High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas: From Corporate Burnout to Cosmic Clarity — A Rebel's Guide to Thriving in Perilous Times
The Engine Stopped. The Volcano Didn’t.
A near-crash above Hilo in 1997 wasn’t an accident.
It was an invitation.
We were banking south over Hilo Bay in a rickety Piper plane
— the late sun turning the ocean a deeper blue below, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa rising through the clouds like sleeping gods.
Then a splutter. A shake. And silence.
The pilot turned in his seat. “Oh, this happened earlier. Don’t worry, it started right away.”
He tried the engine. Not a cough. Not a sputter. Just the dry cranking of a motor that had decided it was done.
I looked out the window at the beauty below me — and stilled the fear.
It did not feel like my time. It felt like a sign.
That was August 18th, 1997. I had been on the Big Island for one week.
My question to the ʻāina was simple and enormous: Is Hawaiʻi my home?
The volcano answered.
It has been answering ever since.
This Book Is That Answer — 28 Years in the Making
Who is this book for?
Who is this book for?
You don’t have to be a hiker.
You don’t have to have been to Hawaiʻi. You don’t have to have survived a plane that lost its engine over an active volcano.
But if you’ve ever felt the sick-care system couldn’t give you what you actually needed — if you’ve ever suspected that the answers to your health, your clarity, and your next chapter are somewhere outside the boardroom, the hospital, and the algorithm — this book was written for you.
Specifically, it is for:
- High-achieving professionals who built the career and lost the body, the clarity, or the will to keep performing — and are looking for a science-backed path to biological sovereignty that doesn’t require a hospital
- Executives in transition who know the next chapter has to be different — and are drawn to high-altitude hiking, strategic fasting, or circadian biology as entry points to a new operating system
- Adventure-seekers who want more than Big Island scenery — who want the volcano to mean something physiologically, ancestrally, and permanently
- Anyone drawn to Hawaiʻi not as a vacation but as a calling — and who suspects the ʻaina has something to teach them that no clinic, retreat centre, or supplement stack ever could
The Maunas don’t care about your résumé. They care about your attitude
What You’ll Discover in Chapter 1 — Free
Chapter 1 — “A Lucid Dream That Changed Everything” — opens on that Piper plane above Hilo Bay. It ends with a decision that changed everything.
Inside, you’ll find:
- Why a near-crash above Puna became a 28-year apprenticeship with the ʻāina — and what it taught me about mitochondrial health and high-altitude resilience
- The difference between conquering a volcano and listening to one — and why it changes how you move, breathe, and think at any elevation
- What happens to your cellular voltage, your nervous system, and your biological sovereignty when you stop performing and start paying attention
- How hiking Mauna Kea fasting — without food, often alone, in thin air — became my most reliable nervous system reset
- The decades after I stopped being a GE development engineer — and finally arrived as a Longevity Architect
This is where the ascent begins. Not at the trailhead. Not at the crater rim.
Here. With a quiet engine. And a volcano that refused to let me leave.
Which Act Are You In?
The book runs in four Acts. Awakening - Trails and Trials - Liberation - Ascension. So does the life it was written for. Five questions locate you on the mountain — and name the chapters written for exactly that place. Chapter 1 "A Lucid Dream That Changed Everything" arrives free with your result.
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This Book Is That Answer — 28 Years in the Making
What makes this book different from every other longevity book:
- The author is a development engineer — not a wellness influencer. He brings the same precision to biological claims that he brought to tungsten carbide quality control at Canadian General Electric.
- The field research is documented. 40 years of independent research and practice, demonstrated before eight million viewers on live British television and seen worldwide on PBS series “Healing Quest”.
- The hikes are real. 200+ times on active Hawaiian volcanoes in all sorts of weather – from tank tops to crampons. The logbook in the military shell case at the MaunaLoa summit exists.
- The confession is in the book. Chapter 6 documents the reactive hypoglycemia crisis that nearly killed the author in a remote cabin at 13,250 feet — because he broke his own fasting protocol. The teacher ambushed by his own curriculum. That’s the level of honesty this book operates at.
Four Decades of Evidence. 200+ Summits. One Volcano.
What Happens to Your Body Above 13,000 Feet
High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas is about what happens inside the body when you take it above 13,000 feet — especially when you do it fasting, intentionally, and in service of something larger than a summit photograph. It is about what circadian biology and high-altitude hiking share: both demand that you stop overriding your body’s signals and start reading them.
