When we decided to book a house on the big island for a month one factor regarding location was proximity to good hiking. We are only around a half hour from the gates to Volcanoes National Park so many trips there are planned. Another factor was avoiding masses of tourists. Choosing a place to base our travels out in an underpopulated area became a very wise decision as the Covid-19 virus is causing havoc here on the big island like it is everywhere else in the world. Most hikes we are choosing to go on are fairly isolated on a good day for tourism but now it is hard to find anyone on the trails.
A picture of the volcanic crater from the rim above. A foggy but otherwise pleasant day for a stroll!Did I mention that the fog turned to a drizzle? What is the difference between heavy fog and drizzle anyway?The path down to the crater floor was in good shape but a bit misleading in appearance. It was a tad bit steeper further on.For our fellow hikers and trail maintainers…..Never heard a cairn called Ahu before. Nice to learn a bit of the Hawaiian language.What an eerie shot here as we begin to traverse across the crater floor.This is not fog here. It is the steam coming from a geothermal heat vent. We lucked out in seeing it as by the time we left the area, there was no more steam.The path, with its many “ahu” neatly placed, was fairly easy to follow.It still amazes us that these pics are not taken with black and white film.Back up the other side we returned to a tropical forest that seems to prevail on this side of the island. This is the entrance to the Thurston Lava Tube. Although it is the biggest tourist attraction at the park, the Caronavirus and the fact that it was a rainy day seemed to keep folks away.The lighting in the football field length tube was sufficient for walking but not for photography. All the signs said that the lights go out at 8pm so make sure to have your flashlight.Back in the car for a drive down to the coast. The road is still in the park and is also a 20 mile long dead end road. At least the rain appears to have stopped.We love being able to see the road (or trail) ahead of us in the distance. With many hairpin turns on the way down we were afforded great views.This picture describes the feeling of understanding when a long hike or drive is worth the effort!Time for a 1.4 mile roundtrip hike over the lava to see some ancient petroglyphs.There were many of these pictures but this one stood out to us.It was if the rainbow knew what our moods were at the time. Back home for more exploring tomorrow.
All the locals we have run into agree that the Green Sand Beach is a must see. It is an hour and a half drive south of where we are staying but we coupled the experience with attending a grand opening of a coffee farm near there. We chose a cloud covered day as there was no shade along the 4 mile round trip route.
What a fabulous gem of a place this is!And the two mile walk to the beach begins. Not too often you get to hike directly along the rocky shores just to find a beach at the end.For a small fee folks (all 4 of them here) can catch a ride in a beat up pick up truck instead of getting some exercise. Boy did those folks get bounced around.
Below are some fabulous pictures of the scenery along our hour long hike to the Green Sand Beach:
These wind farms have helped take up the slack in the grid around here. The lava flows of a few years back took out the geothermal plant that was providing power to the island.Check out the atv paths created by the locals. It makes for a different hike each time too.Being a wee bit color blind myself I am trusting y’all can see the sand is indeed green!Our approach to the beach.Still a ways out we began to notice a few folks seemingly scaling the cliffside walls to get down.We might managed to get a bit of snorkeling in here. Not the best beach for that but it was safe from the rip currents and crashing waves.Scaling the cliffside to get down was really much easier than it looked. A cool path indeed.A nice selfie on the other side of the beach.Contemplating what a wonderful spot this is.
After an uneventful but beautiful hike back to our car we drove to the coffee shop for some goodies. We found a few friends along the way:
This cute looking bull somehow got locked out of his field. We had taken a wrong turn down a long dirt road and wondered if he was curious or aggravated at us for disturbing him?Once we reached the coffee farm we were greeted by some of the bull’s friends.As it was Miranda’s Coffee Farm’s grand opening they had their relatives from El Salvador hand making pupusas. They are a wonderful meat filled pocket of goodness.Lunch and a bag of coffee to go. The coffee really was probably the best we have ever had!
This is actually a view of Mauna Kea from our hike. Mauna Loa really does not have a vantage point for a picture of its own. It is considered the largest mountain (mass-wise) in the world and is spread out over a vast area making it difficult to catch a picture of its summit from afar.
