It's made up of five different volcanoes, the most of any Hawaiian island, and is getting larger every day due to the current and continuing eruption of Kilauea. The Big Island is overlain with scores of ancient lava flows and trimmed with dozens of beaches in a rainbow of colors from white, to amber, to grey, to black, to olive green.
Diversity best describes the island's geology and climate.
In fact 11 of the world's 13 climatic zones are to be found here, from tropical rain forests and sparkling waterfalls, to snowcapped mountains and desolate moonscapes, to sprawling ranchland and rolling meadows. Indeed it is this vastness and diversity that gives the Big Island its charm. The Big Island is also rich in history. Here is where the first missionaries landed and where the very first Christian Church in Hawaii was constructed. Here is where Captain James Cook met his untimely death.