WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Off the Trails: Lava Tubes and White Sand

Episode Date: April 21, 2025

Join Nicole Sighiartau and Storm Drexler as they discuss their wildest experiences in the great outdoors! This week they have special guest Andrew Hawken on to talk about some underrated National Monuments. 

You're listening to Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. Welcome to Off the Trails. Yurt! I'm Storm Drexler. And I'm Nicole Segueratow, and we'll be your adventure buddies every week as we discuss some of our wildest stories from our outdoor endeavors. This week, we have Andrew Hawkenon to talk about some underrated national monuments. How are you doing today, Andrew? Good, thanks.

Andrew! I'm excited. Andrew's my friend. And my friend as well. Yeah. Let's start with trail markers. Andrew, do you want to go first? Sure.

Well, I have a really exciting one for you guys. I was walking in class this morning, and I saw a bird on the ground. Was it a red one? No, no, it wasn't bad. It was walking around. Was it a red one versus was it dead? I love that all both of our minds go to, yeah. Well, I saw a red one today, and it was really pretty.

That's cool. I mean, it was a robin, so it was kind of orange, but. You know, red robin? Yeah. Okay, sorry. All right. Storm, do you have a trail marker? My term marker is I saw a snowman in April, and I've never seen a snowman in April before.

Really? Never? I made a snowman this week. It was like a little snow rabbit, but it was still pretty tall. And I think that I've never ever seen snow in April before in my entire life. But apparently here there's snow. You've never gone spring skiing in like April? Late April?

I don't think so. I think it's usually in like March. Okay. Yeah. And so I was like, wow, when it snowed, was it last night, two nights ago? It snowed a lot. This is bad. I wanted the snow to go away

Not okay in my opinion My shoes were soaked because I took my Waterproof boots on But I saw a snow bunny A snowman bunny And I was like, yo, that's sick And gigai was like, yep, built it with my own two hands Because he's a construction worker

And they build things Good for them, executing on his job Called, do you have a trail marker I do have a trail marker Or you just bluffing girl No, I actually do I saw a butterfly today The first one of the season

It was the first one of the season, and it was really pretty, and it flew next to me for, like, two seconds while I was running, or we probably just, like, flew past each other. Was it dead? No, I'm kidding. What color was it? I have no idea. I just saw it. What do you mean? C equals you know color. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it was just like, it was there, and it was gone. And the wonder just hit you before the actual visual input could enter your brain? Yeah, it was so important that I wrote it down in my Strava notes, and I was like, today.

Your what notes? Strava. Is it like a little notes thing? No, no, no. So it tracks running or swimming or any outdoor activity. It's like an app. And so you track things. Then you become obsessed with it.

You're like, how many miles have I done this week? Is it more than last week? It tracks butterflies? No, but there's a notes section within Strava. And so you can write down anything. I'm really dumb, Andrew. I have to ask her questions about like the outdoor stuff all the time. And so normally I'd be like, today my leg felt weird or whatever it is.

Just so I can keep track of things. But today I was like, I saw a butter. fly and my legs felt great. Yeah. Wait, what are we talking about today? We're talking about underrated national monuments. That's epic. Yeah, so Andrew, what's yours? Well, mine would be Craters of the Moon, which is out in Idaho. And the thing about Craters of the Moon is it's in the middle of nowhere in Idaho, and you're driving down the highway and you see a sign for this thing. And you don't think it could be anything cool because you're driving down the highway and there's just grass and rolling hills and there's literally nothing. But if you take the detour and you go out to craters in the moon, you find out

there's actually an old volcano out there that erupted. So out smack in the middle of nowhere, there's this just huge field of dried lava about as far as you can see. What? Wait, what does that look like? Basically just broken up jumbled black rock. I think it's like basalt. That's so cool. It is actually in the middle of nowhere. Like I've driven past, well, I've driven past it and I tried to convince my parents to stop, but they were like, no, we have to keep going home. But it's, It's in the middle of the state, right? Oh, yeah. There's nothing there.