The Big Island’s two great volcanoes — Mauna Kea at 13,796 feet and Mauna Loa at 13,679 feet — are not just geological formations. In Hawaiian culture they are Wahi Pana: sacred places where the veil between the physical and the ancestral is thin. For four decades, Benedick prepared for these volcanoes not as athletic challenges but as biological reset protocols. The altitude stresses. The ʻāina teaches. The body responds.
When you hike Mauna Kea fasting — as Benedick does regularly — something precise happens to your mitochondrial health. Cellular autophagy accelerates. Metabolic flexibility deepens. The nervous system, stripped of glucose dependency, learns new efficiency. This is not metaphor. It is measurable. And it is available to anyone willing to step off the corporate deadmill long enough to find out what their biology actually does when left to its own intelligence.
Biology is physics first. The volcano understood that before I did.
What’s Inside — 16 Chapters Across 4 Acts
Act 1: Awakening — The lucid dream that brought him to Hawaiʻi. The ancestral lineages he never knew. The humpback whale’s message about the planet’s energy grid. The telluric forces beneath the trail.
Act 2: Trials and Trails — The flat tyre and the five-mile crater rim by moonlight. The fall at 13,200 feet. The Covid sign at 13,250 feet. The fasting architecture. The hiker who never called.
Act 3: Liberation — Why your beliefs aren’t yours. The ethics of sacred ground. Who profits while you sleep. The 244 FOI requests that proved the science doesn’t exist.
Act 4: Ascension — The summit within. The mana mindset. The daily architecture of biological sovereignty. The last cairn.
“High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas brings to life the journey to a new world filled with mystery and magical energy. A calling to the inner world of our beliefs in ourselves and the energy we create and experience here. The Maunas call to us and we respond. A journey we can all take if we want.”
Antoinette Leary“I really enjoyed the beginning of your adventure and can’t wait for the next chapter.”
Michelle
About Benedick Howard
Benedick Howard is an ex-development engineer turned Longevity Architect. Trained at Canadian General Electric and across the mining industry of northern Canada, he spent forty years applying engineering precision to the biology of a human body understood not as a chemical machine but as an electrical system that can be restored.
He trained to master level in [Russian electrotherapy →link to SCENAR/DENAS page] in London in 2003 and demonstrated the technology before eight million viewers on live British television. He invented the DreamWeaver — a sacred geometry sound healing environment still in clinical use today. He has lived off-grid in Hawaiʻi since 1997, hiking MaunaKea and MaunaLoa over 200 times as part of a personal longevity protocol targeting a lifespan well past 100. He hosts the [Fallacy and Idiocracy Podcast →link] and coaches founding clients through the [Longevity Architect Protocol →link to services page].
“Do no harm so love can blossom”
Biological sovereignty – a field manual for recovering that sovereignty.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas about?
High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas is a memoir, field manual, and longevity guide by Benedick Howard — a former GE development engineer turned Longevity Architect who has lived off-grid on Hawaiʻi’s Big Island since 1997. The book documents the last 8 years of high-altitude hiking on Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa, 28 years on the ʻāina, 40 years of field research, 200+ hikes, and what those volcanoes revealed about mitochondrial health, biological sovereignty, circadian biology, and the nervous system. It is not a trail guide. It is a blueprint for anyone who wants to stop managing their decline and start reclaiming their biology.
Is it safe to hike Mauna Kea fasting?
Hiking Mauna Kea fasting is advanced practice — and it is precisely what I have done repeatedly over four decades. At high altitude, the body’s relationship to fuel changes significantly. Reduced oxygen availability shifts metabolism toward fat oxidation and ketone production. For a metabolically flexible individual — one who has trained their mitochondria through strategic fasting and circadian-aligned eating — high-altitude hiking in a fasted state can deepen autophagy, sharpen mental clarity, and accelerate biological reset. It is not recommended for beginners or those with blood sugar instability. It is discussed throughout the book.
It is not recommended for beginners or those with blood sugar instability. It is discussed throughout the book. Consider consulting your physician before attempting fasted hiking at altitude.
What happens to your body above 13,000 feet?
