Kapalana Lava

Theresa and I had a great visit with Mary and Jerry on Saturday afternoon. Jerry gave a "glowing" account of the lava flowing into the ocean at Kapalana. I debated about going there after a whole day at Volcano National Park. Well, I figure that since we were here already we may as well get the complete experience by visiting the Kapalana Lava. We were fully prepared with water bottles, hiking sticks, and the all important flashlights. It took over one hour of driving from the Volcano National Park. After paying $10 entrance fee, we then drove our rental car over a very bumpy gravel road. I did not bother to read my rental car contract to see if I was covered :-) After parking our car we hiked for about one hour over this dark and foreboding lava field. We thought we were never going to get there. We were filled with anticipation. We finally got there. We were flabbergasted. Was that all? All we could see from our vantage point was the white steam with a hint of orange glow. Where was the lava? What was the excitement? As it turned out that when I got back to California I confronted Mary. She said that they were just there two days ago when the lava flow was clearly visible! She said that all the people were ooing and ahhing when the lava flowed into the ocean. Oh well, all was not lost as we did observe some rivulets of lava on the distant mountain. We also got a nice hike out of it. So I called this part of our trip "Big Island, Big Disappointment."

However, the story did not stop here. We then had a "Big Island, Big Scare" experience. On our long drive back from Kapalana we were cruising along on the highway when all the sudden we ran over something. The worst part was that whatever we struck was now stuck under the car. I tried driving forward and then backward to get rid of the mysterious item without success. I also could not safely pull the car over. How frustrating! We certainly did not want to get struck from behind. We finally pulled over to a lonely building along the desolate highway. All the dogs started to bark! We ended up in the parking lot of an animal shelter. It was sad that I could not take them home. With our handy flashlight I was able to discover that a large plastic water container was stuck in the wheel well. Whew. After removing it, we were safely on our way home.

Again, the story did not stop here either. By now we were starving since we had a long day-hike at Kilauea Iki volcano and also the evening-hike at Kapalana lava field. We could not even find a fast food place. Back at the town of Volcano we tried our luck first at the Kilauea Lodge. They turned us away but suggested that we tried the Thai-Thai restaurant just down the block. We were so excited when we first arrived but said "oh-oh" when we saw that they were putting the chairs upside-down on the tables with 5 minutes until 9pm. The waitress said that we could order take-out but there was no indoor nor outdoor place to eat!  Theresa was not excited about eating Thai food in our car. Fortunately the waitress suggested that we could use the picnic table outside the TrueValue hardware store next door. Trust me, after all that we have went through that day, we had a most memorable and thoroughly enjoyable dinner even though we dined on a dusty picnic table under the "romantic" light from TrueValue. :-) Finally we got back to our B&B safely and went to bed by midnight!