The flow began creeping over the road yesterday afternoon just west of the former traffic turnaround. Wind directed the smoke safely away from lava watchers, park officials said.

The latest development in the long-running Pu'u 'O'o-Kupaianaha eruption of Kilauea is making for easy viewing for visitors, who have only a half-mile walk or so to the end of the road to see the surface flow.

Park officials said visitor traffic has picked up in the past couple of weeks because of spring break, but it is nowhere near the 4,000 visitors a day the park was averaging last summer after a new vent opened in May, sending fluorescent-orange flows down the hillside and into the ocean.

The eruption is in its 19th year.

In February, the lower section of Chain of Craters Road was temporarily closed when lava crossed the road and forced park workers to move huts, toilets, signs and other equipment and establish a new center for visitors.