Hell's Half Acre

Hells Half Acre is a lava field in southeast Idaho near the town of Blackfoot.  Interstate 15 passes through the southeast corner of the field for a few miles and there is a rest stop about a mile from the southern entrance.

I stopped there on Thursday driving from Idaho Falls to Utah and took some photos.

We have had rain off and on for the past several weeks and the lava fields were green with moss and grass, though not much in the way of flowers.  I was there in the late morning and the smell of the juniper after the rain was quite refreshing.

The flow is just over 5000 years old, so its not as new as those at Craters of the Moon.  Vegetation has had a chance to establish itself better.  The landscape is still rough and dominated by collapsed lava tubes and domes.  This is not the kind of terrain that you would make rapid progress over if you were on foot!

Photo from the same spot taken in 2005