Above 13,000 feet — the elevation of both Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa’s summits — atmospheric oxygen drops to roughly 60% of sea-level concentration. The body responds immediately: breathing rate increases, heart rate elevates, and the mitochondria are forced to operate under hypoxic stress. Over time and with repeated exposure, this stress triggers measurable adaptations — increased red blood cell production, improved mitochondrial density, and enhanced metabolic efficiency. It is one of the most powerful free biological stressors available. The Maunas trailheads are accessible from sea level in an hour or so, making them uniquely available for Big Island residents and visitors seeking a genuine biological reset through high-altitude hiking in Hawaii.
How does high-altitude hiking support longevity?
High-altitude hiking engages multiple longevity pathways simultaneously. The hypoxic stress triggers mitochondrial biogenesis — the creation of new mitochondria. The physical exertion activates AMPK, a cellular energy sensor linked to autophagy and anti-ageing. The cold temperatures at elevation activate brown adipose tissue. And for those hiking in a fasted state, the compounding of metabolic stressors creates a hormetic response — the body adapts upward rather than declining. Combined with strategic fasting and circadian biology principles, high-altitude hiking on the Hawaiian Maunas is one of the most comprehensive longevity protocols available without a clinic, a prescription, or a supplement.
Is this book for people who have never hiked before?
Yes — and no. High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas is not a technical hiking manual. You will not find gear lists or trail maps. What you will find is the philosophy, biology, and field wisdom that make high-altitude hiking on Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa a transformative rather than merely athletic experience. Readers who have never hiked a volcano will find the book accessible and compelling. Experienced hikers will find frameworks they have never encountered. The mountain is the teacher. The book is the introduction.
What is the difference between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa as hiking destinations?
Mauna Kea at 13,796 feet is Hawaiʻi’s highest peak and is considered the most sacred mountain in Hawaiian culture — the realm of Akua, the gods. Its summit trail is a 12-mile round trip from the Visitor Information Station, with 4,500 feet of elevation gain. Mauna Loa at 13,679 feet is the world’s largest active volcano by volume, and its summit trail is 22 miles and more physically demanding, beginning at 6,600 feet.
Both demand preparation and respect.
In this book, I do not treat them as athletic challenges, more as the journey. I treat them as living organisms — teachers with more to offer than a summit photograph.
What is biological sovereignty and why does it matter?
Biological sovereignty is the state in which your body’s fundamental regulatory systems — circadian rhythm, mitochondrial function, nervous system tone, metabolic flexibility — are operating under your own authority rather than being overridden by artificial light environments, processed food, pharmaceutical dependency, or chronic stress. The term was introduced to me not by a laboratory but by a living volcano. When you remove every modern convenience and stand at 13,000 feet, what remains is your biology in its sovereign state. High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas is, at its core, a field manual for recovering that sovereignty — not in theory, but in your body, mind and soul.
When does the book launch and how can I get early access?
High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas launches in Fall 2026 — in Benedick Howard’s 75th year. Waitlist Warriors receive Chapter 1 free immediately, pre-launch field dispatches from the Mauna, first notification the moment the book goes live, and priority access to the companion Big Island Biological Reset retreat. Take the five-question “Which Act Are You In?” quiz on this page — Chapter 1 arrives with your result, and your place on the waitlist is confirmed.
The plane above Hilo didn’t crash. It redirected. Four decades of field research — and finally high-altitude hiking, strategic fasting, and biological sovereignty work — later, this book is the answer it pointed me toward.
Take the five-question quiz. Your Act appears instantly — Chapter 1 arrives with it. Waitlist Warriors receive:
- Instant access to Chapter 1 — “A Lucid Dream That Changed Everything”: the Piper plane story, the ʻāina, and the decision that started everything
- Your Act — where you stand on the mountain, and the chapters written for exactly that place
- The Sunday Briefings — weekly field intelligence on biological sovereignty
- Pre-launch field dispatches from the Mauna — raw intelligence from MaunaKea and MaunaLoa
- First notification when High Attitude Hiking the Hawaiian Maunas goes live — Fall 2026
- Priority access to the companion Big Island Biological Reset retreat
Go forth, question everything. Many mahalos from Hawaiʻi. Warrior out.
Do no harm so love can blossom
— Benedick Howard Longevity Architect | Founder, Ageless Warrior Alliance | Kurtistown, Hawaiʻi