I think there's a national lab nearby, which tells you how in the middle of nowhere it is, because the government doesn't want you near their stuff. Yeah. Is there a lava tube there, or am I just making that? No, there's a lava tube. You can hike out about a mile into the lava flow, and then just in the lava, there's about a 700-foot mile-long lava tube.

What? And it's huge. Like, you go inside of this thing, and it's maybe 30 or 40 feet high, and there's places where the roof collapsed, and apparently, if I'm remembering correctly, there used to be Native Americans that lived in there. And you can see the smoke stains on the roof.

What? Honestly, that's where I would live. Inside the tube? Yeah. Wait, that's wild. My brain is being blown right now. It's this gigantic room. And occasionally there's like a hole in the ceiling where it collapsed,

but mostly it's covered up. It's just this natural dome. Is it just called that because lava used to flow through it? Exactly, yeah. And then all the lava flowed out of it and then everything hardened and left this tube behind.

And then people lived there? Yeah. That's some Star Wars stuff right there. That's crazy. I wonder if they ever got flooded. By lava. No, not my lava. By rain and then they all drowned.

I feel like that would happen. No, it would leak into all the little holes in volcanic rock. Also, doesn't volcanic rock float in water so their home would just pick them up and go away? Maybe fine. The pumice. Pumice does float, but if it's a lava tube. Is a lava tube made with pumice? No.

No, it's just normal lava rock. Yeah. That's super cool, though. Have you seen lava rock storm? Like the dark black ones? Yeah. I think so, yeah. Have you been to Hawaii?

I have actually. Okay. Yes, that is actually where, yes. So that's where I've seen it as well. And then a couple volcanoes up in Northern California and in Oregon. So I've seen some. So is you going to hike over there or just kind of hook around? Yeah, we did.

So we kind of spent a couple hours, which we weren't planning on doing, which meant we got back home around 2 a.m. But it was worth it because we went. and saw there was a cinder comb, she's basically like a mini volcano that erupted. A cinder comb? It looks like this mountain that's covered in black sand, sort of. Like, just tiny bits of volcanic rock. I need to get out here.

Like, there's nothing growing on it. It's just all dead. And then there were a couple little, like, lava, what do they call them? Chimneys. That's what it was. Oh, yeah. Lava used to bubble up and it drained out. So it's like a vertical pipe.

What? There's one that had snow in it, and this was like in August. Apparently there's snow in this thing year round. It does, yeah. It does, yeah. It's like 20 feet down. The sun can't. shine in there and it just doesn't melt ever. Wow, that's wild. I like need to go there as soon as

possible. This is blowing my life. Well, that's why it's underrated and most people miss it. Yeah. So, but it is a, it is a national park? I pretty, it's a monument. It's a national monument. What's the different? Um, I don't know. I. Is park like a large territory? So, well, not, not necessarily. Um, you could be right though about like a monument being more specific, but I think sometimes monuments are more for like historical reasons as well. The one that I'm going to talk about, I'll get into it, does have some historical significance. However, I'll just say I'm going to talk about White Sands National Monument and at the time I went to it, it was a national monument. However, it became a national park more recently.

Probably because they bought more land around it and made it a park. I assume that's, I just assumed. I'm not sure. I don't think it grew in size. So is Mount Rushmore a national monument? Because I've been told it's also a national treasure. Is there a difference between those two things? I've also been told I am a national treasure.

Well, I think it's a matter of whether or not... Who told you that? My mom. Okay, that's makes sense. I think the difference is whether or not Nicholas Cage is like climbing around behind the mountain. Oh my gosh. I love those movies. Guys, you want to watch National Treasure after those?

Yeah. And watch all of them back to back. Okay, I actually have a trivia question. Do you guys know the three types of volcanoes? Conical? No. I thought it was like shapes. There's like this one, this one, and like that one.

Yeah, you're right. But think of Cinder Cone is one of them. I like that I just said this one, this one, and that one the listeners could not. Storm was making gestures with his hands. I was making hand gestures, yes. But Cinder Cone is one of them, which made me think of the other two. And so I was wondering if you guys know them.

