Hana mao 'ole ka ua o Hilo.

So it's been raining a lot recently. Normally rain doesn't surprise anyone here, even when it rains for several weeks straight. But this is a bit out of the ordinary.



All of these pictures are from my friend S.' very nice digital camera. This first one is a picture of the soccer fields near downtown Hilo, the bay, and the Kamehameha statue. Some people were taking their bodyboards out in the water.



I've been told that over four days, we got about 40 inches of rain. And it's been raining pretty heavily for a couple weeks before that, and for a week since.



There are flood channels here, and for good reason: when it rains a lot, they turn into small rivers.




We got a little wet taking several of these pictures, but that's just the price you pay sometimes. I think they turned out pretty nice.



This last picture is from Rainbow Falls, which is usually a relatively small trickle down what in this picture is the center column of water. The pool below the falls is probably about 5 feet higher than usual.



From most of the stories I've heard, this is one of the heaviest rainfalls to come through the area in several years.