Between Editions

News-Times reporter Joan Hershberger is on vacation in Hawaii. Here is another post from our at-large blogger:

The headline story in the Hawaii Advertizer on Tuesday screamed “Aloha cargo service comes to abrupt end” over a five column picture of an airplane from the company. Hawaiian airlines made the headlines, again.

They made the headlines earlier this month when the Aloha passenger division went bankrupt, dissolving plans for our long anticipated trip to the 50th state.

As my husband scrambled to replace that leg of our trip, a second airline – ATA – also went under, leaving customers stranded and another of our tickets dissipated like lava steam rising from the ocean bed.

A few days later, a third airline, Frontier, declared bankruptcy — but did not cancel flights. My husband spent at least 20 hours rescheduling and writing letters to the credit card companies about the tickets we purchased through them last fall.

Even at that late date he managed to find a relatively decent price. We hope, because we bought using a credit card, that we may get some of our money back.

I met a man whose bank told him to expect nothing for 9-10 tickets he purchased with his debit card for himself, his widowed sister and aunt. He said he nearly rescheduled with ATA. He is not holding his breath on any possible future class action suit settlement.

He did have trip insurance for another part of his traveling. This incident underscores ‘why’ one might want to purchase trip insurance.

According to the newspaper report, in the week after Aloha and ATA went under, round-trip airfares soared, but have settled down. Airline news is very important in this island state. Visitors fly in from everywhere around the world.

The business section of the newspaper gave the monthly report on tourism.

Tourism is the number one source of income for this state, followed by the income from the presence of the military bases and third by agriculture: Kona coffee, fruits and beef. So when the airlines can not or do not deliver passengers, Hawaii sits up and takes notice.

According to the business section the number of visitors will be down in April — due to the bankruptcy. The numbers had already fallen sightly in March although visitors were staying 9 days on the average instead of the usual 8.78 days. Spending on tourism was up, but visitors overall — even though it was spring break season — dipped. So for Hawaii, the price of gasoline, especially jet fuel, does matter.

According to the report, the top four visitor markets compared to a year ago: Japan down 11.9 percent, U.S. East down 8.2 percent from a year ago, U.S. West up 1.9 percent, arrivals by ship down 10.1 percent and visitors from Canada up 16.3 percent.

An interesting side note: A frequent flyer from Canada mentioned that America has immigration offices inside Canadian airports. That way anyone leaving Canada has already passed immigration and does not have to fly to an international airport.

Cruise ship arrivals declined because the Pride of Hawaii discontinued its inter island cruises in January. And the Pride of Aloha trimmed one tour and Norwegian Wind has not been to Hawaii for a year.

It is not because of the staff. We found the airline personnel most gracious.

Our luggage did not arrive with us. Because we switched airlines for the trip from the mainland our luggage was re-routed to a third airline and came via Airline Hawaii the next day.

Airport kiosk

It took me a while to realize that the woman in the flowered shirt explaining this to me was not some kind motherly soul who just happened to have a handy list about luggage. She was an employee assigned to help with luggage.

Maybe it helped that we initially went to the smaller airport on the island of Hawaii. Most visitors go to Honolulu, a major metropolis with soaring skyscrapers an bustling streets.

The airport on the big island of Hawaii is a small one and startled us with its complete openness. It has gates, inspection lines and a guard keeping out anyone except flying customers, but one almost wonders why bother.

The place has few walls. The baggage area looks like a shelter for a picnic area with the baggage train in the middle of it. The waiting area for the gate had impressive locked, iron gates connected to decorative walls with beds of flowers and plants.

But the garden walls only went up as high as a man’s head and did not connect to a ceiling. Nothing kept a willful person from climbing over the wall to the airfield.

No corridors or portable tunnels guided us from plane to terminal. We walked off the plane into the balmy weather and walked from the tarmac and to a terminal that looked like an open mall or a small town with individual shops. We did not feel like we were in an airport.

It was a very casual, friendly welcome after the stress of bankrupt airlines, hours of travel and missing luggage. It set the pace for the “hang loose” atmosphere for which Hawaii is noted.

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Photo credit: Joan Hershberger. Steam is seen from a recent lava flow in Hawaii.

By Joan Hershberger
For Between Editions
The long anticipated trip to Volcano National Park on the island of Hawaii went up in steam when the unpredictable volcano refused to remain in the park’s boundaries earlier this month. The park no longer has any flowing lava. And the day we planned to visit it, the park rangers issued a code orange and shut down the park due to the high content of sulfur dioxide in the air.

That did not deter us long. We called the folks who monitor the area where the lava flows outside the park. They suggested that we take time to visit Black Sands beach. We could still visit the outer parts of the park area and see the recent flow of lava, but admission was only from 2 to 8 p.m.

We went to Black Sands Beach, where the green sea turtle lives, feeds in the shallow waters along the shore, and comes out to sunbathe. The sand is black from the break down of the lava beds at the water’s edge. Although we saw one man make his way carefully over the uneven boulders and rocks of lava to swim, most stayed on shore, ate lunch and watched for sea turtles.

We saw a couple immersed in the water, only their backs emerging with the flow of the tide, or a flipper or head when the tide tossed them away from their feeding.

