Tropical weather, sunny skies, gentle seas … in Hawaii’s winter months, there’s another reality made plain by recent rescues.

A week ago, a California visitor publicly thanked first responders for finding him three days after he fell 1,000 feet on the Koolau Summit Trail. And then on Thursday, a Hawaii island youth paddling coach, Nathan Grocholski Lopez, spent four hours in rough, cold ocean waves when his canoe flipped.

The takeaway, other than gratitude for the happy endings, is the need to respect the power of nature, especially in wet, chilly weather.