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  3. TRAVEL: 2007 through 2011
  4. Hawaii, February and March, 2009

Big Island #4

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How do you mark a trail on fresh lava? Yellow paint and posts, I guess. It works. Follow the yellow striped trail.
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How do you mark a trail on fresh lava? Yellow paint and posts, I guess. It works. Follow the yellow striped trail.

walkinglava

  • Signs in central downtown Hilo point in the direction of Rainbow Falls, but once you go a few blocks, you have to either get out your map or guess which turns to take. We got lucky and found it. I heard later that during dry periods (which I guess must occasionally occur around here, although I didn't see any evidence of it), the river is dry and the falls non-existent. So, again, we were lucky to see (and hear) it at its roaring best.
  • Large banyan trees are so amazing. Gotta love that parka, Bev!
  • We've walked up above Rainbow Falls, and are looking up river (to the west). You can't see it, but there is a bridge just behind the last water fall you see in this photo. The NEXT photo is taken from that bridge, looking even further up river. You see a nice African tulip tree here in the foreground.
  • Here we are on the aforementioned bridge, looking further upriver. Waterfall after waterfall after waterfall after......
  • We drove south from Hilo, toward the southeast coast and toward Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. Just south of the town of Pahoa we came upon Lava Trees State Park.
  • Apparently this area has difficulty with vandalism, and all the interpretive signs were long gone. From what I find on the net, however, prior to 1870 this was a lush 'Ōhi'a forest, 'Ōhi'a being a tree with beautiful red flowers (more about them in the next album). In 1870, the trees were cold and wet from recent rains. Rapidly-flowing lava swamped this area and pooled to 11 feet deep. Because the trees were so cold and wet, they cooled the lava which contacted them (although the lava also reduced the trees to ashes). Then suddenly fissures opened and, as rapidly as it came, the apparently very non-viscous lava drained away, leaving only the towers of relatively cooled lava which had formed surrounding the (previously cold and wet) trees.
  • Can you imagine lava, hot enough to be nearly watery-thin, gushing down this fissure-drain? Amazing.
  • A bit further south is Alahanui County Park, with a natural hot spring. Well, the pool around the spring is pretty much man-made, but the spring itself was natural.
  • Can you tell which head belongs to Bev?
  • To your left is an inlet / outlet to the ocean. You can stand at it and waves come in and cool you off, then it warms again between waves. Where Bev is, and anyplace further to your right, it's always quite warm. It has a nice, sandy bottom. Also a surprising number of fish.
  • On further along the coast, near Isaac Hale Beach Park, the ocean and waves make for relaxing entertainment.
  • Untitled photo
  • We wanted very much to see the lava from Kilauea as it hits the seawater. We were told by the locals that we had to be at the end of this road by 5:00 PM and to ignore the signs. You know me and how I generally like to follow rules and avoid fines, arrest, jail, and prison. It took a while for me to get up the nerve to actually allow Bev to drive beyond this sign. I'm glad I did, though. Apparently this was the old checkpoint, and they just have never bothered to move the signs as they moved the checkpoint further on down the road. Seems even odder due to the fact that the whole contraption holding the signs looks totally portable. Maybe they are just waiting for the same folks who stole the signs at Lava Tree State Park to do their work for them......
  • We got to the checkpoint, a gate beyond which we were not allowed to drive (really this time), a bit before 5:00 PM. A guard at the gate was almost apologetic, saying that it looked like we probably would not see any lava draining to the sea that day. However, up on the hill, we kept seeing steam coming out of the fissures. Quite a teasing thing, really. At 5, the gate would open and we, along with maybe 100 other people, would walk about 30 minutes to an overlook where we may or may not be treated by Pele's spectacle.
  • I'm not sure he cared either way, as long as he had his nice, comfortable chair.
  • At about 4:59 there was a giant plume of steam which formed from the sea, and about the same time, the guard opened the gate. Here is one thing we saw along the trail. The lava we are standing on flowed pretty recently, indeed. I failed to get any shots of the houses built on what appeared to be brand new lava flows. It appears that people barely wait for the stuff to cool before they re-build on it. I heard that this place is a nightmare for surveyors and a paradise for real estate attorneys.
  • Here you see the plume, to your right, against a beautiful, cloudy sky as we start our own trek to the sea.
  • How do you mark a trail on fresh lava? Yellow paint and posts, I guess. It works. Follow the yellow striped trail.
  • You can just imagine this stuff flowing, twisting, partially hardening and then flowing against itself to form twisted, curved wraps before finally hardening once and for all.
  • In years past, the flow was on National Park land, and people were allowed to get very close. It has since shifted to county land, and word is that the county is terrified about possible law suits should someone get hurt or killed. So, now tourists are not allowed within probably 1/2 mile or so (maybe a little nearer, that's an estimate).
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