With our flight not scheduled until evening, we had one last day on the island. We decided to spend it once again in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. This would be Kilauea's LAST CHANCE to show off for us. Spoiler alert: Last night's lava was as good as it got, but we still enjoyed our day.
Inside the park, we stopped by the Uekahuna Overlook for a last look at Kilauea's steaming Halema'uma'u crater. Still not dramatically erupting, dang it! I guess we'll spend our remaining time on one more hike.
Kilauea vents some steam
The trailhead for the Halema'uma'u Trail begins at the Visitor Center, but the parking was packed, so we backtracked to the Steam Vents and walked from there, which turned a hike of under two miles to a total of 3.4 miles. That's okay. It's good for us.
Our last hike in Hawaii
The trail descends 425 feet below Kilauea's rim through lush rainforest, at times cutting through moss-covered rock walls. Reaching the crater floor, the trail was closed to hikers beyond that point because of the obvious dangers, but the view of the caldera was steamy and surreal. We could feel the hot ground through the bottoms of our shoes.
Descending the Halema'uma'u Trail
Passing through moss-covered walls
Crater floor of Kilauea Volcano
Ascending back into the rainforest
Finally leaving the national park, we drove to Kona, on the west coast, via the southern route. When we passed through here over a week ago, it was raining for much of the drive, so now we could enjoy the views.
Haleokane Lookout
Final view
Back in Kona, we reorganized our luggage in the Safeway parking lot, then drove to Hawaii Lifted Jeep Rentals to turn in our ride. An Uber took us the last four miles to the airport. We had driven our sporty rental Jeep 1,201 miles.
Aloha!
Our flights were on Delta: 9:30 p.m. Kona to 5:00 a.m. LAX and then 6:45 a.m. LAX to 12:39 p.m. Nashville. Avid Hotel's shuttle brought us back to our car, which was luckily not one of the vehicles that had been broken into in their parking lot while we were away. Yikes! After flying all night, we were dead tired on the drive home to Clinton but made it by dark o'clock on Monday, the 24th.
Cool trip, with another state high point accomplished!