Haunted Kaneana Cave
Haunted Kaneana Cave
Kāneana Cave is a place of ancient legends and modern mystery. The entrance towers over the highway as it looks out across the road to the ocean. Despite the arid heat of the Wai‘anae Coast, the interior of the cave is shadowy and cool.
The main chamber of the cave follows a downward slope to about two hundred feet from the entrance. It is said that there was a small passageway at the back of this chamber that led further inland, but it’s become blocked by fallen rocks over the years. The walls and the high ceiling are rounded, which seems to give one the feeling of being in the belly of a giant shark.
Back toward the entrance, on the left wall, there is a large, flat boulder, and just past that, another opening that leads to a smaller chamber. The space here is about four to six feet high, with small puddles that collect the water that drips from the ceiling.
Kāneana cave was initially formed underwater millions of years ago. It is believed to have been the dwelling place of the shark god, Kāmohoali‘i, Pele’s oldest and most sacred brother. Eons later, when the cave sat above the ocean, Kāmohoali‘i walked upon the land as a man and met a woman named Kalei. Soon, the pair became a couple and had a child, Nanaue, who was part human and part shark. When Nanaue’s taste for flesh could not be denied, he was banished to the seas and there he lived in his shark form.
But every once in a while, Nanaue would change his appearance and walk among humans.
Legend says that an old Hawaiian man would sit in the cave late at night, cooking meat over an open fire. As weary travelers passed by on foot, the smell of the cooking meat would entice them. The old man would then beckon them to share his fire and partake in a meal. Once the unsuspecting traveler ate his fill and began to grow sleepy, the old man would kill the visitor and place their body upon the large, flat stone to be consume at the shark god’s leisure.
But the strangeness doesn’t stop there. Over the years, Kaneana cave has been the scene of fights, assaults, suicides, and murder, making it a repository of negative energy.
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