Hawaii 2009: Day 9

(Warning: grab and sandwich, this is a long one)
Today we crossed to the other side of the island in search of volcanoes. Yep, erupting, smoke venting, steamy lava spewing volcanoes. There are several ways to get there but for our purposes the most direct route was right between Mauna Loa (on the right-south) and Mauna Kea (on the left-north) via Saddle Road, about the only road that bisects the island, called Saddle because the area is called the saddle because of the saddle shaped valley between the two mountains. Gotta love the consistency of thought going on here.
Saddle Road was built in 1942 by the military because they wanted a road connecting the two sides of the island and they needed it now. It was meant for military vehicles not general real people cars so, as you can imagine, it isn’t the best road in the country. In fact it’s almost bad enough to be a main thoroughfare in Michigan. It was eventually paved by Sadists Paving and Pothole Company, a subsidiary of Saddle Road Body Shop and Alignment Center (I made that up but you get the gist), but the government has been working on redoing it and only the western most 20 miles is lousy. How lousy, you ask? Imagine you made a nice little road our of Play Dough. It’s a little lumpy but the edges are nice and neat and it’s just big enough for your Hot Wheel truck to drive along. All of the sudden you realize that, Oh No!, your friend Timmy is coming over with his Hot Wheel truck and now road needs to be wide enough for two Hot Wheels to pass side by side and you only have 6 minutes to get your road ready. So you grab a bunch of Play Dough, and not wanting to have one side really nice and smooth and the other side totally crappy for your imaginary Hot Wheel drivers, so you pack some extra Play Dough onto each side of the road making it two trucks wide. It’s no longer neat and smooth with clean edges but if only one truck is driving down the road, he can use the middle and it won’t rattle his brains loose. But if there are two and they have to pass each other, well this is the source of a lot of business for Hot Wheels Towing and Alignment Services. Now you’ve got the picture of the first part of Saddle Road. Oh, I forgot to mention that it is winding as a Texas Sidewinder wrapped around a cork screw. But it’s only this way for the western 20 miles not the entire 53.
The terrain starts as dry lava scrub land, then as you climb you start to see grass, then trees. Eventually you get to tropic-like fern covered forests. The fifty-three mile road summits around 6,600’ but there are side roads you can take up to Mauna Kea State Park (summit 13,796’) and some of the best star gazing in the world. The Onizuka Center for International Astronomy as well as the University of Hawai`i Telescope. We didn’t take detours at this point because there’s only so much time on vacation and if you do it all, you will be so tuckered out, you won’t want to come back nor need to.
Continuing to the other (east) side of the island, we did detour long enough to see some cool water falls. First was Wai`ele Falls, the Pe`epe`e Falls, Boiling Pots, and finally Rainbow Falls. Rainbow Falls is – if you believe legend – is where King Kamehameha buried the bones of his father. The rainbows are best seen in the mornings when the sun is at your back and wouldn’t you know it, it was almost noon so no rainbows though still quite beautiful. If we’d brought better shoes and newer knees and appropriate clothes, we might have been tempted to hike the trails and stick our feet in the water. But was getting pretty steamy, we’d read that the mosquitos win prizes for their blood letting abilities and the parking areas are known hang outs for nefarious characters who wait until tourist are off enjoying natures abundance, then break into the cars and grab what they can. When we pulled into the lot at Rainbow Falls, there was a car with a couple ‘nature loving’ young men parked in the shade amidst empty Wild Turkey and Mike’s Hard Lemonade bottles toward the edge of the parking lot. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, we took everything with us – cameras, cases, jackets, water bottles, GPS, Oreos, door handles, steering wheel, seat belts, everything except a bag of oranges, and went for a look/see at the falls. We never (at least not all of us at once) left the upper area where the parking lot was so one of us was always within sight of the car. A few more cars of tourists came, saw, and left, all being equally cautious. Eventually, the guys left for greener pastures, so did we. Next stop food and drink.
We drove into Hilo, found a strip mall, Barb and Judy went to the food court and L and I went to Mickey D’s, because it’s known for its exotic local cuisine and more importantly, it was in Walmart. Larry needed another shirt and I need shorts. I was wearing jeans and was hotter than a fat man wearing a rubber suit walking on a asphalt road through the Sahara in July. Food and changes procured, we were off to volcanoes via the Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park.
Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park headquarters is well worth the stop. There are lots of interesting pictures, an informative movie, rangers who know a lot and exist to answer your questions, books, displays, etc. though it is my guess most folks just stop long enough to maybe get a map and use the bathrooms. Barb and Judy went to watch the movie, Barb’s knees and hip limiting her walking distances. L and I took a walking tour to the overlook of the Kilauea Caldera learning about the different native species of trees and ferns on the island and their unique qualities that have allowed them to be sustained in an often inhospitable environment. Our ranger was a young rookie who was very passionate and informative. After the walk, on the way back he was walking with L and I and wanted to know how he did. “Any constructive criticism,” he asked for. We had none. We appreciated that his script was not rote and that he truly cared showed. It was good.
