This week’s Sunday Stills Monthly Color Challenge is ‘Lava.’ See more responses here. I don’t often run photos I’ve posted before, but this seemed like an opportune instance to rerun some older photos that are perfect for this theme. I’ve put captions on the photos and a link to the original posts for those interested in checking them out.
Returning from a recent hike, I drove round a corner and saw Mauna Kea looking completely red in the setting sun. I pulled over and grabbed my camera, but by the time I took photos, a matter of a couple of minutes, only the top half of the volcano was still illuminated.
This though was my last photo from September, posted here for Bushboy’s Last on the Card challenge (see more responses here).
I took the photo with a view to making a few adjustments, which I’ve done in the bottom photo. The main thing was to crop some of the sky, which I had to include in the photo to get the full volcano. The other thing, which is a bit of an oddity with my camera, is that in certain lighting conditions it will produce a somewhat dull and hazy image. But adjusting the Lighten Shadows feature from zero to one makes the difference seen here.
A view of Kohala and Maui from the western slopes of Mauna Kea.
A view of Pu’u Wa’awa’a and Hualalai beyond it. This is the time of year when Jacaranda trees are in bloom.
Steam rises from vents alongside the Crater Rim Trail in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. In the distance is Volcano House, the park’s hotel and restaurant, which also boasts a decent view of the current eruption.
For more information about Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, go to nps.gov/havo/.
I saw this floating bag while out snorkeling. It looks like flotsam, but people fishing use such bags to get their hook and line out far enough to where it won’t get snagged on rocks and coral. Unfortunately, it’s not uncommon to see such bags, deflated and abandoned, left behind in the water. That’s because they do sometimes get caught on rocks or because the line broke leaving them to drift, just one more bit of drifting garbage.
This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Meaningful Memories.’ See more responses here.
This seemed like an opportune time to revisit my first visit to Hawaii, back in 2010. My wife and I stayed in a vacation rental near Captain Cook, overlooking Kealakekua Bay. The sky was hazy with vog from Kilauea Volcano, but the place was awash with colorful flowers. Just down the road was the Painted Church and at the foot of the hill, Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park celebrates Hawaiian culture and history with its wooden ki’i and towering palms.
We traveled the whole island from the black sand beach at Pololu (even if we had to pass the carcass of a dead whale twice) to the black sand beach at Punalu’u, dotted with resting green turtles, and rocky surrounds. There were waterfalls big and small, and roads lined with tropical foliage leading to the active lava flow at that time.
There, signs warned that flowing lava is dangerous (who knew?), but we were still able to get within 10 feet of oozing tongues of red, and saw small fires still burning in nearby brush.
There was even a house for sale: ‘Buy now before it burns!’ We didn’t, though that house still stands while others, much farther from that scene, have since been consumed by subsequent flows.
It was this visit that prompted us to return permanently two years later. Hawaii isn’t paradise – it has its pros and cons like any place – but we haven’t regretted the move and are looking forward to the next 10 years.
I took a photo of Hualalai while swimming one day and this was the result. Gotta be a UFO, right?
Posted in response to this month’s Becky’s Squares challenge theme of ‘Odd.’ See more responses here.
Graham's Island 