PREPARE YOURSELF FOR A FIERY ADVENTURE AT THE HAWAII VOLCANOES NATIONAL PARK.
BY DIANE BAIR & PAMELA WRIGHT
PHOTOGRAPH BY G. BRAD LEWIS
While Hawaii’s Big Island has its splendid stretches of sand—eye-popping beaches that come in unexpected hues of black, red and green—lying around all day would be missing the point. This is the place to let your inner adventurer come out to play. If you get a little giddy at the thought of trekking along the rim of a volcano or following the yellow glow of lava flow, put this place on your list of must-sees.
The Big Island really is big.
At 4,028 square miles, it’s nearly twice as large as the rest of the Hawaiian Islands combined—and it’s getting bigger because volcanic eruptions regularly add lava to the shoreline. Two mountains tower over the landscape. To the north, there’s Mauna Kea (13,796 feet), long dormant. To the south, Mauna Loa (13,677 feet) is active but quiet. Meanwhile, Kilauea, the world’s most active volcano, spews lava from its east flank. Only 28 miles southwest of Hilo, Hawaii Volcanoes National Park (www.nps.gov/havo)—home to Kilauea and Mauna Loa—is one of the few places in the world where the casual traveler can visit a live volcano.
Hawaii’s shield volcanoes produce quiet eruptions, not violent explosions. Rather than fleeing Kilauea’s fireworks, show up and bring a picnic. The show is best at night, when red-hot sparks splatter against a backdrop of inky sky. By day, you can see steam rising from vents. You’ll marvel at lava’s many forms; it can be crumbly, like day-old donuts, or as shiny as the tile in posh hotel bathrooms.
Make the Kilauea Visitor Center your first stop at the park—you can pick up a map and find out if eruptions are occurring. Although Kilauea has been erupting continually since 1983, it’s mostly unseen. Magma moves through seven miles of lava tubes under the surface, and only where it breaks out above the island’s southern shore is it visible. The 2,000-degree molten rock oozes into the water, creating a boiling sea and sending a plume of steam into the sky.
Into the Volcano
(FROM MILD TO WILD)
DRIVE:
Along the 11-mile Crater Rim Drive, you can peer into craters, walk on glossy black lava and see (and smell) steam and sulfur fumes emanating from the ground. The road circles the great pit of the Halemaumau Crater, which erupted most recently in 1982 (and is likely to do so again). A 10-minute walk will get you to this mammoth (a half-mile across and 1,000 feet deep) crater, which has been designated as a sacred site. Another worthwhile stop is the Thomas A. Jaggar Museum, where you can “see” every earthquake on the island—there are several hundred tremors a day here— thanks to seismometers and other high-tech stuff. Video screens show footage of the volcanoes spewing fire and ash into the sky and spilling red-hot rivers of lava down their slopes. Keep in mind that this may not be happening during your visit; whether you witness a real show or visit during the volcano’s downtime is up to Pele, goddess of fire and volcanoes.
Volcano Vacation
You could do Hawaii Volcanoes National Park as a drive-by, but it deserves more attention. Spend the night in Volcano Village, and appreciate the raw, primal beauty of volcano country. Just a mile from the park, Kilauea Lodge (www.kilauealodge.com), a former YMCA camp, is a rustic but cozy place to crash. The on-property restaurant offers fine dining with Old World flair (think antelope flambé and braised rabbit). For simpler fare, try Kiawe Kitchen (808-967-7711). Good salads and sandwiches (try the ahi tuna on a baguette with pesto mayo) are luncheon mainstays. They also serve good pizzas and a short list of entrées at dinnertime. The area isn’t much of a shopping mecca, but the go-to place is Volcano Art Center (www.volcanoartcenter.org), where the work of nearly 300 mostly local artists is displayed in the 1877 Volcano House, the original hotel in the national park.
HIKE:
Don’t miss a cool, easy stroll through the Thurston Lava Tube. You’ll trek through a short passage of fern-bedecked rain forest, and then you’ll reach a dark, drippy, cobwebby tunnel, where gnarly tree roots hang down like spooky chandeliers. Bring a flashlight, put little headlamps on the kids and poke around. Across the street from the Thurston Lava Tube is the Kilauea Iki Crater Overlook, where you can pull off the road and peer into a huge, “frozen” lava lake, still steaming from a 1959 eruption. Want to get a closer look? The three hours or so you’ll spend hiking the four-mile Kilauea Iki trail is definitely worth it. The trail begins with a series of steep switchbacks that traverse a dense rain forest, and gets easier as you go. As you get to the crater floor, look for ahu (rock piles) to show you the way. You’ll pass the Puu Puai cinder cone and return along the crater’s rim.
DRIVE AND HIKE:
The outrageously scenic Chain of Craters Road is an 18-mile stretch of blacktop that curves through a landscape of lava fields and descends 3,700 feet to the coast. It ends where the lava crossed the road in 2003. In some places, the hillsides are covered in rust-colored lava and spiky vegetation. Elsewhere, fields of ropy pahoehoe lava are shiny and dark, like chocolate syrup poured over a hot-fudge sundae—with a backdrop of brilliant blue ocean. You could simply drive it all, and hike at the end—many people do—but if you start early enough in the morning, you’ll have time to take a wonderful walk along the way. A one-and-a-half hour trek over lava fields leads to Puu Loa Petroglyphs, where more than 25,000 petroglyphs (rock art) were carved into the pahoehoe lava. Holei Sea Arch, a short detour off the road, is a great photo-op spot. A two-mile hike around Puu Hululu reveals “lava trees” where the lava flowed, and then cooled, around the trees. This created perfect tree-forms where the incinerated trees once stood.
Depending on the direction and character of the current flow, you’re likely to see lava flowing down from the cliffs, up close in a slow-moving surface flow, or spilling into the ocean. Visit at night for eerie views of glowing lava as it travels through lava tubes.
REALLY HIKE:
At a mere 13,677 feet, Mauna Loa isn’t the tallest peak in the Pacific. But it is the most massive mountain on earth—100 times the size of Mount Rainier. Rising 18,000 feet from the floor of the Pacific Ocean, this perfectly shaped shield volcano last erupted in 1984. You can do it by car (the road climbs 6,662 feet), but why not hike it—if you can handle it. Mauna Loa Trail dishes out some of the toughest hiking in Hawaii. The trail ascends 6,000 feet in 19 miles, heading seven miles from Mauna Loa Lookout to a cabin at Red Hill, then 12 miles up to the summit cabin at 13,250 feet. It’s steep, through a moonscape of lava flow. Expect to spend four days on this adventure, not including advance planning (you’ll need to register and get a free permit from the Kilauea Visitor Center). The climate is sub-Arctic, with whiteouts and overnight temperatures below freezing year-round. Snow in July is common; altitude sickness is also an issue. Plan to spend the night at the cabin at Red Hill to get acclimatized. Talk to the rangers for more details—and don’t even think about doing this hike unless you’re properly equipped, physically fit and experienced in high-altitude trekking.