If you’ve always wanted to see the inside of a lava tube, hop on Crater Rim Drive in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

We followed the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park brochure Crater Rim Drive map

in a counter-clockwise direction from the Kilauea Visitor Center.

Come prepared if you plan to get out of you car and take the short hikes along the Crater Rim Road. It can be windy and chilly this high up in the mountains. It can also be rainy so pack a jacket, hat, sunscreen, rain coat, water and snacks.

The first stop on Crater Rim Road heading counter-clockwise from the Kilauea Visitor Center is the Steam Vents parking area. Rain seeps down into the hot volcanic rock below the surface. It rises back to the surface as steam. The more rain there has been in the past few days, the more steam.

Take the very short trail from the parking lot to Steaming Bluff for a great view of the crater and some more intense steam vents. Trees can’t grow here because the earth is too hot just a few feet down. That’s why you only see the shallow-rooted grasses.

Walk across the street to the trailhead for the stinky Sulphur Banks. This trail is wheelchair accessible. Steam combined with hydrogen sulphide gas forms sulphur, hematite, and gypsum deposits on the ground. The hydrogen sulphide gas is what gives the area that rotten egg smell.

Warning: People with a heart condition, respiratory ailments, pregnant women, infants and small children should avoid this area.

The next parking area along Crater Rim Drive is at Kilauea Overlook and picnic area. Don’t let the picnic area sign fool you. It is a good place for a picnic but the view is the winner here.

You can see Kilauea caldera and Halema’uma’u Crater (the pit within the larger caldera) and usually less crowded than at Jaggar Museum.

Take the next left off of Crater Rim Drive and you’ll arrive at Jaggar Museum. This parking lot can get pretty crazy with all the visitors and parking may become a little more complicated if some Nene are visiting, too. Nene is the endangered Hawaiian goose.

If the weather is bad, this is a great place to come see Kilauea. There are large windows that look out over the Caldera. This is a museum of volcanology. You’ll find working seismographs, singed clothing from scientists who got to close to lava, and a gift shop.

I really wanted to go into the US Geological Survey's Hawaiian Volcano Observatory where the action is. Unfortunately it is closed to the public.

Next along Crater Rim Drive is a stop at the Southwest Rift Zone unless you are traveling with people with a heart condition, respiratory ailments, pregnant women, infants or small children—then keep driving until you reach the Keanakako'i Overlook.

Rift zones are areas where eruptions are likely to happen because they are weak points along a volcano's flanks. The southwest rift zone stretches from Kilauea's summit beyond the seacoast.

This place is barren not because of lack of rain. There is plenty of rainfall here but is acid rain. About 300 tons of sulphur dioxide is spewed from Halema'uma'u Crater every day. The sulfur dioxide gas rains down as sulfuric acid. No wonder nothing grows here!

Next you can turn off Crater Rim Drive and park at Halema'uma'u Crater and take a 10 minute walk to the crater unless you have people with a heart condition, respiratory ailments, pregnant women, infants or small children with you—then keep driving until you reach the Keanakako'i Overlook.

If you choose to take the walk, you can look down directly into Halema'uma'u crater, Pele’s home. Pele is the Goddess of Hawaiian Volcanoes.

The crater is over a half mile across and about 300 feet deep.

The next stop you can make on Crater Rim Drive is at Keanakako'i Crater, meaning "cave of the adzes". Hawaiians used to collect unusually hard stone here for making tools until it was buried in lava in 1877. You can cross the road to the overlook. Here you will see a lava fissue. These fissures are very long cracks where lava can erupt in a curtain of fire. This one did exactly that in 1974

On a clear day this is an excellent vantage point for viewing Mauna Loa's 13,677 foot summit and Mauna Kea's 13,796 foot summit adorned with some of the world's largest astronomical observatories.”

After you pass by the turn off for Chain of Craters Road you’ll arrive at Devastation Trail parking area. This is a paved, wheelchair accessible ˝ mile (each way) path. You have the option of sending the driver ahead to the Pu'u Pua'i Overlook a half mile up the road to pick you up or you can walk out and back.

As we drove along Crater Rim Drive toward Thurston Lava Tube, the forest becomes lusher. After all the black lava it was refreshing to take a 1/3 mile walk through a tree fern forest. At the end of the trail we got to step into a very large, cave-like lava tube. It is cool and drippy with tree roots hanging down.

Currently, lava is flowing in underground lava tubes just like this one.

This lava tube was discovered by Lorrin Thurston, a local newspaper publisher in 1913. Its ceiling was originally covered with lava stalactites but over the years they were removed by souvenir collectors.

If you want a real adventure and have a flashlight, follow the steps into the unlit portion of the tube. The ceiling is lower and did I mention it is not lit? If you go in far enough you will experience total darkness. I didn’t have a flashlight but stumbled in a ways without any light. It was very disorienting.

This is a very popular spot so expect to see crowds.

At Pu'u Pua'i Overlook you can see the spatter cone that formed when lava pumice cinders from Kilauea Iki welded together. When you look into Kilauea Iki Crater, the Kilauea Iki Trail looks like a gray line on the crater floor.

The last stop on Crater Rim Drive is Kilauea Iki Overlook. In 1959 this was a seething lava lake with lava fountains up to 1,900 feet high. The crater is huge (3,000 feet across, a mile long, and the floor is 400 feet below the overlook). From here you can take the 4 mile loop hike around Kilauea Iki. When you get back on the road you are about 1.5 miles from the Visitor Center.

You’ll see these red flowers everywhere.

These are Red Lehua blossoms found on Ohia trees. The trees tend to look like small bushes when growing on lava. In better conditions they are over 20 feet tall. They contain nectar which is food for the honeycreeper birds. Honey can be made from the nectar but it is rare and expensive. The Red Lehua blossom is the official flower of the Big Island.

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