We have generally found it a worthy endeavor to try and climb to the highest point in each state we visit. It turns out that Mauna Kea, the other large volcano on the island, is the taller by around 100 feet. The problem there is there does not appear to be a good hike up it as the road goes to the summit. Mauna Loa has a really cool 17 mile one lane road to the weather observatory on its slopes but from there, one has to hike another 6.5 miles to the summit proper. We have never been at these types of altitudes and did some research on Acute Altitude Sickness before heading out. It was recommended that we stop and sit for a while a few times during the car ride to around 11,000 feet to allow our bodies to acclimate. Literature seemed to point to the quick increase in altitude you might go through while driving versus hiking is the true issue.
A picture of the 17 mile approach road. We saw absolutely NO ONE on this road on the approach or return trip.Another shot of the approach road. The electrical wires are “feeding” the weather observatory at the end of the road.Laurie reads the placard at the base of the observatory driveway.This placard reaffirmed what we read regarding Acute Altitude Sickness.We did note that there were no trees to be blown down and removed or trimmed!Not sure what the P is there for? Cars can not go any further and there was certainly not a parking area up ahead.Off we go! What a grand view we had as we were above the clouds.A picture of a lava tube. Note the man-made wall in front of it. From what we heard, there are times when bad weather can roll in unannounced and this may have been a spot where someone holed up to wait out the storm.After a mile and a half of uphill hiking we came to the border of Volcanoes National Park. We have spent a few days wandering around the park at lower altitudes.Although I am shade colorblind I was easily able to see the multitude of minerals and their striking colors.More fabulous colors!Another lava tube to check out.Check out the two types of lava meeting up here behind the crushed lava in the foreground. The type on the left is called A’a lava and is very tough to walk on and, for goodness sake, do not fall on it. The type on the right is called Pahoehoe lava and is very smooth and not tough to walk on.The summit crater from our lunch spot.The Hawaiian hand signal for Aloha
The next two pics are of the trail conditions we encountered. Sometimes it was smooth going and others…….
Check out the snow pack as we reached 13,000 feet.We are at “cloud altitude” The clouds are floating over the Saddle Road that winds its way between Mauna Loa and Mauna KeaThe only sign of life we saw were these two helicopters flying above the clouds and under us on the return hike. Check out the fabulous shade of blue you see when at 14,000 feet!We made it back to the car with about an hour to spare before sunset. The angle of the sun allowed us to grab an easy selfie!Yes, we are in Hawaii! It was 77 degrees back down at sea level.
We feel very fortunate to have found a lovely house to call home on the eastern side of the big island near Hilo. Our hostess Gwin, is in Colorado caring for her elderly mother but Mango, her ex, lives in the back of the property in his tiny-house and is simply fascinating to talk to (nevermind very diligent regarding our needs). There are no tourists in our neck of the rain forest and the many local residents we have encountered are all extremely friendly and forthcoming with their knowledge of the area.
Curb appeal!A peaceful spot to hang out with the morning coffee and contemplate life on the big island! Awesome table for morning coffee. Check out the coconuts growing right outside our front door.A guava tree outside our window.There are many papaya trees to be had on the island. Some of them grow right in our yard.This is one of the mini pineapple plants on the property. Not ripe enough to eat yet but when they are…….We have used the lemons from this tree on many occasions.The sun hits this plant just right every morning to make it seem like the top leaves are flowers.
There are so many different and beautiful flowers on the property that we created these 3 collages for your visual entertainment:
Rows and rows of macadamia nut trees in our backyard. We counted near 50 trees. Laurie learned the art of cracking open the macadamia nuts we gathered. They are one of the hardest nuts to crack so to speak. They have an outer shell and a harder inner shell. Roast them at 225 for 15 minutes with salt and a buttery spray and oh my….. Mango’s tiny-house toward the back of the one acre property.Each house on the island seems to have one of these modern day cisterns. Rain water is captured and used for all needs water related except the drinking water. This can be found a few miles down the road at town run natural spring sites.
Mark pulled a coconut out of the refrigerator so we could enjoy our first refreshingly carbonated fresh coconut right out of the coconut. Mark then showed us his coffee trees, and we purchased some of his freshly ground home grown coffee!
