Mount Lasu area. We will hike to a beautiful saddle in the ridge, just south of the Shinto shine on Mount Lasu. From there, we will go through a tunnel that goes through the ridge and explore the cliff line. When I was up there two weeks ago, I found a lot of Japanese defensive shelters from World War II. We will be meeting on Saturday, December 22, at 8 AM at Grace Christian School.

As always, everyone is welcome to join in on these hikes.

December Hikes

December Hikes

For the month of December we will be hiking to the following areas on Tinian.

For all hikes, meet at 8 AM at Grace Christian School.

December 1, Saturday - San Jose Village Cliff Line
On this hike we will be hiking the cliff line behind Tinian Junior/Senior High School to the Korean Monument. This area has native limestone forest, some steep slopes (no cliffs to climb) and caves and tunnels made by the Japanese during World War II. Please bring a flashlight on this hike.

December 8, Saturday - Masalok Area
I have been told that there might be a small crashed airplane in this area. On this hike we will start above Masalok Beach and head south, in the hope of finding the airplane. I have been told that this area is fairly rough so wear good shoes. Additionally I have never been in this area, pass the beach, so who knows what we will find.

December 15, Saturday - Long Beach
There are two possibilities for this hike. The first possibility is to explore all of the beaches at Long Beach. The last time I did this I counted 13 beaches. Be prepared to get wet. I will be wearing swimming shorts and reef walkers.

If the ocean is too rough, we will explore the forest area above Long Beach, west of the road to the beach. This area has small cliffs and caves. So, bring a flashlight.

December 22, Saturday - Mount Lasu
We will follow the ridge line going south from the Shinto Shrine on Mount Lasu. There is a tunnel that goes through the ridge and down to the an old Japanese road. Usually I follow the road back up to the shrine, but depending on the group, we might go the other way on the road to see where it leads.

December 29, Saturday - Atomic Bomb Assembly Buildings and Lamlam Beach
I have been told there were three buildings built to assembly the different atomic bombs used in World War II. I have been to the first building. On this hike we will try to find the foundations for the other two buildings. After the hike, we will stop at Lamlam beach, one of the invasion beaches used by the Americans during World War II.

As always everyone is welcome to join us on the hikes.

Coordinates of Some Sites on Tinian

Since I go hiking with a GPS, I have been collecting coordinates for different sites on Tinian. I have decided to post them so that others will have an easier time finding these sites.

• Lion's Head - N 14 degrees 58.260 minutes, E 145 degrees 39.522 minutes
• Masalog Large Latte Site - N 15 degrees 1.116 minutes, E 145 degrees 39.331 minutes
• Tachonga Latte Site - N 14 degrees 57.111 minutes, E 145 degrees 37.948 minutes
• Long Beach Large Latte Stone Site - N 15 degrees 2.313 minutes, E 145 degrees 38.741 minutes
• Chiget Beach - N 15 degrees 3.6711 minutes, E 145 degrees 39.311 minutes
• Beulah marker at Dump Coke - N 15 degrees 3.156 minutes, E 145 degrees 35.793 minutes

I also recommend the following sites if you are into using a GPS to find things. Just do a search for Tinian, to see what I have posted on these sites.

• Geocaching.com
• Waymarking.com

I will be publishing other coordinates as I slowly get more during future hikes.

Long Beach Hike - October 27, 2007

On this hike, four of us set out to try to follow the latte stone trail above Long Beach. This trail was created either by the Marianas Vistor Authority or the Historical Preservation Office. It has not been maintained for years, so we were in for an interesting hike.

The trail starts at Long Beach. Long Beach is really a series of beaches on the east side of Tinian. It is one of the best beaches for camping and just relaxing. The swimming is not too good at Long Beach because of the shallow reef, and it is hard to get over the reef's edge because of the large waves. The picture below shows the main beach at Long Beach, looking north toward Saipan (not in the picture).

The trail that we are going to try to follow starts near the cliff at the back of Long Beach. The trail can be found if you follow the cliff on the north side of main beach at Long Beach away from the ocean. It will go into a notch in the cliff that will have steps going up the cliff. The picture below shows the cliff line above Long Beach.

Instead of following the north cliff line, I happen to know where the trail really started a little south and east of the cliff. The start of the trail is really overgrown as you can see in the picture below. After cutting the brush with our machetes for awhile, the trail opens up and was fairly easy walking.
As you start on the trail, you will come to a wall that usually has a lot of hermit crabs on it. They are usually found on the wall when it is wet. They are eating the algae that grows on the wet wall. Follow this cliff to the right and it will lead you to the notch in the cliff that has the steps built into it.

