Reflections of My Travel

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After work this morning, we made a quick snack out of some microwave frozen dinners and headed to some waterfalls. We first went to Rainbow Falls located right in Hilo. It was a very pretty waterfall. We didn’t see the rainbow looking at the falls but when we walked up above them, we could see a rainbow spanning from the foot of them over the pool at the bottom. It was a beautiful area. And I was apparently there just in time for lunch judging by all of the itchy welts all over my legs and arms. Our next trek was to Akaka Falls. This was the first time the GPS has led us astray. And really, I hesitate to blame the GPS since I believe that, at one time in the not-so-distant past, that road did go all the way through. Anyhow, the GPS led us out into some little podunk pigtrail in the middle of some abandonned sugarcane fields. I’m still impressed that it knew that was a road because I never would have guessed it. After getting about 2 miles into this nowhere, we were blocked by a gate that someone had thrown up across the road. Clearly, they did not bother to update the satelites when they did this and it caused our poor GPS to suffer some humiliation. We snaked our way back out of the fields and found an alternate route. Akaka Falls turned out to be a twofer. It led us on a little loop through some gorgeous rainforest that started out with Kahuna Falls which was pretty but far away and ended with Akaka Falls which was pretty but disappointing. It is supposed to be a 420′ fall but I wouldn’t know it since the vantage point did not allow us to see the bottom of it. They claim that they are the most photogenic falls on the island but I just didn’t see how. The trail through the rainforest was very nice but the falls were only so-so. Rainbow Falls was so much nicer, even if it was quite a bit shorter. While driving back through some more rainforest along the coast, we drove over a bridge and noticed that there was a small waterfall pouring out of what we believe to be a lava tube. We pulled over to take pictures of it and when we walked back up to the bridge, we looked down in time to see an old nekkid man walking down to the water and jumping into the pool to swim around. I was a little surprised to see a nekkid person on the side of the road like that. I did my best to pretend like I didn’t know he was down there while I took my pics of the lava tube/waterfall. Don’t worry, I’m pretty sure the pics are all G-rated. Randal and I had a good laugh walking back to the car. We stopped for some dinner before coming back to our room. I’ve been working on getting pics ready to post. Hopefully I’ll get some of them up tomorrow.

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We slept until daylight this morning (after a 0400 work-related phone call). It was nice to feel like I had slept in a little. It wasn’t the most comfortable sleep. Everytime I moved or rolled, my back/shoulders/neck screamed at me. But I woke up feeling refreshed. We went back into the park to do some hiking. We stopped at a lookout for the caldera, which was neat. There were steam vents all over it. And we were able to get a good, close view of the Halemaumau crater, which also had steam vents and sulfer banks. It was a little smelly but I didn’t say anything. You don’t want to offend something with such an explosive temper. With some photo stops along the way to better view the lava fields, we made our way down to the Puu Loa Petroglyph trail. It was a 2 mile round trip trail over lava fields to an area where early Hawaiians drew petroglyphs into the lava. They were actually very good. Very well-defined. While taking pics of the drawings, it decided to pour on us (I’m so pleased that we carry our raingear with us on hikes). We finished looking at the rest of the petroglyphs and made our way back to the car over the now slippery lava field. We then did the short walk through the Thurston Lava tube. I was pleased with how nicely the pics show the inside of the lava tube. The last walk we did before leaving the park was the smelliest. We walked about 1 mile round trip to get a nice, close look (read: whiff) of some sulfur banks. They had some really pretty sulfur crystals which was neat but the smell was really foul. We left the park after that and made our way around to Hilo where we had reservations at a little B&B. It’s a pretty comfy setup with a kitchenette so we stopped at the grocery store to get a few commestibles. I’m displeased that we have to work again starting tomorrow. It’s been such a nice few days. Not that I’m complaining, mind you. A workday in Hawaii is still better than a workday in Georgia.

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Well, since this is a happy vacation, I’m going to refrain on commenting on our night. Let’s just say I know a hotel that will be receiving a letter soon. We got up around 0430 this morning to get to the airport for our flight to the Big Island. We had a short layover on Oahu but they let us stay on the plane so it wasn’t such a pain. Speaking of pain, it wasn’t just a nightmare. The flesh is still well-seared and quite painful. I could not stand to put on a shirt this morning so I wrapped the sarong that Jonna brought back for me when they were here around me. Sidenote: sarongs are a wonderful and magical clothing option – terrific as quick, casual skirts and wonderful for a non-shoulder/neck abrasive top. Clearly, I need a wardrobe full of sarongs. Such a shame that they aren’t as accepted as clothing on the mainland. The flights were short and uneventful. We got to the Big Island, got our van, and started along the southern road. We stopped at the southern-most point in the United States and took some pics of the huge waves. We thought we were going to see a green sand beach there but the maps did not mention that it was a two mile walk to get to it and, unfortunately, we just didn’t have time. Further up the road, we did stop at the black sand beach (where I finally saw some mongooses). It was pretty but really was not much different from the dark granite beaches of Alaska. We didn’t stick around there long. We had a date with Kilauea before sunset. We ended up getting to Volcanos National Park around 1600 and made a stop at the visitor center for a 20 minute film and some hiking maps and information. We then headed straight down toward the coast. When we got to the parking area, we could already see the steam coming from the shoreline a couple of miles away. We donned our rain gear in order to spite the heavy rain that was battering down on us and walked about .5 mile up the road to where a lava flow had blocked the pavement. We then hiked a short distance across the piles of lava to get a decent vantage point. We made it just around dusk – still light enough to get pics of the steam rising from the sea as the hot lava flowed into the water, but just dark enough that we could already see the red glow of the lava. As it got darker, the hillside turned out to be the better show. The lava was glowing nicely up there. And even though we were still a good distance away, we could see the movement of it. Every so often we could catch a good glimpse of the glow at the sea, but for the most part the steam was obscuring it in the dark. What a great experience to see flowing lava. Granted, we could have hiked further and gotten a little bit closer, but I don’t think it would have gotten us National Geographic close and we could see it well enough. Not to mention, this was our first night of really staying awake past dark so it was way past our bedtime. We sat through a few rain squalls, mesmerized by the liquid rock and after a while we turned on our little flashlight and found our way back across the other-earthly landscape to the paved road. We drove back up out of the park to a little campground down the road from the park entrance that had running water (no, I haven’t been able to get that primitive yet, I like a flushing toilet).