It’s not just Michael and I that love all things volcano – Tessa is well and truly in on the act.
Here is a painting of a volcano she did for school recently:
Here is a monster sand volcano she has been working on. She is very persistent – it partially got washed away and she rebuilt it 🙂
I’ve never seen a real volcano (though I have seen remnants of extinct volcanoes – crater lakes, calderas, plugs and that sort of thing). Have any of you seen an active volcano – perhaps in Hawaii, Japan, Italy or New Zealand?
Make me jealous and tell us me all about your experiences with volcanoes 😉
Gabe Feathers McGee 
Looks a bit like Tessa is on the moon (in the last photo) – haha
Thaty is a huge volcano for one not yet really big girl!
Yes, there is a ferry that wanders among Indonesian Islands, completing the circuit in one week. Between Kupang in West Timor and Ende in Flores there is a volcano sticking straight out of the ocean, smoking away but apparently has done little else for years. On Flores there are about nine active volcanoes out of fourteen, but I saw only the Kalimutu volcanic lakes that are adjacent and are green, blue and a dark red. The blue one starts off yellow each day and changes to blue as the day procgresses.
At the time of the trip, 1995, the ferry offered air conditioned cabins, good food and a band for $20 per day. One could stay aboard and do a very cheap cruise to see South East Indonesia for very little! Probably not much has changed.
It is a big volcano for a little 8 year old – haha. Thanks for sharing your volcano stories Stafford – sounds like a fabulous trip, and low cost to boot. Those crater lakes sound amazing – I wonder why it changes colour during the day. I visited a crater lake in Far North Queensland on the Atherton Tableland and it was the most amazing dark blue colour – a bit eerie.
Yes…in Central America (.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arenal_Volcano)..actually they have a pool heated by the volcano at its base…when I was there lava could be seen flowing near the top…made me a bit uncomfortable.
Wow, that looks amazing slpmartin – I think I would be a bit uncomfortable as well watching the lava flowing – haha – thanks for the link (don’t you just love the internet – a click and you get some information about a place you have never been) 🙂
Tessa did amazing work, in the painting and in the sand sclupture!
The painting is very good, well observed and a lot of energy and movement. I like that the volcano is black. Bravo a l’artiste!
Thanks Benedicte – she has read everyone’s comments and is a happy girl – she does love art (constantly creating things) 🙂
yes i see she has the artists passion! plus that sand volcano! marvelous, its a giant sculpture, amazing.
It is like a giant sculpture – we are going to work on a lunar scape soon (down the beach) 🙂 thanks tipota
Like your work, Tessa! 🙂 You could build a decent bonfire in that volcanic sculpture. Looks like Shirl’s outvoted and might as well join in on the planning for the Bryden Volcano Expedition – I’ve never seen an active volcano so am looking forward to your photos 🙂
I’d love to build a bonfire in that sandpit – but the firies around here are very strict about fires, even on the beach, unfortunately (though tourists sometimes light fires on the beach but they often get in trouble for it, if the ranger gets on to it). Might have to wait a few years for the volcano expedition, when the finances are a bit better – but one can dream (and plan – haha)
How much for that beautiful piece of work? lol, that’s impressive for such a young child, it really is. Good job Tessa 🙂
Thanks Mary – she wants to sell it to you (little entrepeneur she is) – hahahaha – but I told her we are keeping it forever 🙂
Tessa’s painting looks exactly like my hair used to look when it was red, before I decided to tone it down to blonde.
Haha!
beautiful painting Gabe, or should i say Tessa
Thanks Dhyan – yes, it is all Tessa 🙂
Tessa is a fantastic artist. I would be so happy to have any of her art on my wall. What a spectacular volano she has created. It is so cool. You guys need to get over to NZ. There are some great volcanoes there. And it’s only a 2 hour flight!
Thanks Selma – I will pass on your comments to the girl 😉 I think NZ might be the go – and Shirl loves NZ (I’ve never been there).
smoldering. aloha Gabrielle (and Tessa) – yeah, the painting says it. the scale of the sand creation is moving toward it. yeah, volcanoes are awing. even when they are not in full bloom blossom explosion mode… they still give me the sense of wow. and yeah… hike around the edge of one… well… may be not in one day… and yeah… the smells… erm… let’s not go there. and the fumes. and smoke… and… the oozing flow and rapid molten stone rivers… yeah, hawaii has a few. and the trail for crunching crisp stone left cooling. the ropes of hard rock… yeah, amazing. aloha.
