Vagabond's Compass: Volcano to the ocean

After I changed clothes in a parking lot and figured out how to hang all my clothes and backpack items around the car to perhaps dry. I headed south along the chain of craters road. As advertised there are a chain of craters, lava fields, and eventually sweeping views of the ocean. Once I reached the sea, I headed east toward the end of the road . . . or at least the current end of the road. That is to say where the road was ended by a lava flow a couple of years ago. They actually have the road blocked a mile or two from where the lava flowed, so I parked and started walking. Eventually there were a series of rough road ahead signs, then I was there. They had bulldozed a rough road through the lava so that scientists and park officials could still reach the other side. I decided to follow this and see if I found anything interesting. A couple of miles in I crested a hill and realized that the lava flow still went as far as the eye could see. I have to admit when I heard that a lava flow blocked the road, I imagined a narrow stream of lava, not a stretch miles wide. I knew that it was like 10 miles to the area where lava was actively flowing, so I eventually turned back, but decided to do the return trip out in the lava field proper and saw an amazing variety of lava forms from mounds and pillars to braided ropes. Very cool. I even saw a weird turquoise colored lava formation.