The Caldera look a little other worldly, moon-like, vents of steam spewing wisps of white smoke. The area around the crater was coming back, the farther back you got the more growth there was, the canyon surrounding reforrested over. You can see the lava flowing but not from here. And it’s not the mountain blowing off it’s top spraying the air with molten lava and explosions of rocks, a boiling lake of fire flowing down the mountain consuming bushes, trees and curious but slow tourists in it’s path. The eruption is farther around the coast, through a lava tube flowing into the ocean. Historically (OK since volcanic eruptions have been tracked since 1778) eruptions outside of a crater last weeks or months, not years. Only once, from 1969-1974 at Mauna Ulu, has an eruption lasted more than a year. But this current Kilauea one began in January 1983 and has been going since. The vent created, the Pu`u `O`o, ran until 1986, then shifted to a new one called Kupaianaha flowing until 1992, then it shifted back to Pu`u `O`o and is still going strong.
Today was an exceptionally clear day with some pretty good winds blowing. There were high levels of sulfur dioxide in the air, and because of the wind direction large sections of the crater rim road were shut down. Sometimes you can drive completely around the top of the crater but today we had to be satisfied with a quick drive to the Jagger Overlook, another viewing area of the crater but could go no further. Ah, but what’s a little stinky gas in the air? Well it’s some bad stuff. Deadly bad. The rangers all wear testers that show how much gas they’ve been exposed to, like X-ray techs. Too much and it’s bad news, baby. How bad, you ask? Back in 1790 Kilauea exploded. Kamehameha I (KI for simplicity) ruled most of the island. A pesky upstart chief named Keoua seized control of this part of the island and got in a bit of a row with KI. KI sent troops to do battle so Keoua and his loyalists regrouped at Kilauea, which was rumbling and grumbling at the time. Keoua spent a couple days trying to appease the goddess Pele (the volcano goddess) figuring she wasn’t happy with him to no avail and split his group into three parties to get the hell out of Dodge. The first group made it out, but then the mountain exploded, ash rained down and a suffocating gas covered the area.
When group three went to find group two, they finally saw them all huddled together, happy to find them, until they discovered that they were all dead where they stood. The only survivor was one pig (and if you’ve ever been to a pig farm you can understand why the noxious gas had no impact on the animal.) As for Keoua, he figured this was proof that Pele had it out for him and even though they kept fighting, eventually murdered by one of KI’s officers on his way to surrender. Bummer, for sure. (My book is just chocked full of useful and interesting little tidbits like this.)
Anyway, we spent a couple hours at the top, again, bad knees and wrong shoes prevented any of the incredibly beautiful and historic trails but one could spend a couple days and not get bored and when I am younger I fully intend to, then we headed back down the hill to go around to the south ocean side to see where the lava was entering the sea. It was about a 45 minute drive to the area of the lava flow look-out. Sometimes you get to go in, sometimes you don’t. It depends on the flow, winds, and whatever else the civil service wants to factor in to their decision making. You are allowed to enter between 4:30-8:00 pm and everyone is out by 10:00. The road, some parts two laned and clearly a road, and other parts that used to be a road before lava turned it into a crusted blob that has since been sort of paved into a one lane – it’s good to be in a four wheel drive vehicle – path/road thing. Warnings of danger, requirements of proper shoes and flashlights for those who dared adventure out over the 1/2 mile trek, were posted along the way in. We parked, sans flashlights but had the requisite closed toed shoes (although they didn’t stop anyone in sandals or flip-flops) and got into the flow of humanity off to witness destruction and creation simultaneously. Wouldn’t you know it, there were good old flashlight vendors along the way. We purchased a decently priced ($3 including new batteries) torch and continued. Seeing the distance to be covered and the inhospitable terrain, Barb and Judy decided to stay at the trail head and watch the smoke/steam/fire from there. They gave us their light and we continued with our fellow lemming toward the sea.
The trail is over an old lava field that is a bit treacherous; trenches, rivulets, rocks, crevices. You had to watch every step of the way and be careful of your footing. They had made an attempt to mark the trail. It looked like they had a road striper but only enough yellow paint for 100’ not the 2500’ needed so little 4” stripes were scattered giving you the idea of the way to go. While it was light, this was not that big of a requirement. I mean, you could look ahead and see the way, but on the return trip it proved indispensable.
We made it to the trail end with about 500 others as the sun was setting and could see the lava flow about a mile or two away. Describing it is like trying to describe the Grand Canyon or take pictures of fireworks. Words and photos are completely inadequate and you know me to be never at a loss for words. If you ever get a chance to see such a thing, do it. That’s all I got. We did take pictures and video, but like I said, totally inadequate.
We watched the show for about 25 minutes they decided to trek back ahead of the others as much as possible to get a head start down the long and treacherous trail, first by foot then by car, back to civilization. We picked our way back in the pitch dark over black lava along the broken yellow brick road, extremely grateful for the dotted line to follow. You had to look down the entire way, sweeping the trail for bumps, ridges, man-eating crevices, and land mines all the while trying to keep track of the little yellow blotches that kept you from wandering off never to be found again. I felt bad for the parents who brought young ones out, the ones we saw happily skipping and jumping from rock to rock, who would now demand to be carried back so said hapless parent would not only have to maneuver the trail from Hell but do it with a 7 year old on their shoulders (who probably whined the whole way because they didn’t get to hold the flashlight).
We eventually made it back, as is obvious by this little epic tale, with all parts intact and undamaged – just in case you were worried.