Cinder Cone Conical. Look, I got it right, guys. Close enough. Okay, there's two others. Do you know? No. Another one starts with a C. chemical blowup

no no that one's composite composite composite and that was my third guess but I thought that wasn't the second one you were talking about oh yeah and then the third kind is like something you use in war to protect yourself yourself gun volcano shield volcano yes I forgot about that that's like the big gradual one isn't it I think so yeah it has broad gently sloping sides formed by fluid lava flows My mom also said that I have broad, gently sloping sides. Storm, what is up with you today? I'm just in a goofy mood.

Okay. Wait, so you went on a hike and explored the area. Is there anything else? I just want to hear you keep yapping about cool stuff that you found. Yeah. So, I mean, the cool part is that they actually let you climb down in this lava tube and just, like, walk through the whole thing. So there's stairs on one end, there's stairs on the other end. And there's just, like, a trail all the way through.

But there was a, like, there's a little side tunnel that went off. just into the darkness. And I really wanted to go in there and explore that. So I did. And it was all choked up with boulders and it was kind of dripping a little bit. But I just went in there

until I couldn't see the sun anymore. So it was pitch black. And then I turned my phone off. And that got scary. So I turned my phone back on. Yeah. But yeah. I think there were bats in there too.

That's cool. Like hanging from the ceiling. Hot take, I kind of like bats. I mean... Like I hate rats. The bats are cool. I mean, I don't mind them if I'm in an open space.

But if I were in an enclosed area with them, I don't think... What are you going to do? land on you? That's fine. That's not fine with me. Once I learned that bats don't really bite. They don't, but they can.

But once I learned that they don't, and they, like, usually they will choose not to nine times out of ten, I was like, I would be totally fine being surrounded by a swarm of bats. I'd feel like Batman in that one movie. I don't think he was happy about that. Well, he had childhood trauma.

I feel like I've gotten through the point of my life from impressionable. And I'll just be like, ah, I'm in a volcano. And that'd be cool. With bats. With bats. That's awesome.

That's a superhero or super villain. I guess so. I mean, imagine the bat cave, but it's like in a volcano. So instead of all the water, it's lava. That's awesome.

That'd be cool. Yeah. Anyway. Andrew, anything else you have to say about the monument? Why people should go besides to see cool lava things?

Well, no, not really. Because that's about it. That's about it. Okay. Could you climb down any of the vertical tubes

or were those kind of just for a look at, you could look at them. I mean, you could look at them technically you're not supposed to. Like they had them railed off so like they couldn't fall in there. I mean, if you want it at night with the rope, you could do it.

Technically you're not supposed to ever stop to you. I mean, it really hasn't, but I also haven't done anything with the federal government yet. So, you know, besides, some of those park hosts at the campground can be pretty nasty. You know, like the grandparents in the trailer home, like, they can be mean. They pack a wall up. You shuddy. Yeah. You're listening to Off the Trails on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.

Let's get back to some underrated national. Monuments. Yippie. Nicole, do you have a store? Oh, wait, are you done? Yeah, I'm finished. Okay. So, like I said, mine is

White Sands National Monument. Now it is a park. It's in New Mexico, outside of Alamagordo, I'm pretty sure. Alamagordo. I'm 90% sure. I could be forgetting, though. Isn't there like a missile testing range

somewhere right there? Yes, there is. So, White Sands, as the name implies, is this big, empty space of white sand. dunes. Now, it's not just like really yellow sand, I guess. It is white because it is made from gypsum. Gypsum? Yeah, the surrounding mountains are made of gypsum rock. And so when it rained a long time ago, all of that rock would get worn down and eventually got grounded to this fine white

sand. I think it's just called gypsum sand. That's cool. But anyway, stuff that drywalls made know it could be i have no idea i don't know i was going to say fun fact fun fact i'm not sure uh but anyway so there's this big empty area and it's just covered in white sand and the united states government did missile testing there a long time ago uh because it's completely empty like no one goes there and they have a space museum actually uh really close to it and i they have a big rocket there. I don't remember what rocket. But anyway, the park, there really isn't a whole lot to do, except for go hiking on the sand and go walking on the sand. And so my family and I, we went and we slept out on the sand dunes, and I've never done that before. And it was,

it was fantastic because it was truly one of those parks where you just didn't see anyone. And personally, that's what I really like when I'm outside. I don't like to run into a lot of people or to just hear other people around me. And so we hiked probably like three miles out into the dunes. And the sand is cool to the touch. Like it was a hot day, probably 80, 85 degrees. But because the sand is white, it just reflects all of the sunlight. And so it's really cool to the touch.