Yeah, I was thinking you would have a lot of experience with volcanoes Rick, living in Hawaii – I love the ropey magma the best – pahoehoe they call it (what a great name too) – the slow moving magma that destroys everything in it’s path but people have heaps of time to get out of the way – but way down the track you have very fertile lands from the volcanic soil (we have rich red soils around here – away from the beach – and it is volcanic soils – extinct volcanoes that a long eroded away – the land in Australia is very old and there is not much volcanic activity). I’d love to go to Hawaii one day 🙂
yeah, volcanic activity is amazing. would you believe… that people have gotten seriously injured watching that slow moving magma – pahoehoe – that can be almost black crusted but glowing red-orange between the cracks because they’ve reached down to touch it. IT’S MELTED STONE. IT’S GOING TO BE HOT. Dont Touch It. at least not until it’s cool – which is a long time after it stops flowing.
and the really spectacular moments – well there are a lot of them. at night the rivers of stone flowing red-orange to the sea (i have not seen this live). i have seen from a distance the spectacular plums of what look like white smoke… but are actually water steam – where the flowing red hot stone slurges into the sea. wow. i wasnt close enough to hear or actually see what was going on where lava met sea – but i was close enough to see the plumes of steam rising up like clouds in the sky.
also around the rim of a reasonably quiet volcano… looking down into the stone floor of the crater – which is miles across – and picking out the vents by the steam and fumes and such that could be seen rising out of the cracks of the floor.
i have been close enough to vents (not on the crater floor – but out on what would be the sides of the volcano – which in some cases are not all that steep) to feel the heat coming out – not too close – you dont need to be too close to feel it – and smell it and – yeah, amazing. altho you dont want to be too close to the smell either… that stuff can be potent even if it isnt heated. the heat just makes it… burn if you inhale when you’re too close.
yeah, spectacular. awing. amazing. i’ve occasionally wondered if with long tongs and long handled tools and scoops, you could scoop up the cooling stone and pour/flow it into shapes or drape it in shapes to let it cool. i think it may be rather sticky tho…
there are places where indigenous people have ridden their horses over the freshly flowed lava fields as much as days after the flow (if i’m remembering right) and you can see the imprints of the horse hooves in the stone where the stone was still soft enough to take the impression – much like firm mud or sand on a beach – only… it was hot stone – still. i think this may have been in the 1800’s (the place where i was). it was probably(?) too hot to walk on in boots (i’m guessing too hot barefoot too) – i dont know how it would have been for the horses for long… but you can see the trail where the horses went to cross the fields of once flowing stone… if i remember right that was in Oregon (state – usa).
oh. i was in Seattle when Mt. St. Helens went kablewie and took the top off the mountain too. that was amazing. i grew up in eastern Washington state – i collected ash from St. Helens on my moms driveway – about 300 miles from Seattle. but it blew even further into Montanna.
yeah… i get earthquakes here in Hawaii as well… once i was sleeping and woke up to one… i thought the bed was floating down a rough river for what felt like a minute or two and was probably no more than 20 seconds – it felt like houses were just trees blowing in the wind. okay. enough? yeah. bwhahahahaha
oh. ha. may be not enough. …i collected several pounds of St. Helens ash when i drove over to see my mom. …from different places along the roads and highways. later i used some of that ash experimenting as glazes for stone ware and firing it in a kiln by mixing it half and half with fireplace ashes from wooden fires. it was a murky greenish yellowish brownish color straight like that. by adding a little of this and that, i found i could make it approach a honey color and become slightly translucent. yeah, cool stuff from a volcano. i still have a few of those experiments on platters and may be cups and things. (volcanic ash is an ingredient found in a number of ceramic glaze recipes – it’s just finding the right temperatures and mixes to make it work with an unused or unknown ash – which is what that ash from St Helens was). yeah, fun. aloha.
That is so cool Rick – volcanic art – I am very impressed – and thanks for telling us all your experiences – I can’t believe people would walk on the pahoehoe – haha – doh! That is amazing that the horses went over it – maybe they were escaping and didn’t have much choice – it’s funny, but I have never thought of lava as liquid stone (stone always has a cold connotation to me – might have to write a ku about that – the contrast of cold and hot) – haha
Wow, what a talented kid! Those are the two most fabulous volcano artworks that I’ve ever seen! Wish I could make you jealous, but I’ve never been anywhere near a volcano myself. However, I did recently experience an earthquake … and then we got tons of rain and scary wind from Hurricane Irene. Of those two the earthquake was definitely the “it” natural event. So, how do earthquakes rate? A tinge of jealousy? Perhaps just a little bitty tad of jealousy, a breath, a whisper…?
Definitely a tinge of jealousy with the earthquake thingy Aletha 😉 I am glad you survived hurricane Irene (you are getting some of what we got earlier in the year) – I thought your power might have gone out (maybe it has 😉 I have been thinking of you. In fact the path of the hurricane is also following a blogging path – haha – you in Washington, Rachel Blackbirdsong in New York, tipota in Cape Cod, the querulous squirrel in Boston, almost reaching up to Benedicte in Canada (not quite – haha) – have I missed anyone (there’s Thomma Lyn too in Tenessee – but that is too far inland I think – gees my geography is bad – haha).
Unfortunately my poexplosions are the only things that come close…
Haha – whatever is in the mix is good Maxine 🙂
I see talent abounds in the Bryden family!
thanks adeeyoyo 😉 any visual talent comes from hubby’s side of the family
Hi Gabrielle, Wonderful picture by your daughter and photos by your son and the closest I every came was when Mount St. Helens here in Washington State erupted and we were traveling with children on the freeway. It was blue skies one minute and a sky so black and dark the next we could not see to drive. We did make it through, though, and had a story to tell everyone on the other side and all these years later. Too close for comfort, that one.
Wow, how scary would that be (I would make a terrible volcanologist – haha ‘ ‘you mean I have to go near the volcano?’ What!). Thanks for sharing your volcano story Renee 🙂