THAR SHE BLOWS!!!

after a wonderful breakfast prepared by Ken

www.luanainn.com

consisting of fratitas,  cheesy potatoes, Kona coffee, OJ, delicious fruit,

homemade Hawaiian sweet bread;  AND splendid conversation with

table partners from Medford OR - Roger and Fay -

we headed east to see the "volcano country".

you probably know about all the active volcanoes still in Hawaii, but we made our way

to the area of Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa

rough place to be, but somebody had to be there!  80 plus degrees when we left.

while driving saw a sulphuric plume some 30 miles in the distance ahead

laughed and said, "bet that's the volcano..."

more later.

so in we go to do our hike.  we start at the upper rim of the Kilalua Caldera (south of Mauna Loa)

and look down - saying "there's people down there!"  of course we thought we were doing a

walk about the upper rim of the caldera.  little did we know our hike took us INTO the place!

how cool!

steam vents at various places in the caldera (by the way, it last erupted in 1959).

it was eerie going through the hole - about a mile long and maybe 1/2 mile wide.

there's places where the heat still rises!  Fortunately it was overcast and the temp was about 60.

our total hike today was a little over 5 miles - some, pretty rugged territory!  remember you had to climb DOWN several hundred feet to enter the caldera, and then climb UP just as many (though it

felt like more) to get out!  but with smiling faces we made it!

smiling but still had more than a mile to go - uphill ...

we then drove around to the other side of the caldera - maybe 10 miles and saw

what we had seen on the way up - the smoking Crater!

it was awesome.  unlike Mt. St. Helen's, this visitor center is actually higher than the active volcano -

but not higher than Mauna Loa or M Kea.  

Heading back down the mountain for perhaps a 2.5 hour drive back to the B&B we found this:

great wait person - a gal who used to live in Kona, now works at her folks' (the owners) place

every day - has a bakery, too.  Karina had fish and chips (3 pieces of Ahi - not breaded, but fried; with potatoes like American cut.  I had to try the "Outrageous Grilled Cheese Sandwich"

a grilled cheese smothered with sauteed veggies and sprouts and stuff.  don't believe it?

here it was, before devouring it! you can see K's F&C in the background.

but now you know two people who have eaten at the southernmost restaurant 

in the United States!

a couple thoughts from yesterday (Pearl Harbor) ...

standing where history has such a significant impact is remarkable.  Though it will be 70 years this December, I remember the old B&W films we saw in grade school and junior high.  Even having Mr. Miller playing the old 32mm projector backwards and watching the smoke billowing backwards into the ships in the harbor - funny back then, but wasn't nearly as funny yesterday ...

what a great tribute - leaving the men in their "tomb" - and also on the Oklahoma - and the Utah, and others.

but so sobering. 

as I said - one of those goosebumps and tears moments.  I was really taken in by the memorial. 

but the way they've set everything up now, there's the beginning and the end.  You go to the Arizona and come out and then go to the end of the war - by boarding the USS Missouri - where the surrender was signed.  even the placement of the memorials is unnerving - the Missouri looms over the Arizona like a protective parent.  it looks like this:

then as you walk around the decks of the Missouri you see the place where the table that MacArthur and the Japanese leaders signed the surrender ... words can't describe how I was feeling ...

oh well, that's about it from Hawaii today ... 

except to think, we walked across this caldera today!  That's an accomplishment!

love ya.

K & D