time for a volcano

I suddenly had an urge to go and see a volcano. Maybe it's a symptom of my rather boring (right now anyway) life on the flats of western Finland. The only mountain around here is a tiny little hill that takes 1.5 minutes to ski down. It's definitely not a volcano. From up there, though, you can see an enormous treeless flat: the crater made by a meteorite that struck sometime in the dawn of time. The reason you can only see it from the hill is the fact that the surrounding area is just as flat (only with more trees), so the crater does not stand out in any way.

Nine years ago on the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii: I remember stumbling across endless fields of old lava after dark to look at a stream of new lava pouring down the hill into the Pacific Ocean, creating an enourmous cloud of glowing steam. Maybe not the most dramatic of volcanic eruptions but Kilauea is (or was) the faithful one - at this time, the eruption had been going on for the last thirteen years (I think it has stopped by now) in a nice, controlled fashion which allowed the tourists really close. I was in awe. To me, it didn't seem particularly nice and controlled. This was nature, wild forces beyond anything I had ever imagined.

We spent a night on a campground on the mountain, not far from the craters. Our sleeping bags on the grass, directly beneath the open sky. And the sky was open - it rained most of the night. Despite this being the summer in Hawaii, we did not realise the nights actually get cold up on a mountain, volcano or no volcano.

But when the rain finally stopped I lay there - too cold to sleep - and saw all the stars in the sky blink into view. It may have been my imagination, but I thought I could hear the volcano rumble in a dark muttering beneath me.