And it's just fascinating how all the animals have adapted to the white sand to camouflage. Oh, there's like white animals? There's white lizards. And so I saw one and somehow I caught it. Like I'm really bad at catching animals. You can ask my dad. But I caught it and it was a pretty good size lizard. And it was just fun to like climb up the dunes.

I was eight years old. So I was just having a blast like rolling around. And if you're into photography, it's a great place to do sunset photography with the white stands. It looks like snow. And so it's, but it's not freezing cold, obviously. and the stars are so beautiful there. It's just so dark at night.

No one around. I guess you have some distant light pollution from Elamogordo, but it's far enough away where it's not like a super big deal. But it's definitely a park that after we went to, like, I feel as if my family told everyone about it because we're like, no one knows about it. It's just fantastic and the history is really interesting. Oh, okay, I listened to this park.

podcast actually about this park one time. And apparently there were these horses that were released into the park at one point. And they lived there. And missile testing was still going on. And so like extreme nuclear radiation was all throughout the park. And these horses didn't die. They mutated. I don't know how they just kept living.

Gould horses. Yeah. So if you want to do more research on that, I'm sure you could Google it or what. whatever. But it's really just such a fun special place. Very hidden. I don't know how it is now. I mean, that was a long time ago whenever I was eight, 11 years ago. But cool place would definitely recommend. That's cool. Now did you guys go sledding on the sand dunes when you were there? Because I know that's the thing that people do sometimes. That is the thing. I did not. But one of my very good friends, she went, because I told her about it and her family went sledding on the dunes. So, no, no sledding.

down myself. And then I also like somersaulted down and then my mom got mad at me because I got so much sand in my hair. That's kind of awesome though. Yeah. Oh and then another thing is not only are the lizards white, but the spiders are white. Because we woke up in the morning and we were packing up the tent. No, no, no, no, no. I'm telling you guys like this big of a spider. No, that's very big. Yeah, it was, it was a big spider just crawling out of the tent. And I think I probably screamed. And my dad was like, it's not going to hurt you and you just brushed it out. But it was completely white, like translucent-esque. Another thing.

That feels so much worse than a normal spider. I know. White translucent, Invisa spider. Yeah. Another thing is when we were walking back, there is like a path that you follow with trail markers kind of. Trail markers. But anyway, we came across another campsite and you could see that someone had built a fire

because when the sand burns, it crystallizes together and hardens. And this is not allowed. Like, it's very illegal. So I bet those people probably got in trouble. But so don't start a fire on the dunes. Wait, but it like collects, like together? It collects together and it forms like this crystal chunks.

I believe it was like blackish. But it wasn't all black and it was weird. That's fire. Yeah. It was fire. But that's awesome. Yeah, that sounds cool. I must melt more easily than regular sand does then because it's gypsum.

Yeah. Imagining going out like the middle of like way off the trail and making, oh, off the trail, sorry, and making like a campfire somewhere and like camping out in there and then making a whole like crystal. And then like taking a home. What would you do with those crystals?

Well, what do they look like? You have they're blackish crystals? I believe they were kind of blackish. That's cool from white sand to black crystal. Not, okay, they're not like extremely hard crystals.

They crumble kind of. of. Br. It's not like a solid rock. Ding, ding. Yeah. It would, no,

it would, it flakes apart. Like, you know how if you, like, put peanut butter in a hot enough oven, it becomes a diamond?

I've never tried that. Did you not even know about that? No. There's, this is real, actually. There's a, there's a,

there's a couple things that can turn into diamonds if they're hot enough, and peanut butter is one of them. Okay, how hot are we talking? Because I have an idea. Unfathomably hot.

Like, like, more than industrial, most industrial oven. More than the oven in my dorm then? Yeah. Oh, shoot. Okay, well.

