Hawaii`i Volcanoes National Park

Mauna Loa,  HI

August 18, 2006

   

	Kilauea Carldera.  The rim of the crater is about 4,000 feet.  There is some steam coming out of the ground but it is hard to photograph and see.  Most of the white stuff in this picture is chemical staining on the black rocks.  This caldera is a couple of miles across.
	Perry experiences a few to many fumes at the Halema'uma'u Overlook.  Occasionally the wind would blow some really nasty smelling air over to us.  The established trails are well marked on the map but harder for follow on the ground.
	Jeff takes a breather on some lava.  There are three different flows in this photo.  This lava was flowing back in 1972 and 1981 I think.
	This is the walkway in to the Thurston Lava Tube.  This is an old lava tube that all the lava flowed out of and it is now a cave that is open at both ends.  It was easily tall enough to stand and walk in.  If you visit this bring a flash light.
	After a visit to the caldera we headed down to see the red lava.  The plume in the distance is steam.
	After we parked it was easy to find where the lava crossed the road.  There were lots of people hiking out to see the fresh red lava.
	Jeff is standing on Chain of Craters Road.
	The lava is on top and the road is on the bottom.  You might almost see how the lava melted the asphalt it didn't cover.
	Jeff pauses to take a picture.
	Jeff sets up to take pictures with the digital camera and a pair of binoculars.
	We were about one mile away from where the lava hits the ocean.  The plume is steam.  After the it gets dark we could see red chunks of hot lava flying around at the bottom of the plume.  The boiling water was so violent it was throwing chunks of lava the size of a car around.
	The pictures of the red lava were hard to capture on the digital camera the binoculars.  The cactus was there as a stand in.  The three lights in this photo are flash lights of other visitors.
	This is the best picture we got.  The red dot is the hot lava.

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