Taking this route, we visited the most southern community in the United States. We also stopped at the World’s Biggest Lava Tube and the lowest in the earth. The owners of the land where the lava once broke out of the ground casually walked away from their work on creating a parking lot, took us into their newly constructed building with the fresh smell of wood and cheerfully accepted $29 per person to take us on a one-hour tour.

If we had been able to go to the National Park to see a lava tube it would have cost $10 per person — or been free with the Golden Eagle Pass my husband keeps tucked in his wallet.

The guide was a self-taught man in his 20’s who spends a couple hours a day exploring the cave, reading everything he can about the names used to describe the different ways that lava cools and how the tube was formed on top of another tube. The guide gave us flashlights and carried a big spotlight.

The cave has no other lights and a minimally established trail between and around the pieces of the ceiling which have broken off over the years. But, the guide assured us of the cave’s safety. “I’ve been in here during an earthquake and nothing fell.”

He also said he had been in the cave when his flashlight went out and all he had to see was a hand-crank flashlight. “But that broke and now I just hope nothing happens,” he said.

The lava tube we visited was part of the longest (55 miles) tube known. We saw less than a quarter of a mile of the tube. It is the lowest cave in the country because it is so close to sea level.

And it was the only place we found to actually visit a lava tube that day. (The next day alongside the road we found a small cave formed by a broken open lava tube … but no guide to explain the formations.) Emerging from the live lecture inside the ancient lava tube we headed out for our afternoon and evening visit to the lava outbreak.

A flashing sign warned us: Orange zone, sulfur dioxide emissions. Close car windows. Caution. We promptly closed windows, then decided we needed a picture of this, backed up, got out and snapped shots. A couple miles down the road, still in the orange zone, only the most fragile in health heeded the warnings, the rest went on with their lives.

The road could not be closed, it is a major link between one side of the island and the other.

After making the final turn to the limited access to the ocean outbreak, the Civil Defense met us with a very official looking van.

They calmly, quietly handed us another warning through our opened car window. A mile or so further down the road, a long forgotten hippie manned a very old roadside stand selling freshly made green leaf straw hats, flashlights, snacks and bottles of water. Peering into the woods surrounding him we caught a glimpse of the aging tent where he obviously lived.

We drove past houses perched in the midst of the lava beds. The land is privately owned. The National Park Service has no authority in this area so the Civil Defense takes over.

That said, we parked in the designated area, walked past more modern looking vendors offering snacks, flashlights, bottled water and hats. And read the faded billboard listing the possible ways we might be injured just like this or that person had been injured in the past when a shelf of lava broke off, or the crust gave way.

Because the park is closed, however, the park rangers showed up to explain the most recent lava flow, to warn the curious from climbing on top of the mound of lava which covered the road higher than a man’s head and to show a notebook of pictures taken of this month’s outbreak of lava and the before and after pictures of the coast line. The line of safe viewing had changed.

We walked 20 minutes across older, more established lava beds, following a path of yellow stripes to the viewing area. It was not a trip for the faint of heart. We stepped over huge cracks in the waves of lava, and went up and down in the once undulating, now frozen black waves.

We spotted the impression of a fruit tree caught in the surface of the lava flow 26 years ago when the lava flow pushed the tree over and caught the fruit in an instant mold.

Yellow caution ribbons and park rangers and Civil Defense personnel made sure that we stayed inside the marked area. But oh, it was so tempting to venture across the ribbon and move closer to the plume of steam and place where we caught the tiniest glimpses of the volcano spewing black boulders of lava up into the air.

Around us a quietly chatting crowd of young and old watched for something to happen. During the day little could be seen except the steam. As we waited for the sun to set, we visited. One man and his son had come many times and told us to wait to take pictures - the show got better as night time came.

Two young guys sat on a small shelf of lava and played guitars and sang. Parents held children and waited. The lucky with their impressive telescopic cameras on tripods waited for the lava to blow.

We watched enviously, our dinky digital cameras all but useless for recording anything more than the plumes of steam during the day. Night time pictures showed only a glow of red in the distance.

But, we did see the night time display. It reminded me of the bank of photographers at a launching of a space shuttle. We did not need our bottles of water. We did not need sunscreen. But we did need a flashlight to find our way back over the lava trail to the road. It was a stumbling experience. Once on the smooth highway which had been laid over the lava bed years ago, we looked back at the parade of flashlights following us back to the road.

As we left the area, other cars came and parked. With a half hour to go, those with hotels closer to the area came to watch the spectacular show until the area closed at 10 p.m.

We had a long drive back around the island. We had caught a glimpse of the volcano’s energy. As we left, we snapped on the radio and listened to a lengthy list of all the areas under Code Orange, yellow, red or green codes.

Whatever the code, the vog still smeared the usually clear, blue skies. We literally had seen the black clouds formed as the lava hit the ocean and steamed up.

In Hawaii, the fog and ash from the lava are called “vog.” We did not get to see the park. The view of the highest mountain remained obscured during our stay, but we did see the lava tube and joined the hearty few who visited the volcano’s reminder that no one can really predict or anticipate what will happen with a live volcano.

Following are photos from Joan’s adventures.

Joan Hershberger

Fiery lava flows at night.

Dried lava flow completely covers this roadway.

Ominous warning