Volcanoes National Park is a surreal place even without flowing lava. I flew in direct from Australia (via Tokyo and Honolulu) to Hilo and was picked up by Paul and Hollie and after a very nice pizza for lunch we headed up to the national park. We had booked in for Thursday night at Volcano House and while it was very tempting to just crash I decided that a drive around Crater Rim Drive would be interesting. This turned out to be an excellent idea since it was fairly quiet and the following day Rangers were recommending that people not get out of their cars near the Halema`uma`u crater due the sulfur level in the fumes. When we were there it was pretty bad, made worse when the wind picked up an blew them at us.

On Friday we visited the Thurston Lava Tube and then headed down Chain of Craters road. After an earthquake last year the flow of lava has changed and it is no longer visible but there are plenty of scenic lookouts down the road and the “end of the road” is quite an interesting area.