At the top of the notch, and the steps, is a sign that shows the old trail that used to go to the different latte sites above Long Beach. If you walk about 100 feet north of this sign, through the jungle, you will come to two large sinkholes. Sinkholes are common in limestone areas. They are usually created when the top of a cave collapses. In the picture below is Ariuka standing next to the first sinkhole.
Another 20 or 30 feet to the north is the second sinkhole. This one has a much larger opening. In the picture below you can see Ariuka standing on the south edge of this larger sinkhole.

Below is are pictures of the roots from a Banyan tree (Nunu) that grows down into the second sinkhole. The first picture shows the roots going down into the sinkhole and the second shows part of the tree on the top of the sinkhole.

Both of these sinkholes are connected together and must be about 40 feet deep.

After looking at the sinkholes, we returned to the sign at the top of the cliff above Long Beach. From here, we followed some old surveyor's flags that seemed to follow the old trail. The first part of the trail goes through an area of small limestone pinnacles and large trees. After the rough limestone area, you come out into a mixed secondary forest area. This forest is dominated by tangantangan trees, which was introduced to the Mariana Islands right after World War II. The trail was overgrown as you can see in the picture below.
The trail follows a long row of ironwood trees that parallels the shoreline. Most of the smaller latte stone sites are found in this row of ironwood trees.

As we followed the trail we would encounter old signs that indicated we were going in the right direction. Most of the signs were readable and offered interesting information about the different historical features along the trail or gave interesting information about the ancient Chamorros. The sign below was one of the ones in the worst shape. With a little cleaning it would have been fine and readable, but we decided not to clean it off because of the large boonie bee nest below it.
The picture below shows a closeup of the nest below the sign. Before touching a sign or getting too close to one, it is always a good idea to look below it first.

As we walked under the ironwoods, we were joined by White Terns. They could be seen hovering over us and following us along the trail. At any one time there would be from five to ten birds above us. When we left the area of the ironwoods, the birds would quite following us. White Terns roost and nest in ironwood trees, and that is most likely why they were keeping an eye on us.
In the picture below are Ariuka, Stacy, and Dan reading a sign that is next to a small latte stone site. The latte stones here are only about a foot and a half in height.

After following the trail for awhile, and looking at several small latte stone sites, we came to the foundation of an old farm house from Japanese times. I knew that the large latte stones were located to the west of this foundation. By this time, the survey tape flags that we had been following had ran out. So we set off through the jungle going toward the west. There is a row of ironwood trees that sort of go northwest, so I began following them.

As we traveled through the jungle, we came to an area without trees. I sort of remembered that the large latte stones were near such a clearing. I also remembered that these stones were not near ironwood trees. So, I headed out into the clearing to see if there was anything that I might recognize from my trips here in the years past (it had been about five years since I last visited this site). Looking toward the southwest side of the clearing, I sort of saw a tree I remembered. I did not want to walk across the clearing toward the tree because of the pako and lantana, which have sharp small thorns. We headed back into the jungle and walked around the clearing.

As we walked around the clearing, we came across some large papaya trees. Below is a picture Ariuka and Stacy standing next to one of the large papaya trees.

Finally, we arrived at the site with the large latte stones. In the picture below is Ariuka standing on a log near one of the large pillar stones.

This is an other latte pillar stone with a Banyan (Nunu) tree growing on it. This was the tree that I recognized on the other side of the clearing.

In the picture below, you see Stacy and Ariuka, with Dan behind, standing next to a pillar stone with its capstone next to the tree at the left side of the picture.

Below is the whole group between the two of the standing pillar stones. The one on the right is the one that had the Banyan tree growing on it.

After spending some time at the site with the large latte stones, we headed back through the the jungle. After a short time, I lost the trail and got a little too close to the cliff line. Below is a picture of Ariuka and Stacy look through a hole in one of the pinnacles that are common near the shoreline.

As always, the hike back is faster than the hike in. Below is a picture of Stacy and Ariuka sitting in the back of my truck, while I look for my keys.

It was a great day for a hike. The sky was clear and with no rain. There was also a nice breeze that helped to cool us off on the hike. As for the boonie bee count, it was only one, me again.

Since this Saturday is election day, the next hike will be on November 4th, Sunday, to the Dump Coke area to look at ancient Chamorro pictographs. We will meet at 4 PM at Grace Christian School so that we will have a chance to enjoy the sunset of Dump Coke.