Volcanoes & Lava Touring Day!
27 March 2018 | Reeds Bay, Hilo, Hawaii
Helen
Set the alarm and got up early. I did not sleep well as my left side hurt from my fall. Had breakfast and loaded the dinghy for our travels today. A small cruise ship, Oceana Regatta showed up just as we were heading to shore. A tug boat was needed to push her to the cruise dock. Stored the dinghy in the usual place at Reeds Bay Park. Our red mustang survived last night parked on the street. Headed to the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. It cost $25 to enter the park. We drove to the Lava Tubes and walked thru one with the help of my cell phone flashlight. Very interesting sights. Then we walked around the park and back to the car. It was raining by now. We drove to the ocean, which was about 20 miles. They had any places to stop and look out, but the flood gates were open with much rain. Took lots of pictures. Went back to the Welcome Center and checked out some more information on the park. We did not go to the active volcanoes as it was quite the hike and we were wearing flip flops. Another time, perhaps. We then drove a couple of hours, around 90 miles, to the Captain Cook Memorial. We had plans to snorkel. Before we arrived, there were signs for the Black Lava Beach, so we stopped and walked on the beach. There must have been a dozen huge turtles on the beach. Very impressive and lots of people on the beach. When we got to the Cook Memorial, it was a long hike thru the jagged lava rocks, to get there, so we changed our minds on the snorkel. The coast of the Big Island is pretty much lava rocks and not many areas with sandy beaches. There were several resorts on the west coast, but they had private beaches. We stopped and walked to another rocky beach, up from the Cook Memorial. The waves were hitting the rocks and exploding high into the air. We could see back down the shore line to a place where the tourists jump off a cliff into the water and then climb back up on the rocks. Looked too dangerous for us. Some boats were just off the coast, bringing tourists to that very spot. We drove back on a different route, across the island thru some very tall mountains. It was raining very hard with little visibility. I was so glad that I was not driving. We picked up our laundry and some groceries and headed to the dinghy. We were able to fit everything on the dinghy. Mark noticed that our boat had moved about 300' closer to the shore. He turned on the engines and backed us up. Apparently, this area got 10 inches of rain while we were gone. The wind or storm must have caused the anchor to move. Thankfully, our boat did not come too close to the rocks on the shoreline. We headed back to shore and filled the mustang's fuel tank before taking her back to the airport. We took a cab back to the park and the dinghy back to the boat. It was still raining some and there was a beautiful rainbow over Reeds Bay. At this time, the rains are over and the sky actually has some color from the sun setting. Another day finds us both exhausted. We were driving for most of the day. Yes, there was the dry side of the island when the sun shone and we put the top down. It didn't last too long. Mark is planning on working on boat projects tomorrow. I will spend some time and clean the boat. We will have some visitors on Wednesday evening. How nice!