Wrangell Mountains

Alaska is a wonderland. The harsh winters make the land difficult to live in, and in consequence much of the wilderness seems hardly touched by human hand. No need for rewilding here – it is wild enough to begin with! Amidst the wilderness are the most majestic mountains of North America, and some of its…

Inconsistency and Cerro Negro

Guest post by Tallis The more I think about Chiles-Cerro Negro the more I get worried about it and the less simple the answer seems. I can’t seem to make sense of this system and its recent unrest. I have already written a piece on this system but I wasn’t entirely satisfied with it. I…

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon

There is something about it. Gardening is a very human passion. Wherever there is nature, there is the urge to improve on it, removing the thorns, thistles and weeds, and replacing them with colour and fruit, adding beauty and harmony, a taming of the wild world, an artifice of flowers and pleasing shapes, where every…

Henrik Lovén 1958-2019

It is with great sadness that we have learned that Henrik Lovén has passed away. Volcanocafe is run by volunteers, often people who have never met, may not know each other by face and communicate by chats. Such is the on-line world, where people are brought together by a shared interest. One of those volunteers…

Mineralisation Processes

Léon Prunelle November 14, 2014 If you haven’t yet quite decided what to ask for for Christmas, perhaps this post will give you some inspiration. It is a gem – editor The Earth is constantly being reshaped by the processes of creation, erosion and sedimentation. If looked at world-wide, there are two different types of “land”,…

White Island

The Bay of Plenty is an evocative name. The Bay is sandwiched between the two northerly peninsulas of The North Island. The name includes the adjacent land region, so this is a Bay you can live in. The geyser of Rotorua is world-renowned. So are the adjacent Taupo volcanoes, although not quite as widely publicised.…

Climate in action

16,000 years ago, Iceland was in the grip of ice. The sea was 100 meters lower than it is now, and the land extended far beyond the current coast. But too little benefit. The island was covered in an icecap which extended well beyond the current coast. At its peak (21.5 thousands years ago) the…

Ross at Ambrym

Re-posted, from January 24, 2014 Our dear Mike Ross is currently (that was written 5 years ago – editor) at the volcano on Ambrym Island in Vanuatu photographing a documentary. Apparently Ambrym means “Here are yams” in the local tongue. The volcano is a large shield volcano constructed by alternating layers of pyroclastic deposits and…

Vesuvius in paintings

A re-post (edited) from Dec 6, 2014, by Schteve Vesuvio in Southern Italy (and alarmingly close to the huge conurbation of Naples) has been dormant since 1944. It was not always so quiet; as well as numerous and sometimes hugely devastating eruptions documented since 79 AD, the last 285 years have seen significant eruptions in:…

A potential issue

Guest post from Tallis Lately, I have been researching 2 volcanoes and have found something disturbing to myself for a variety of reasons. I’m sure you have heard of these volcanoes but maybe, since there is a lack of attention on these volcanoes, that you have missed out on some valuable information. I am not…