Big Island Trip 1 - the flight there.

Note: During my trip to the Big Island last weekend, I wrote several blog posts. I didn't have internet access, so I didn't post any of them at the time. I'm posting them now, as originally written.

The 50th State is a group of islands, and if you want to travel from one to another you're probably going to wind up flying. At the moment, there's no commercial ferry boat service between islands - one is planned, but the launch was just delayed again. Unless you're massively opposed to human flight, though, the air travel isn't that bad an experience. Our flight to Hilo was actually quite pleasant.

We booked early enough to get seats on the left side of the plane. If you're flying from Oahu to Maui or Hawaii, that's the side of the plane that usually has the scenery. (If you're flying back to Oahu from Maui or Hawaii, the right side has the view.) It's usually been either dark or cloudy (or both) when I've flown interisland, but today the weather was beautiful. This had two big benefits. There was a lot less turbulance than the last few flights, and the view of Molokai and Maui was fantastic.

Molokai is a nice, country island. There aren't a lot of residents, so you're not flying over subdivision after subdivision. It's also half the island it used to be (a huge chunk of it slid off into the Pacific a while back). This really shows up when you're looking at it from the air. The western side of the island rises gradually, and has that characteristic eroded shield look to it. It reaches it's summit near the east coast, and just drops right off into the ocean. From above, it looks like the volcano was cut in half with a giant knife.

Maui's a bit different. It's a younger island, to begin with, and although there's evidence for large landslides from the Maui peaks, they haven't been bisected the way Oahu and Molokai's volcanoes have. From above, they look like complete volcanoes instead of pieces of volcano. We had a great view of Halaeakala summit as we flew past. We could see the drop down from the summit into the caldera, the clouds draped over the Koolau Gap, and the cinder cones that dot the bottom of the caldera. Absolutely beautiful.

We're landing in Hilo now. We've got a nice view of the Hilo area, but the Volcano area is concealed by vog. We just landed, so it's off to claim bags and rent car. More later.