Photographing the Flora of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park

Several years ago we took a family trip for the wedding of a friend, a native of the beautiful island state of Hawaii. We spent most of our week in tropical paradise on the Big Island where her family has lived for many years. During our stay on the Island, we spent an incredible, wonder filled day in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. It's our most "unique" U.S. National Park and, if you ever get the chance to visit it, it will be a visit you'll certainly never forget.

The park, surprisingly to many, is filled with flora that grows right out of the hardened lava. It's truly amazing the amount and variety of plant life to be found growing from rock in an otherwise desolate wasteland.

Please join me for a brief photographic journey through a park where things grow that you would never expect!

The above photo is an enlarged (but certainly not life size!) view of the Hawaiian named 'Ama' U Fern, commonly referred to as a "Fiddlehead Fern".

When we entered Volcanoes National Park back in July of 2001, we weren't quite sure what to expect. Oh sure, we had a tour book and some basic information about the park from our friend and her family, but since we were touring on our own, and not with a bus full of tourists scurrying from one "overlook" to another, we wanted to get the full scoop about what to see and how to get there within the park. So, after entering the park, we stopped and spent some well worth it time at the Kilauea Visitor Center.

While we were there we viewed the video in place at the time which showed, among many other things, the plant life present in the area. We were stunned that such beautiful - and obviously "hardy" - plants could grow out of lava hardened over many decades of Hawaiian sun. One of the plants we saw in the video was the Fiddlehead in our photos. These amazing ferns literally unfurl into beautiful fronds. Little did we know, as we watched the video, we would see one of these amazing plants, with a head still completely furled and one in the early stages of unfurling, on a walk later that day along Devastation Trail in the park.

Photo Credit: MJsConsignments, July 2001

And "New" Life

It's been more than 55 years since the 1959 eruption that caused the "devastation" that gives the park its aptly named 5/8 mile Devastation Trail. Plant life is very slowly returning to the area. Very, very slowly. Only the most hardy of plants, like the ferns above, can grow and survive in such harsh conditions.

Signage provided within Volcanoes National Park tells us the paved pathway that you see was part of the old Chain of Craters Road that was devastated in the lava flow along with the once lush forest. It also told us, during our visit, that the lava is 2 meters thick in much of the trail area. It's simply an incredible feat of nature that anything is growing there at all, even after all this time!

The trail is an easy walk as it is mostly flat since it runs along the Kilauea caldera. It can be hot though as there is no overhead cover from the sun which reflects off the hardened lava all around. It's an experience that a little "heat" shouldn't keep you from. Just be sure to take some water with you!

Photo Credit: MJsConsignments, July 2001

Incredible flowering plants growing in the most inhospitable conditions...Amazing! This and a couple of other hardy plants like it were seen near the rim of a crater caused by the last major eruption of Kilauea in 1959. You can see the craters - and possibly the plants - along Crater Rim Drive in the park.

Photo Credit: MJsConsignments, July 2001

There are lots of "Hawaii" travel guides. There are even a few "Big Island" only guides. This one gets my vote though because it's made for those of us who like to see everything, yes, including those things that we have to get out of the car and walk a bit to see. The book, of course, offers extensive coverage of all things volcano related including where to find the magma flows.

Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is not all craters, ash, rock and hot lava. There's also a lush tropical rain forest full of flora within the park that harbors one of the most visited park locations, the Thurston Lava Tube. It was carved out by an active magma flow several hundred years ago. The tube was discovered by exploerer Lorrin Thurston - for whom it is named - in 1913.

The photo is mine from July of 2001. The two people in the photo are unknown to me; my apologies. Though I do have a photo of my then husband and son standing at the entrance, it's a close up view. I chose to show this photo to give you some idea of the vegetation that now surrounds this tube.

Have you been to Volcanoes National Park? Surely then, a memory of the park stands out for you!

When I went to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in 2001, digital photography was still in its infancy. Cameras were extremely expensive and the images were of poor quality, good only for computer screen viewing. I took the shots above with a mid-range 35mm camera. I didn't know for sure what I was getting until I got them back from the processor.

It doesn't have to be that way now. You can get a highly rated, great digital camera for well under $100 that will let you frame the perfect shot every time. My pick for a camera that will do it all is the:

Great videos from visitors to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. Visit Volcano House, drive Crater Rim Drive, hike the trails, go through the Thurston Lava Tube and see the active lava flow!

Have you visited this amazing National Park? Did you hike to see the lava flow, drive Crater Rim Drive or walk through the Thurston Lava Tube? We'd all love to hear about it!