Travel

it was on a tour organized by the University of Hawaii for Mainlanders attending summer sessions there (we stayed in the dorms of a boarding school), but the Big Island is "big" only in relation to the other islands.

It's worth driving around the whole island and into the center for the sheer variety of landscape: black lava, jungles, landscapes that look like the American West in higher elevations, and snow at the top of Mauna Kea.

You might want to post your question in the Hawaii Forum, where a lot of locals can give you more in-depth answers.