In September 1830, “(T)he king (Kauikeaouli, Kamehameha III) set out with a party of more than a hundred, for an excursion further into the heart of the island, and an ascent to the summit of Mauna Kea. To watch over and instruct my young pupil, and to benefit my health, I accompanied him. The excursion occupied nearly five days, … In the course of this day’s journey, the youthful king on horseback, pursued, ran down, and caught a yearling wild bullock, for amusement and for a luncheon for his attendants. … The next day was occupied chiefly in ascending in a northerly direction … Having gained an elevation of about ten thousand feet, we halted and encamped for the night.”

“In the morning we proceeded slowly upwards till about noon, when we came to banks of snow, and a pond of water partly covered with ice. In his first contact with a snow bank, the juvenile king seemed highly delighted. He bounded and tumbled on it, grasped and handled and hastily examined pieces of it, then ran and offered a fragment of it in vain to his horse. He assisted in cutting out blocks of it, which were wrapped up and sent down as curiosities to the regent and other chiefs, at Waimea, some twenty-eight miles distant. These specimens of snow and ice, like what are found in the colder regions of the earth, excited their interest and gratified their curiosity, and pleased them much; not only by their novelty, but by the evidence thus given of a pleasant remembrance by the youthful king.” (Hiram Bingham)