Yeah. But that's real. I learned that on, I think, like, national geographic kids, the little, like, they had those, like, little, what are those called? The little books,

little magazines? Yeah, the little square books where it was like the facts, the facts. Yeah. What is that called? The little fun facts. I know what you're talking about.

I don't know a more specific name. A hundred things you didn't know. It's something like that. But I used to read through those. We had the same little two books. We'd look through over and over again. One of them was like, peanut butter can become diamonds.

I was like, yo! So then I ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and I was like diamond in me. I don't think that's how it works. Well, I used to think before people told me otherwise

that my stomach was a raging inferno rather than like an acid pit and that was how the food was decompressed and destroyed. So I was like, I am the human torch. When I was like, that was when I was like five.

Wow. So Storm, I do know this, but I don't know if other people know this, but you've never been to a national park ever. Okay, I feel like I have. I feel like we've addressed this.

But I'm trying to remember because... I don't think you have. If you can't remember, I feel like you haven't. I think there's been the only forgettable ones. You know where I have been? Wait, I don't know if this counts. I don't know if it's a national park. I have been to the Oki-Fanokey swamp.

Oh, that in Florida. It's in northern Florida and southern Georgia. Most of it's actually in Georgia, my home state. And we went down there. This was like five or six, probably six. six, seven years ago, something, to the Okee-Fanokey swamp. Hilarious name, by the way. That is really funny.

And I'm pretty sure there's a part of it that's, it might be a state park, but it maybe is my closest, my closest time to going to a park. It's cool, though. Did you know that Michigan actually has a national park? No, because it doesn't. Yeah, it does. What is it? National Lake Park.

Um, it's, what is it called? I'm looking it up right now. Oh, okay, okay. Um, so I tell a little story about when I was in the Oky-Finoki. Sure, go for it. I was in the Oky-Fanokey swamp. I'm going to say that word as many times I can. And we decided to go like kayaking, not kayaking, canoeing in the swamp. Um, and we got followed by an alligator, a big old gator. That's my worst fear. I was actually far with it. See, like, it's weird. Like spider, white, albino, the invisible spiders, no, but bats, alligators, that's cool. I'm fine with that. But it was like that murky water

where there's all this green algae, big lily pads, you know, classic what you think of when you think of a swamp. Those weird little like tree roots that like just like points that come up out of the water, lots of those. And the big trees that just grow straight out of the water.

And there were many much gaiters. And one large one was like following us for a little bit. And then we were like, ooh. Andrew, how do you feel about gators? I mean, I'm a storm. I like him a little better than spiders. just because you can see them. I feel like I have a chance.

They can swim and run fast. They can run up to 30 miles an hour. If we're going by mass. With those short little legs, there's no way. Yes, they can. Let's say, spiders can. No. We're talking about gators.

I feel like my odds of taking a gator-sized spider is worse than a spider-sized gator. There's a slight skew in this object. Or enough. Or enough... How much does a gator weigh? Like, 250 pounds?

A small gator. That might be a really big one. A small swamp gators, you know, like, we're talking like 400 pounds. But, um... See, I think I have better odds of, like, seeing and avoiding a gator... If it's that much weight?

Then I have, like, avoiding a spider. Okay. So, an alligator can weigh as much as half a ton or a thousand pounds. As much as. That's a big. But an average male weighs between 500 and 600 pounds. God damn! Okay, I think that I won't take that actually.

Yeah. But I don't know. I feel like I'm still, my heart goes a little bit piddra padder when many much spiders. Like if I'm in an Indiana Jones room and there's hundreds of spiders, like, that's my option. Get dumped into a pit of spiders where I'm like wading in spiders or get dumped into a like you fall off the cliff into the pool of alligators that are going to. I feel like I have a better chance with alligators. All right. Well, you try that out someday.

I will. If you were curious, I did look up National Parks in Michigan, and there's Isle Royale National Park and pictured rocks national lakes. Those don't exist. Sure. They don't exist. Thank you so much for listening to Off the Trails on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. We hope you have a great week and make time to go outside and enjoy the great outdoors. Thank you for joining us this week, Andrew, and we'll see you out there.

Happy trails. Jump! Bye guys.