Today we would see the one thing, you could see nowhere else, but on Big Island. Lava flowing into the ocean. But to get to see that, it took some effort. We had to hike (it was more a walk, because it was on a paved street) two hours forth and two hours back again. So with six litres we made our way to the ocean. What I still don´t understand is, why you weren´t allowed to drive there. The street already existed and a few people just drove through. Probably it’s, so the bike rentals have better business. It was a little like back at Greensand beach with cars. But we hiked there. And we got lucky, because the lava doesn’t always flow into the ocean. It was good, that dad brought his pinocular, since you weren´t allowed to walk up right to the lava. Which I can understand, but 500 meters is a little overcareful. Here comes the dumb part: When it was already dark, we found out, that you could hike through the old lava right up to new flowing lava and go as near as you wanted. I´m not sure which point was more enoying. The fact that we had to sit 500 meters away from the lava while in other parts you could easily walk up to the lava and even touch it, if you wanted to get burnt very badly.

Or that we had sat there all the time waiting for it to get dark, while we could have hiked right up to it in the dusk, being able to see, where we´re going and then arriving in the dark, getting to see the lava up close. Dad wasn´t sure, if he wanted to walk one and a half hour in the dark through the slippery and unsafe breakable lava. But I thought: „It can’t be, that we have hiked all the way here and would stop, because of one and a half more hours, to see the real thing.“ And we made it! It was so exhausting , because of the unsteady ground, but when we got there it was satisfying. But it was also really scary, because once you got to where the lava was, the ground gets really hot and spiky (as if glass had shattered there) so you didn’t want to fall. If you made a wrong step, you could step into the lava flowing between gaps. And the air was hot luckily now and then a wind blow came, that brought in some fresh air. Since we couldn’t stay to long at one spot anyways, we made our way back. Then only two more exhausting hours on the pavement under the milkyway and we were back at our car.