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Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park

Two-Hundred Years Of Written Observations Of Kīlauea's Summit Activity

On August 1, 1823, an English missionary named William Ellis visited Kīlauea caldera with his Hawaiian guides on a tour of the Island of Hawaiʻi. He and his missionary companions were the first Westerners to visit the summit of Kīlauea, and the book that Ellis later published includes the first contemporary written observations of Kīlauea’s eruptive activity.

Trails I’ve Hiked: Kīlauea Iki Trail

Imagine a lake of bright yellow-orange lava with a molten fountain gushing 1,900 feet (580m) in the air. Now imagine walking across a smoothed solid rock surface where that lava lake once churned, guided by ahu (rock cairns) past a tall cinder cone as you aim toward the other side. That’s the experience of the Kīlauea Iki Trail in Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.

Eruption Viewing In Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park

The sky glowed fierce shades of orange and red that night in February when I stood at the Kīlauea Overlook and watched one of the world’s most active volcanoes do its thing. I was grateful to have evaded the crowds that gather here in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park at sunset but also secretly unnerved to be alone in unfamiliar territory just before midnight.

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