Black lava comes right up to the shoulder of Highway 11 south of Kailua-Kona, long rough fields of it with the Pacific off to the right. The road climbs from there to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, where steam leaks from vents around the Kīlauea summit and, when the volcano is erupting, the crater throws a red glow into the night sky. Then the circuit swings around the east and north sides of the island and comes home through Hilo and Waimea, so you never drive the same mile twice.
Give the day an early start and plan the rest of the week around it. The Park Service puts the park 96 miles from Kona on Highway 11, or 125 miles by Highways 19 and 11 through Waimea and Hilo. Going down the short road and back the long one saves the bigger miles for after the volcano, which in a full-size motorhome still makes for a long day at the wheel.
Kīlauea summit and the Namakanipaio grove
Up at the summit the coast's heat is gone. Namakanipaio, the park's campground at 4,000 feet, stands in a grove of tall eucalyptus and ohia, and the air under the trees is cool enough to want a sweatshirt after a morning on the lava. It's the quiet stop before the crater, where the steam vents and the overlooks take the afternoon.
What the summit shows depends on the week. Some visits are all steam rising out of the ground along the rim, others bring the glow after dark, and that's worth staying for even with the Hilo road still ahead.
The rig does this as a self-contained day. Namakanipaio has no electrical hookups and no dump station, so fill the fresh tank and empty the holding tanks before you leave, and plan to sleep back on the Kona side.
Where a motorhome can sleep on the Kona side
After dark the county beach parks along this coast belong to tents. Hawaii County's rules ask for a permit, freestanding tents no larger than 10 by 10 feet, and camping only in designated areas, with nothing written for a motorhome. Hawaii's state parks are plainer still and don't allow sleeping in motorhomes, trailers, or other vehicles in their campground lots. Up at the volcano, Namakanipaio's sites are tent-only.
That leaves no public campground on the Kona side that promises a motorhome a night, so work out where the rig sleeps before you settle on the rig. If the trip is two people chasing beach nights, a campervan is usually the better fit, and the Kailua-Kona campervan page covers Hookena, Kealakekua Bay and the Captain Cook Monument, and Spencer Beach Park.
Spencer, up on the Kohala coast, shows the county's rules at their most visible, with a permit for every tent and a gate the county locks overnight. Ironman week in Kona competes for the same rentals and the same county permits as any beach week, so if your dates overlap the race, line up both early.
The Hawaii RV page sets out the rules island by island, and the Big Island campervan page takes in the rest of the island.
