Volcanoes National Park

http://www.nps.gov/havo/index.htm Link to Volcano National Park Website.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWSU4cF9anA Link to You Tube video of volcano.

We are lucky to be living 45 mins from this must see sight on Hawaii. Kilauea Caldera is located at an altitude of 4000ft, and the park is open 24hrs per day. Mauna Loa (long mountain) is the most massive mountain on Earth, occupying an area of 19,000 cubic miles.

Measured from its base on the seafloor, it rises 56,000feet, over 27,000 height than Mount Everest.

From the visitor's centre we could see the sulphur rising out of the crater. There is a road that goes around the outside of the crater, but due to high sulphur levels being emitted, part of the road is closed off.

Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park encompasses a portion of Kīlauea, and the park visitor center is located near the margin of the summit caldera overlooking a large pit crater called Halemaʻumaʻu. The roughly circular caldera measures 3x5 km (or 6x6 km, including the outermost ring faults. The best place to view the caldera is from the Jagger museum.

From here we drove to the Kilauea Iki Crater a small crater to the side of the Kilauea Caldera. The last eruption here was November 14th to December 20th,1959. It produced the most spectacular lava fountains.



There is a trail which takes you around the crater through lush rain forest with loads of birds singing. Every now and again there is a gap in the trees and you can get a glimpse of the crater floor. It is a mile across in size, and it is very hard to judge just how big it is, until you spot little people walking the path along the crater floor.

The descent into the crater is quite steep and it is difficult to walk on the uneven surface of the lava. It is a big contrast between the lush forest and the barren lava. There are piles of rocks marking out a path across the crater floor.

To start with the lava is jagged as it contains remnants of lava spatters rather than the smooth lava which you encounter further into the centre. There was small amounts of steam escaping from the rocks and minerals leaching from the rock.

Even in this place, plants are trying to get a foothold in the ground. The walls of the crater were towering either side of us and it was an amazing experience. On the other side of the crater floor we climbed back up through the trees to the top of the crater.

Once at the top again, we took a look at the Thurston Lava Tube.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lava_tube Link to info on Lava Tubes.


Another first for us, we walked through the tube being able to see the different levels of lava as it cooled. The ceiling was wet where water from above is still seeping through the porous lava roof.

From the crater rim, there is a road that follows a number of craters down towards the sea.

On either side of the road were massive holes, like quarries where eruptions had happened in the past.

There were lava flows, which the road cut through, coming from these craters and flowing down and into the sea.

From the side of the mountain we could see where new land had been formed. The latest flow was 2002.

When it got dark we re-visited the crater where the sulphur was coming out and we could see a red glow where the sulphur was reflecting the lava beneath it.

The stars were amazing, with no light pollution, they looked near enough to touch, the sky was full of them. This will be an experience we will not forget in a hurry.