Trip to the Big Island

On Monday we went to the big island of Hawaii to see the volcanoes. We were first taken to the macadamia nut factory and saw how they process the nuts and we got to taste a bunch of different kinds, YUM! We were then taken to the Volcano National Park and got to see the crater, escaping gasses and actual lava. We also got to walk onto the cooled lava that covered the earth when the volcano erupted in the 1990's. The lava began to flow into the ocean while we were there (we were told it is quite a rare occurrence). It was REALLY cool! They didn't allow us to get too close (for obvious reasons). Take a look at the pictures.

Macadamia Nut Factory YUMMY!

On the self guided tour. It was basically peeking into windows to see people packing the little boogers.

Good nut....bad nut.....good nut......bad nut.......

This is one of the vents where gasses were escaping. If you put your hand over the top of the steam it felt just like it does when you put your hand over a boiling pot.

Taking a picture of you when your taking a picture of me.

Notice there are no trees. They don't grow that well because of the stuff that is below the ground and the stuff that is escaping from the ground.

This is the crater. It's mighty BIG!

This is us in front of the crater. It's a bit chilly, but Jordan wasn't cold at all!

Getting ready to enter the "Lava Tube". It's a biggun'!

See how big it is?!

Here we are inside the lava tube.

We stopped at a local restaurant to eat.

Cooled lava.

People build their houses on that stuff?!

See the little red dot in the middle of the picture? That is a lava flow.

Lava going into the ocean.

There is Jordan in the neon vest. He is as close as they would allow us to get. It's just a little too dangerous........

There were various explosions, but it's hard to time them just perfectly. Although there were several people at the site, it was very quite as if everyone knew we were watching something truly amazing!