Both of us have always wanted to explore the islands of Hawaii. As winter was in full swing we figured that there was no better time than now to make that dream come true. After much research we opted for a month on the big island aptly named Hawaii. We purchased one way plane tickets on March 1 figuring that if we wanted to spend more time there we could. We rented a full house near Hilo for $40 per night and an all wheel drive Buick (of all brands) for $60 per day. Something seemed wrong with that but, you know. We will update the blog as our adventures dictate but for now, our first day was spent simply wandering near our home base. As with most of our travels we opt for meeting locals and taking in their stories and advice. We first met Mark, a 60 something farm market owner. He was in the Air Force and called himself a “gun runner” for the Afghans back in the war with the Soviet Union. As his dad was a Pearl Harbor survivor he found himself back here making a living as a farmer. We got lots of good advice (hopefully) regarding special sites and destinations that he thought worthy. He pointed us to a dirt road that was recently re-scraped (what locals call turning a new lava flow into a road) after the 2016 eruption of Mauna Loa. Off we went to explore:
We spotted a nice spot to pull off the road where the lava had just recently flowed to the sea. There was no real path to follow but, as with life, we just put one foot in front of the other and soon we were walking across the lava flow. So cool to be walking on new land!The colors buried deep in the lava were spectacular.I even tried to help create a path to the ocean for future lava walkers to use by building a rock cairn to guide the way.It amazed us that the vegetation was already growing back. Who knew lava had the ability to allow green plants to grow?After about an hour we reached the ocean. As we are on the windward side of the island, the surf is generally a bit rougher but oh my how the blue came through.We noticed a number of abandoned cars along this small dirt road. We were later informed that there is now no place on the island to bring junked cars to for salvage so folks tend to simply leave them abandoned. Some locals appear to salvage them during the night before authorities paint the big letters AV on them. Abandoned vehicles are then eventually towed away to the big car graveyard in the sky.As it appeared we were reaching the “end of the road” we came across a freshly scraped driveway with some signs signifying that there might be someone home that could tell us a bit about the area:
A short quarter mile drive found us at a small house with its owner Gary coming out to greet us. Gary was a self named “Lava Addict” who has lived on the lava flow near the ocean for around 15 years now. He was able to get a special permit that allowed him to track the lava flow while working with volcanologists to track the lava flow, he captured phenomenal pictures during this up close and personal experience with the lava flow. Originally from Wisconsin he fell in love with lava, and hence the area, back when he was visiting on vacation in 2005. He went on to tell us the story of how he purchased the land and built a small home. His stories of how the native Hawaiians treated him were mind boggling. His story of how he watched his house get burnt to the ground when the lava flowed over it were even more mind boggling. He filled us in on a number of other places to go and explore before selling us a DVD that chronicled the building and burning of his first house. I jokingly inquired if he had lava insurance and to our surprise, he did. That allowed him to rebuild on the same spot that the lava had claimed his previous home.
Gary is a professional photographer that makes his living selling occasional tourists like us a poster or dvd. What a great time we had with him.Gary was nice enough to label all the different lava beds with the dates they flowed.We cannot argue with the sentiments here (not the no parking sign!)
Next it was off to find the black sand beach both Gary and Mark clued us in on. They also said it was a “clothing optional beach”. We of course “opted for”.
An ominous sign for those who would be going swimming.This is the only picture we took or would post….Sorry the pics of the black sand will have to wait for another post.
Our last stop of the day was Isaac Hale State Park. Our GPS told us it was permanently closed (we figured that was because the 2018 lava flow was right there creating 800 new acres of land)
This road had recently been scraped to reopen the park. There were 3 “fingers” of lava that we had to drive across. The locals said that the bull dozers had to take month long breaks as their temperature limit is below the 700 degrees the cooling lava was.The eerie view from the road on one of the lava fingers. No, this is not taken with black and white film.It amazed us how much vegetation survives along the well defined edge of the lava flow.There is a local movement to help plant coconut trees in the new lava. This cute baby coconut palm tree plant is trying its damndest to grow.The boat dock to nowhere! This dock used to be part of the lagoon until the 2018 flow separated it completely from the ocean. The remaining pool is thermally heated for a nice swimming opportunity.On the way back “home” we stopped to take pics on the side of the road of the remaining steam vents from 2018.
