Camp Mekokiko - Hawaii

Camp Mekokiko – Hawaii VIM trip
January 19 to February 3,2010

We flew out of Milwaukee, to Minneapolis, to Honolulu, to our final destination of Hilo on the Big Island of Hawaii. With our flight out of Minneapolis being delayed and flying into strong head winds, we were late for our connecting flight to Hilo. However, the flight was held for us and we arrived in Hilo about 1 hour before our luggage, but just in time to meet the members of the Hilo UMC for a soup and salad meal at the church.
We stayed at the Wild Ginger Inn (a hostel) for the first night. Our breakfast Wednesday morning was apart of the room cost. After breakfast we shopped for groceries, ate lunch, and headed up to Camp Mekokiko. The camp is located about 1 hour north of Hilo, on the slopes of Mauna Kae, at an elevation of about 1800 feet. When we arrived we unloaded our food and luggage and moved into the lodge. After setting up our cots we toured the camp to see what work projects there were for us to do, it was decided that we would work on finishing the pavilion at the tent sites and landscape the area.
The landscaping required the cutting and chipping of guava, digging out stumps, cutting weeds, and filling all holes. The pavilion required the finishing of the installation of the metal roofing, ceiling, exterior sheeting (with backer board) of upper level, cement board in the showers, installing hurricane straps, scraping down block walls, some framing, caulking, and painting of the walls, ceiling, and beams.
Hawaii state building codes require a licensed plumber and electrician to do all plumbing and electrical work. Since the plumbing had not been pressure tested, the walls could not be completely enclosed, and the tiling of the showers could not be done.
Our team was able to finish the landscaping of the 4 tent sites and to finish the roofing, ceiling, framing, backer board sheeting, cement board (except on walls were plumbing needs inspection), hanging of doors, caulking, and painting that needed to be done on the pavilion.
Plumbing, electrical, and tiling needs to be completed before the sites can be used. We would expect to see this happen within the next 2 months. When this happens, the camp will be able to expand it offerings to the area and start earning some money.
There is still much to do at Camp Mekokiko. There are 3 duplex cabins, a second tenting site similar to the one we worked on, 2 large bunk houses, a large conference center, a chapel, a fale, an amphitheater, a foot bridge, and 2 twenty thousand gallon water storage tanks. All this will need to be finished or at least started by 2012. They have a very large task in front of them and are still in need of as much help as they can get.
Another important part of this trip is the connectional aspect of the United Methodist Church and the people we were able to meet. We had a very warm reception at the airport from the Hilo church and their members. They invited us to dinner at the Hilo UMC that night. We were also invited to a pot luck at Honoka'a UMC on Thursday, and a dinner at Sandy and Joe McCleskey's home with other church members near the end of our stay. There was a "Big Island Work Day" that gave us a chance to work at the camp with local church members. As we wore our pins out into the communities, we had many people ask questions about our group and what we were doing, giving us the opportunity to share the story.
We left the Big Island early Monday morning, February 1. We flew into Honolulu to pick up our flight home on Tuesday. We landed in Milwaukee about 8:00 Wednesday morning.
I feel that the trip was very successful.
Report submitted by: James Houwers, team leader