MARCH 13 - A VISIT TO KILAUEA

We got up, ate our condo breakfast (Cheerios and/or English muffins), packed our PBJ sandwiches, and off we drove toward Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  We expected rain, but the day turned out to be lovely.  The drive from Kona to the park is the longest one we could take on the island (2 hours each way).  Some lovely scenery, but a long drive.  Once we got beyond the Kona coast, most of the island is very rural.  The farms were mostly macadamia nut farms, and, possibly, some coffee farms as well.  The entire ride was along the slopes of, what I was later to find out, was Mauna Loa.  Factoid:  It's one of the largest volcanoes in the world - not tallest - just widest - it takes up a lot of territory.  The road was steep on both sides - one up the other spectacularly steep downwards.

Our first stop was the Thurston Lava tube.  We took a half mile walk through the jungle to the tube.  Both the walk and the tube were great.

Charlie beginning our walk

Kilawuea-iki crater from the trail.

Inside the tube.

The tube is huge - I'm in the photo for scale.

Lovely trail to and from the tube.

Our next tour was the Chain of Craters road.  Due to caution and recent eruptions  the mile trail was reduced to 0.4 mi.  Oh well.  The photos below were what we were able to see.

Along the highway were a number of stops to look at old calderas.  The one below is from a 1974 eruption.  Note the lava flow into the caldera lake.

The caldera below is the Pu'u Pua'i caldera - about 1979.  Note the trees above are full sized - the crater was amazingly deep.

Puhoehoe lava along the road.  (This is ropey looking lava).  The other kind is ahaa - lava chuncks.  Behind me was a trail, of a sort, that led down to the water (about 10 miles).  The trail was supposed to be marked by cairns.  Since piles of ahaa lava look like cairns, I'm sure I'd get hopelessly lost.

This photo was a view of the ocean from the road.  We stopped and had lunch with this lovely view.

The two photos below are of steam rising from the ocean where the newest lava is flowing into the sea.  We couldn't get anywhere close.  Again, precaution, road blocks, and some real potential danger.  Piles of the new lava build up, then collapse.  Other than a helicopter, there really wasn't any way to see this close up.

We opted for a 0.7 mile walk to the Pu'u Loa petroglyphs.  The trail was all lava flow which made it interesting - like walking up and down loads of little steps.

Steam vents are seen in the photo below.  These are very close to the visitor center

Across the street from the visitor center is the Volcano House.  A hotel that sits right at the edge of the Kilauea crater.  The photo below was taken from the porch of the hotel.