Summit Of The Mountain (Haleakala Volcano)

The journey to the summit of Haleakala brings you from coastal Maui, to the remote, native, high-elevation world on Maui's highest peak, over 10,000 ft. above sea level you find an island in the sky where the clouds spread out below you like a second layer of ocean. From the summit one looks down into a massive depression some 7 miles across, 2 miles wide, and nearly 2,600 ft. deep. The surrounding walls are steep and the interior mostly barren-looking with a scattering of volcanic cones. The potentially active volcano has produced numerous eruptions in the last 30,000 years, including in the last 500 years. Until recently, the Haleakala Volcano was thought to have last erupted around 1790, based largely on comparisons of maps. Recent advanced dating tests, however, have shown that the last eruption was more likely to have been in the 1600s.