Chris goes to Hawaii!

Well, it's a long story, but really it comes down to my sweetie going to hawaii to visit her mom, ALONE, and tickets really not costing THAT much... Sorry this isn't a work blog, but whenever I travel somewhere cool I gotta share it with the Torque community, just to make y'all jealous!

(WARNING, heavy image content!)

So, first thing you see flying into Honolulu, outside of the megalopolis, is Diamond Crater, which is hella cool:


Then once you get to the Big Island, which is where the mom lives, you gotta drive around it and see all the amazing coolness, one part of which is the Waipaio Valley. If it looks like Jurassic Park, that's because it is! Picture CG dinosaurs down there...


Farther south (or, clockwise in the islander's spherical coordinate system... there is no north or south, there is only around this way, around that way, up toward the volcano or down toward the coast... very cool) you find lava trees park, which has DANGEROUS EARTH CRACKS:


And, of course, lava trees:


And the main reason for the trip, her name is Sylvia :-P


Down near the coast, there's still lava actively pouring into the ocean! Island getting bigger as you watch... just a few years ago, it dumped a huge bunch of it all over the research station, and this is what it looks like now:


Here's some scale:


Then of course, if you go "mauka" (or inland, uphill, toward the center) you end up in the middle of a freakin volcano!


You can go right down there and play on the lava in the middle of the crater, if you don't mind that it might just blow up under your feet whenever Pele gets pissed at you.


And, no travelogue is complete without some reference to food, so here's some fresh starfruit, pineapple, rambutan, and smoked shark meat to keep you hungry!


So, I'll be back next week and on task, barring any sudden airplane-related catastrophes, but until then, Aloha and Mahalo!

Chris