We had a wonderful, and somewhat thrilling, time at Halema'uma'u House. We arrived just as the latest eruptions of Kīlauea began and on the day of the biggest earthquakes. There were a few small aftershocks during our stay, but while this was exciting, none of them were very serious. Now it seems to have subsided.
The Volcanoes National Park was closed for the first two days because of all this. But we found other things to do during that time, such as swimming with sea turtles on the Punalu'u black sands beach and a nature walk on the south coast, and eating lots of local meals. The national park has now partially reopened. We went to view the magical glow of the lava in the Halema'uma'u Crater by night and also walked among the steam vents and sulfur banks in the caldera. Some parts of the park may remain closed as the rangers assess the stability but things are clearly normalizing again now.
We can't recommend this house highly enough. It has a very interesting layout with a cleverly designed open plan kitchen and lounge space. The interior and the decorations are beautiful with a personal touch. Ben was also very quick to respond to any of our questions.
Also to reassure other visitors: We heard from a lot of people cancelling trips to Big Island because of the volcanic activity but this is really unnecessary. Volcano Village is entirely safe. All the lava activity is actually quite far off to the south-east down the mountains by the sea. This must be a hard time for people in Leilani Estate and Pāhoa but the international news coverage can be quite misleading - most of Big Island really carried on pretty much as normal during this time.