We started the day by deciding to visit a winery in Volcano. As Miranda texted that day – ” I’m at a winery by 11 am, it’s a pretty good day.”

We had an 8 wine tasting and bought a couple bottles of wine and the ladies serving were fun and obviously loved their job. They had this honey/tea infusion wine that I was certain I was going to love… but it needed milk. 😛

Went for a drive for the rest of the afternoon. Drove down to the County labs viewing spot only to find that it didn’t open until 3. Drove up the coast and took a few photos of some intense waves.

Found a farmer’s market just outside of Pahoa and wandered around. Lots of neat things to see, and some great eats. Lots of hippies.

More driving. Our guidebook claims that Sunday isn’t a great day to visit these beaches, as the locals aren’t as friendly, so we just drove by with the occasional stop.

The County lava viewing area opened and we went for another short hike.

The lava in this area flowed through in 1990 and covered a community called Kalapana. You can still see houses standing, and we’re told that people still live here. Hard to imagine. As Miranda said ” oh yeah, that’s where Suzies house used to be”… Rough.

The guards here wouldn’t let us walk past a certain point, which was to far away to see much of anything. As we arrived we saw a couple walking towards us from outside the viewing area. When we asked about that, the guard said that these people had now received a $5,000 fine per person. Don’t screw with the County.

Drove to Hilo. Here’s our hotel. No kitchen is weird. And it turns out that the airport is… Right there. And crying babies in the room over.

Today we have a helicopter tour of a volcano. Hopefully we see some lava…

Writing this at breakfast, so now I’m caught up again!