Many of the National Parks are preserved because they are intact pieces of history, records of thousands of years of geologic transformation, human settlement, and natural evolution. Volcanoes National Park is instead a constantly shifting reminder of the past, present, and future. In this park, new land is always being created. Surrounding the active volcano Kilaeua, the park contains active lava flows as well as preserved lava flows from previous recent eruptions. My husband and I visited in February of 2018, and in March of 2018, an enormous eruption destroyed much of the parts of the park that he and I visited, completely changing the landscape and shutting the park for several weeks. Many had to flee their homes.
The incredible ʻŌhiʻa lehua plant that is one of the first things to grow in the harsh and barren lava flows a few years after an eruption, glowing like little embers in the rocky oceans of frozen lava, giving life where there was once molten fire.
Rivers of cooled lava spread across the hillsides into a vast field of swirling black lava flows.
The cooled lava has an iridescent, crumbly crust, like oil on water, that cracks when you touch it.
At the coast, turquoise waves batter the hardened lava cliffs.
The nearest active lava flows were miles away, and it was dangerous to hike out to them in the rainy weather, because sometimes the lava releases toxic gases when it his hit with rain. But far in the distance we could see the steaming glow of thin trickles of lava.
At night, we went to Halemaʻumaʻu Crater where the glow of molten lava in clouds of steam billows like dragon’s breath from the crater below. In the recent eruption, this area of the crater collapsed and the lava lake drained. But the volcano is still active, and the landscape of the park could change at any time, creating new land and new life.
In an annoying epilogue to this trip, all of my drawings from 10 days in Hawai’i were accidentally left on a connecting flight, and despite constant calling of the airlines for several months, never seen again. So if you happen to ever see one of these drawings, give me a call! :)