Day 5: The Big Island, April 29, 2010

Since Jason and I are currently vacationing in St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands, I thought, what better time to try to get caught up with my other vacation recaps? Once the sun goes down here, there's not much to do except drink lots of fruity rum drinks. Being Mormon puts a damper on that, so instead we're back in our little house, on our mutual computers. Actually, it's fantastic, if you must know.

I've been dragging my feet on the Hawaii recaps because Day 5 was kind of an eventful day with many pictures to cull. Day 5 was our big excursion to Volcanoes National Park on the other side of The Big Island.

We started out in the morning and our first stop was the Punalu'u Black Sand Beach.

Okay, actually, our FIRST stop was the Punalu'u Bake Shop. Hawaiian sweet bread, anyone? There are no pictures because I think we were all too busy stuffing our faces full of samples.

Then we got to the black sand beach. The black sand beach is the result of lava hitting the cold water and basically exploding. Awesome, right?


Then it was on to the volcanoes. Kilauea is an active volcano. A portion of the national park loop road was blocked off because of recent volcanic activity. In fact, the flowing lava is still wrecking havoc, as you can see from this article from today.

We hiked the Kilauea Iki trail, circling around one side of the crater in tropical jungle, then down into and across the moonscape of the crater, then up through the jungle. Kilauea Iki is the crater resulting from a 1959 eruption of Kilauea. The floor of the crater is now solid, but is still warm.

The sign at the start of the trail
Jungle path

Baby Anya had a nice ride (having just seen her recently at 10 months old, I can't believe how tiny she was!)
Baby ferns
View from the trail of the crater below.
The crater
Crossing the crater
Back in the jungle
Taking a break for baby to have a snack.

After the trail, we explored the nearby lava tubes.

We finished in the park with a drive down Chain of Craters Road.
The road has been redone a few times, since the lava flow keeps covering it up.


These signs were all over. Comforting.
Don't worry. Anya stayed in the car for this part.

Some of us walked about a half mile off the road to look at the petroglyphs.

As you can see, the lava flowed right into the sea, leaving a wasteland in its wake

At the end of the road was an arch created by the ocean in the lava rock

At this point, we split into two groups. Jason's parents, Sarah and the baby headed up to look at the red glow from the caldera, then back to the condo. Jason, Taylor, Marissa, Brandon and I drove (like speed demons because we had heard it might close soon) to see the flowing lava.




We got back to the condo pretty late, but seeing the lava was worth it. Very neat.

Snow Day!

Fairy-tale house all covered in snow

View down the street from the front door
My car
Tiny likes snow days too because it means there is always a lap to sit on.

I think my space heater may also be a big draw.

Happy New Year!

Jason and I had planned to go to the Providence Bright Night celebration last night. But when we looked at the line-up of performers, we decided we didn't really want to spend $15 on it. So we stayed home and I cooked us a yummy dinner and some pumpkin spice custards and we watched the first season of Community and rang in the new year together in our sweet little house.

Most of the time I like having a big party or at least something more festive going on, but last night was nice and peaceful and a great way to bring in 2011.