the big island

A week ago, we headed to the big island for one of the shortest hawaii visits ever to spend some quality time with M/H. Of course, I managed to book a b&b at the coldest and wettest point in Hawaii in the city of Volcano. Every time we drove away, we always ended up in much warmer weather. We had 3 full days there and of course in typical fashion, I packed them to the gills. No relaxing for us! It was probably also the first trip where I didn't have a guide book. I didn't have a chance to pick one up in time and then I had been looking everything up online anyways.

Day 1: Picked up M/H from Hilo. Brought them back to the b&b and then off we went to buy some sandwiches and do the Kilauea Iki hike into the crater floor. This would have been brutally hot if not for the nice cool wind on the crater floor. We almost lost M/H who didn't see where we went and started wandering off into another random direction. The trail was a little hard to follow in the actual crater. Then we ended up at the lava tube which was very cool (literally as well). I still have a bump on my head from whacking it inside the cave though.

Day 2: Morning was at the Hilo farmer's market which had delicious food that we stocked up on and really exotic fruit. Then we headed to the Kapoho tide pools for some snorkeling. There were no facilities here and no real beach so not a real good place to just sit at the beach but the snorkeling was stellar. The first tide pool we went into had tons of fish and coral. I also got to watch C swim which was a little scary. Note to self: bring fins next time. Boy has no buoyancy - I was all ready to tow him in. We were done with snorkeling in the afternoon and since we were a good hour from the b&b and were instead near the lava viewing point, we decided to try and kill time before sunset. We got some dinner items and visited a cool black sand beach nearby and then headed to the viewing area.

We ended up getting there a little too early though and after walking over to see the lava and coming back, we weren't sure how good the lava viewing would be at night esp since it wasn't flowing into the ocean anyways. I asked two of the workers there who clearly didn't even know which volcano eruption we would be looking at. But somehow, I made the rash decision to see the lava glow instead at the Halemaumau crater at the summit of Kilauea volcano. So back we headed up the mountain and once again, I forgot to subtract 20 degrees and add cold wind to the factor. Brrr. It was icy cold but we did see the very cool glow.

Day 3: North of Hilo. We visited Akaka falls as does every tourist bus it seems but it was very nice hike. Google Maps attempted to make us drive on a dirt road to get there though. Beware shortcuts. Then we went on the 4 mile scenic drive and discovered the botanical gardens. That was a really pleasant surprise - it was absolutely gorgeous. We ended our trip with a really nice dinner at Hilo Bay Cafe chosen because it was one of the few places open on Sunday.

So yes a very short but efficient trip and it felt like we were eating every 4 hours which is always nice. We will have to go back and visit the Kona side and swim with manta rays. One of the other couples at our B&B did this and said it felt super crowded with 7 boats and apparently in high season, 30 boats will be out there. oof. That's when it starts not to be too fun.

People actually build houses in the lava areas.