HAWAII - *City of Refuge and Volcanoes National Park* April 18th and 20th

Oooh boy, this is going to be a big one. Hi guys, during the past few days we have been taking day trips and tours to various parts of the Big Island. Follow me very briefly through The City of Refuge on Sunday the 18th and then on to the wonders of the active volcanoes that we visited on Tuesday the 20th.

The City of Refuge (Puʻuhonua O Hōnaunau)

Pu’uhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park preserves the site where, up until the early 19th century, Hawaiians who broke a kapu, or one of the ancient laws against the gods could avoid an otherwise certain death by fleeing to this place of refuge. If they made it inside the walls of the city they could then be absolved by a priest and free to go. Defeated warriors and non-combatants could also find refuge here during times of battle.
The grounds just outside the great wall that encloses the pu’uhonua was home to several generations of powerful chiefs.

The beach, temples, and offerings in the City of Refuge. The man in the upper right corner is carving a replica of a tiki pole that had rotted over the years.

The winding road down to the park just about had me with my head between my knees for the whole ride, but I survived. When we arrived we walked through the Visitor Information building and then out into the park. Since there are no guided tours of the City of Refuge, we walked around on our own. We took followed the paths through the city walls and took pictures of the ocean and scenery, as well as the temples and tiki poles (as seen above). The whole place had an energy of ancientness about it, and it was a really cool way to spend a few hours.

We saw sea turtles and some kind of heron, along with the usual fish and other birds.

Hawaii Volcanoes National Park

The park encompasses 230,000 acres and ranges from sea level to the summit of the earth's most massive volcano, Mauna Loa at 13,677 feet. Kilauea, the world's most active volcano, offers insights on the birth of the Hawaiian Islands and gives visitors views of dramatic volcanic landscapes.
The Park includes barren lava flats and lush rain forests. Extensive caves formed by rivers of lava only 300-500 years ago stretch under forests of hearty palm and ohi'a trees.

This is the current active lava vent within the main crater Halema`ma`u, at the summit of Kilauea mountain. Kilauea hasn't erupted since 1982, and this secondary crater was formed in 2008 when the magma chamber underneath the area emptied enough to cause the ground above it to drop, causing a crater called a caldera.
We didn't see any flowing lava but we did see many steam plumes coming from both the main vent as well as other cracks in the lava crust throughout the park.

Fumes emitted along with the steam from the majority of the smaller vents include sulphur dioxide and hydrogen sulphide. The sulphur particles from the steam are deposited on the rocks outside of these vents and form feathery crystals of pure sulphur.











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Within the park there are vast climate differences. During our tour we went from lava flats with sparse vegetation to moist, extravagant rain forests.

While in the rain forest, our guide took us into a lava cave that was 334 meters long. The diameter was about two and a half meters and the deeper we got, of course thew less light there was. We each had our own small flashlights but they really didn't do all that much to illuminate our surroundings. Fortunately, our guide had one of those huge, one million candle-power flash lights to help light our way through this awesome cave.


These are the roots of the ohi'a tree growing through the roof of the lava tube. This tree can grow its roots straight through the solid lava rock, and flourish both in the rain forest and on the desolate-looking lava flats.




The entire day of hiking around the park, up the slopes of Kilauea and back down, through the rain forest and lava tubes and over shadeless flats took seven hours altogether. The day was long and all of our faces got pretty sunburned from climbing the mountain (Except for our guide's, of course...) but it was all entirely worth it. Seeing the active vent and craters from past eruptions was an incredible experience.