R. Doug Wicker's Blog, page 144

Port 1 Hilo — Kilauea Iki Crater

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Kilauea Iki Crater

Our last look at Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park before we move on.  The overlook of Kilauea Iki Crater is along Crater Rim Drive.  Kilauea Iki may look quiet today, but in 1959 rivers of molten lava flowed along its floor:

1959 Kilauea Iki eruption

The overlook is on the northeast corner of the crater, and in the background you can see the smoking Kilauea Caldera.

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Kilauea Iki Crater

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Kilauea Iki Crater — Kilauea Caldera smoking in the background

Today’s photo gallery of Kil...

Port 1 Hilo — Lua Manu Crater

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Lua Manu Crater

We still weren’t done with Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.  Ricky had two more stops inside the park.  By the way, Ricky’s Tours gave us a great tour in a comfortable van with time along the way to enjoy the sights.  And Ricky did so at a reasonable price.  You certainly can’t ask for more than that.  Here’s our van, and a shot of Ricky:

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Ricky’s Tour van

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Ricky

Our next stop had appropriate signage:

 

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Lua Manu Crater

The smallish Lua Manu Crater is along the Chain of Craters R...

Port 1 Hilo — Thurston Lava Tube

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Nāhuku — Thurston Lava Tube

Kilauea is not the only attraction within the Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park. Just a half mile from the Kikauea Caldera overlook is the Thurston Lava Tube, known to the locals as Nāhuku. I’m pretty sure that the lava tube did not get its name from famed millionaire castaway Thurston Howell, III, but you never know. Actually, it was named after the Thurston family, missionary Asa and Lucy Thurston and their descendants.

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The hike to Nāhuku

It’s a short hike from the...

Port 1 Hilo — A closer look at Kilauea Caldera

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Kilauea Caldera

The Kilauea Caldera is a forbidding landscape. Hardly a speck of green intrudes into the area surrounding the smoking Halema’uma’u Crater in the distance. The crater itself is 2,530 feet/770 meters wide, 2,950 feet/900 meters long, and is 270 feet/83 meters.

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Kilauea Caldera

And that “smoke” you see rising from the floor of Halema’uma’u? It’s deadly sulfur dioxide gas.

Now for today’s photo gallery of this hellish place and the beauty of the surrounding area:

Filed under...

Port 1 Hilo — Rainbow Falls and Volcanoes National Park

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Kilauea Caldera

Our next stop on Ricky’s tour bus was Rainbow Falls, aptly named depending on how the sunlight hits the spray rising from the Wailuku River.

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Wailuku River

The falls are quite the sight, and it’s very fun composing shots highlighting only certain aspects of the falling water.

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Rainbow Falls

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Rainbow Falls

Still, the complete falls are themselves fun to capture, especially in portrait orientation.

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Rainbow Falls

Check around the area for some beautiful flora, as well.

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Rainbow Falls...

Port 1 Hilo — Lili’uokalani Park and Gardens

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Lili’uokalani Park and Gardens

The Crown Princess left Los Angeles on October 17, 2015. Aboard with Ursula and me were our good friends from Houston, Al and Lisa Fittipaldi. You may remember Lisa and Al from our adventures together on another cruise we did together just last year. That one was to Alaska, and you can read up on Lisa and Al here: The Norwegian Sun Docks in Ketchikan.

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Lili’uokalani Park and Gardens

We arrived five days later at our first port of call, Hilo, on the island of Hawa...

28-Day Pacific Cruise Series

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Nawiliwili, Kauai

Today begins a series on a 28-day Pacific cruise aboard the Crown Princess that took place from October 17 to November 14, 2015. Along the way we’ll be making port on nine islands. Those ports are Hilo, Honolulu, Lahaina, and Nawiliwili in the Hawai’ian Islands; Apia on the island of Samoa; Fagatogo, the port serving nearby Pago Pago on American Samoa; and the French Polynesian ports of Bora Bora, Mo’orea, and Papeete in the Society Islands.

For today’s article I have chosen...

Fun Photo Friday — Vancouver Favorites

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The Laughing Statues of English Bay

Today concludes this series on the Crown Princess West Coast cruise from April-May, 2016. I hope you enjoyed the journey. Below is today’s Fun Photo Friday of Vancouver favorites:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation Tagged: Crown Princess, Fun Photo Friday, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation, Vancouver

Continuing our Hop-On/Hop-Off tour of Vancouver

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Canadian Chinese Monument

One of the stops we made from our Hop-On/Hop-Off tour of Vancouver was near Granville Island. Granville isn’t really an island; it’s a peninsula. Youwalk over tothis shopping district from the H-O/H-O stop that services it by passing beneath Granville Street Bridge and along a marina on False Creek.

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False Creek marina

I love photographing marinas, for some reason. Perhaps it’s the vertical features of the masts, or maybe it’s just that I enjoy seeing boats.

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False Cre...

The End of the Cruise — Vancouver, B.C.

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Leaving behind the Crown Princess

We disembarked from the Crown Princess for the final time this journey on May 6, 2016. Our hotel was within an easy walk of the Canada Place cruise terminal, and equally convenient to Vancouver’s famed Gastown District. The hotel, which I highly recommend, was the Delta Hotel by Marriott Vancouver Suites. It had everything from a great suite to a fantastic location with easy access to Vancouver’s Hop-On/Hop-Off bus. Yep, another city, another hop-on/hop-off t...