The Big Island: Lava is Flowing!

Pele is the Hawaiian goddess of volcanoes.

To access the area where you can witness the lava moving is rather convoluted.  In actuality if we could have just driven north on the Chain of Craters Road from the point where the road ended inside the park we would have reached the site in 15 minutes.  However, 15 years of almost constant lava flow from Pu'u O'o volcano obstructed that route.  So it took us an hour and a half to drive outside of the park and make a huge U on the highway to get almost back to the coast to see the moving lava.  This area is now outside of the park and the lava is flowing on private property.  The viewing site is operated by the county.

So this is the scene.  I think I was as curious about this as I was to see the lava - How will we see it?  Is there a platform?  Will there be a railing?  How do you have a structure primed to watch lava flow when that structure is always under the constant threat of destruction?  Well, this is what I was afraid of.  Just temporary barricades on a road paved 4 days ago and a crowd of people all standing and waiting for the lava to move.  Guess who always looses this game?  Christina and Matthew.  We are neither tall nor aggressive.  And the truth is this situation tends to bring out the worst in people. 

I'll save you the suspense: we never got to the front of the line.  I managed to squeeze to a second tier spot (which did me no good since the couple in front of me seemed a foot taller).  I guess if I were in the front I might enjoy the spectacle for over a half hour too. I managed to get the photos included by photographing under their arms or between their waists.  This silent battle, combined with the rain made this experience less fun that we wanted it to be.  

But we saw raw earth move and that was pretty cool.

This photo was taken looking inland, the steam revealing the path of the lava.

This was the lava's progress when we first got to the site, around 5:30pm.  Notice the ferns.  When exploring lava fields this is the easiest way to guess how recent the last flow.  I would not tread in an area without ferns.

5:40 - lava is on the move and the rain has returned.

5:50 - The rain has stopped an the lava is really moving! 

6:00 - And still the lava flows!  I like comparing this photo with the previous one - you can see areas that were once red cooled here, and other cooled patches being shifted by the force behind it.

This was the attendent monitoring the crowd.  He was a cop.  Ha!  He serves as a nice scale figure.

We retreated a few minutes later and I ushered the 10 year old standing next to me into my spot.  I hope he eventually got a front row spot.  I was pretty soaked after the experience (somehow Matthew was alot drier than I was).  All was made better after a fantastic dinner and beer at Hilo Bay Cafe (if every you find yourself in Hilo go there for dinner!).  I promptly fell asleep.  Thankfully Matthew had the energy to drive us back to the resort.