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coote : cliff jumping, hilo, 1882

Walter Coote : Cliff Jumping, Hilo, 1882 .

Extract from
Coote, Walter: Wanderings, South and East.
Sampson, Low, Marston, Serle and Rivington.
Crown Buildings, 180 Fleet Street, London, 1882, pages 98 and 99.

Introduction.
Although he visited Ohau, he only briefly mentions Waikiki as a place renown for "surf-bathing", page ?
The account of cliff jumping and rock-sliding notes taht this is a regonised tourist attraction, for which the participants receive payment.

For similar accounts of clif jumping at Hilo see:

1876 Mrs. Brassey : Surfriding at Hilo.
1886 Walter M. Leman : Cliff Jumping, Hilo.

Page 98
Hilo is a pretty village, this is a kind of spot to which we looked foreward.
Telephone and American "notion" stores seem out of place in the Sanwich Islands, palm-trees and bananas, and thatched cottages, and almost naked natives are more what we have been expecting.

We went down one afternoon to a valley near at hand, through which the Hilo River flows in a deep ravine.
Here we witnessed feats of swimming and diving, and also saw the great leap of which travellers speak.
The man jumps ungracefully from a height of ninety to a hundred feet, clearing five yards or so of projecting rock in his descent.
It's an awful exploit, and I dare say he will kill himself ...

Page 99

... someday.
At present he makes a fair profit from this daring exhibition, and falls feet foremost into the stream with apparently no sort of injury.

There are falls at the upper end of the ravine and over these the natives in scores are sliding and re-sliding.
Girls and women, men and boys, all plunging about in the water, climbing up rocky walls and hurling themselves in again for quarter dollars, and enjoying it amazingly.
We left when our stock of silver was exhausted, but they splashed and paddled and dived about in infinite enjoyment for hours afterwards.

Coote, Walter: Wanderings, South and East.
Sampson, Low, Marston, Serle and Rivington.
Crown Buildings, 180 Fleet Street, London, 1882,

Geoff Cater (2010) : Walter Coote : Cliff Jumping, Hilo, 1882.
http://www.surfresearch.com.au/1882_Coote_Wanderings.html