Volcanic Collection

Perhaps a slightly more dangerous but exciting hobby than stamp collecting, here I recount all of the volcanoes I’ve visited as a fiery collection of my own.


Mount St. Helens: The first volcano I visited when I was 10, my main memories of the trip to Mount St. Helens were of just how large the volcano felt to me as I stared at it from an observatory miles away, and how many chipmunks were running around outside the observation deck. I had read about volcanoes for years before seeing one up close, and thought I understood their power and gravity. Seeing one in person though, showed me how incredible these systems are and I felt both awe and slight fear staring at the volcano capable of destruction, death, rebirth, and renewal.

Mount Vesuvius: I got a chance to visit Pompeii during a trip to Italy, and was even more fortunate because our chaperone had worked in Pompeii before during excavations. This basically meant that the “do not enter” tape meant nothing to us and we got to walk around the entirety of Pompeii. After walking deep into the city, our chaperone stopped us all and pointed up to a looming volcano in the distance. An eerie calm hung in the air, and while I’m not deeply superstitious, gazing at Mount Vesuvius from Pompeii felt off, like I was seeing something from a different time and that modern man wasn’t supposed to be on this ground. Vesuvius stood quietly, an ominous reminder of just how powerful and destructive volcanoes can be.

Kilauea: Visiting the big island of Hawaii was an amazing experience, and was the first time that I felt the entire land around me was connected to a volcano, rather than a volcano taking up an isolated area on a larger continent. The integration of volcanic tradition and experience into Hawaiian culture was significant and showed me how some areas are shaped by the geology around them. I was lucky (or in some perspectives unlucky) to be in Hawaii a year before Kilauea erupted, so I was able to drive down Crater Road and view the lava fields and old flows. Standing on those fields with the ocean close by and wide open skies, it felt like the borders between them diminished and everything flowed into one another.

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