3rd day in paradise. Today we go back to Volcanoes national park. We want to check out the south slope down to the sea. On the way there we'll do a few stops to see a waterfall, lava trees and do our grocery shopping for the new year's dinner. The waterfall is in Hilo so we stop there first. It's a instant gratification spot called rainbow falls. You park next to the waterfall, step out of the car and enjoy a beautiful waterfall and if you're lucky (we were), get to see rainbows. It's nice and chill and it's early enough that we have the site for ourselves. We leave when a bus of tourists arrives. Before leaving Hilo for the day we go grocery shopping. Au menu: Fresh local fish with vegetables and I find a bottle of Pouilly-Fuissé in the wine section of the grocery store. It happens to be the only french white wine they have. Obviously it does not come cheap in the middle of the Pacific but it's New Year's eve! It's very European of them to offer wine in supermarkets ;) They also sell a shitload of fireworks right at the entrance which is a bit scary. Seeing the quantity of firework they seem to sell, the night should be interesting.
We stop by the house to drop our groceries and are on our way to the 2nd stop of the day, Lava tree state monument. It's not far south in the middle of nowhere. The GPS does not really know where it is and we miss it the first time we pass in in front of it. Sadly for us, most of us is closed. They had a bad tropical storm in August and they're not done cleaning all the fallen trees. We get to see a few of them though. Depending of the type of lava (it's temperature), when it flows in a forest, it can create these structures. The tree burns and dies, but the lava creates a mold that remains behind. Some of the features of the tree can still be seen on the mold, very curious.
Back on the road, we see a unusual warning on Waze as we arrive at Pahoa... a lava flow. We search a little bit and end up finding the road that was cut by the lava flow. I saw videos of that on internet when it happened in September, it's weird to see the place for real! We can touch the lava but we can't go walking on it yet. It's still very hot inside and it'll take years to cool down. Lots of people are checking it out and some are leaving offerings to Pele (goddess of volcanoes). This flow is stopped, hopefully for Pahoa because we're really close to the center of the village but it's still going on further inland. It's expected to keep on going until one of the flow reaches the sea to the East. One woman there was talking with a park ranger to figure out whether her house would be hit or not. According to the guy, it'll be a close call but I don't know how you live with that sword of Damocles hanging over your head like that. Despite the destruction, you can see local authorities know how to handle lava. The power line along the road is still up and functional. They have a special technique to protect the poles when a lava flow is coming. The cover them with fire proof material and then dump earth and gravels around up to several meters high to protect the pole both from the heat and the push of the lava flow.
Finally at the park entrance, we're getting ready to pay the entrance fee but the park ranger notice our previous ticket and we learn that it's actually valid for a few days. We turn left right away and go south. We pass by the Kilauea Iki crater and arrive on the moon. First stop is Lua Manu. It's a crater that got filled by lava again during a 1974 lava flow. We break for lunch there and walk around on the old lava flow. It looks like a frozen river cascading into the crater. All of it is black rock with vegetation taking over every single available crack. Arriving shortly after us is an organized bike tour; we suspect they only go downhill because the road after Lua Manu is flat for sometime as we'll discover. That and the fact they get the bikes back into the truck before getting back on the road. The pleasure of the bike without the hassle of pedaling... elegant solution :D The parking lot is getting crowded so we take off. Our next stop is Mauna ulu. It's a huge plain of lava. This time it looks like a frozen sea with small waves. It's huge and desolate, a post apocalyptic landscape with a few trees here and there. We skip it but we can still see the previous road somewhere in the plain. They don't bother trying to recreate the same route here, they just create a new road adapted to the new landscape.
At the edge of the plain, there's a somewhat steep cliff then another plain leading into the sea. It feels like stairs for giants. The view from the top of the cliff is impressive, as well as the road zig zagging down. Just before reaching the sea we have our first (and last) real hike of the day. Half an hour away from the road is a petroglyphs field. The ancient Hawaiians were coming here to record birth (among other things). A stilt walkway goes around the field allowing us to see the different kinds of drawings. With the sun setting, the huge volcano, the endless black cliff it's a unique place. They had the very good idea to keep the road far away so on top of that, it's peaceful.
At our last stop, we reach the end of the road. The road continues East but it's off limits and some portions have been buried under lava. Nothing is permanent here, nature is still shaping and reshaping the south part of the island, man have to adapt. Off the south coast, the next big volcano is already there. It's still 1000m under the sea but it'll soon (in geological time) join Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa and extend the big island. We've been seeing “Nene Crossing” signs all over the place and we enjoyed it very much since in Spanish it means “Baby” and it's used as an term of endearment. For the first time, at the very end of the world, we'll get to see them in the flesh (and feathers). Two of these geese are grazing, not caring much about the tourists. We follow the rules and leave them in peace, it's a protected specie after all. We check out the natural arch nearby then my partner decide to go exploring the road that is off limits. We don't go very far since we don't have much natural light left and it's already time to go back home. We get a glimpse of the sunset behind the clouds on our way back and when we enter the forest, close to the entrance of the park, we hit a crazy fog. My travel partner has been refreshing her driving skills all day long and it's the first time ever she has to drive in these conditions. I have to admit it's pretty bad, visibility is null. On top of that the road is zig zagging wildly in the forest... despite all that, we remain calm, take it very slowly and everything goes well. 15 minutes later, we reach the entrance of the park and leave the fog behind. The rest of the road back home is luckily event-less.
Back home, we take a nap before preparing our New Year's dinner – Huge and delicious local avocados, Fresh fish and vegetables with a bottle of Pouilly-Fuissé. Champagne (French tradition) and raisins (Spanish tradition) for midnight. With all the fireworks we saw in all the supermarkets, we expect to see some action and the least we can say is that they deliver. It seems the whole town is playing with fireworks. It's a bit crazy and I ask jokingly how long before we see the firefighters. The answer will be 5 minutes! With that many people playing with fire, it's a surprise the city is not burned down to the ground every new year :D Tonight for once, the coqui frogs will have a bit of competition.