Volcano Explosion!

No, I wasn’t trapped in a volcano explosion. I sure as heck wouldn’t be here, writing this, if I’d been toasted to a crisp by molten lava hurtling 30 miles into the air. At least, that’s what my research assistant says happens when you’re in the very wrong place at the absolutely, positively wrong time.

But I did get a chance to visit HandiLakula Volcano the other day. And it was wild. You may think a volcano is some exotic thing that erupts once in a billion years. But you know what? A lot of islands have come to be because volcanoes have built them up over time. When you have an underwater volcano under the ocean and it constantly oozes magma and lava, that hot, liquid rock hits the water and cools down.

Then it forms… you guessed it: solid rock. Enough solid rock that sometimes an island or a mountain emerges. Rises right out of the sea. It takes a really long time, of course, but that’s how HandiLand came about, back in the day. That’s why the farmers in the Country do so well — we’ve got rich, volcanic soil that helps lots of different things grow.

Anyways. Since the volcano is a pretty big tourist attraction, I was sent there for this assignment. And everything was going really well for a while. I rode a bus to the top of the volcano, snapped some pictures of HandiLand from above, peered down into the crater and was a little disappointed that there wasn’t any bubbling, scalding lava, posed for pictures with a couple readers… the usual.

I was about to turn around, head home and file a pretty boring old travel story, I had an idea. There were steps going down into the crater. I was sure of it. What kind of travel journalist would I be if I didn’t investigate and spill the beans to you guys?

So I quietly broke away from my tour group and pretended to drop a lens cap down the steps leading into the crater. A park ranger stopped me. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” he asked.

“I dropped my lens cap. I’ll be right up, I just need to get it.”

I jumped the barricade and scrambled down the steps before he could stop me. Now, not the smartest thing to be doing — just skipping down into the crater of a volcano — I know. Just because HandiLakula had been dormant for over 500 years didn’t guarantee that it’d STAY that way.

But I took my chances and walked down the rocky steps. The more I walked, the steeper the descent got. And the warmer. For every step I took, I tried not to imagine the hundreds of billions of gallons of hot magma beneath my feet.

Finally, the path ahead of me began to straighten out. It seemed to go behind some kind of boulder. Well, I’d risked everything to get down there, so of course I had to duck behind the rock and see where the path led. Just in case I found anything, I took the not-really-missing lens cap off my camera and shoved it in my pocket.

When I got around the boulder, the path got much thinner. I took another step and saw a glimpse of fire. My heart started thundering in my chest. This was it… the lava was coming!

But no. I looked again. That was definitely lava, but it wasn’t rushing toward me at volcanic speeds. In fact, it was flowing down a nice gully. And there was a window separating me from it. Not that a puny glass and wood window made me feel any better, but I’d found something I totally didn’t expect.

That was a sign that someone was down there. Now I couldn’t control my curiosity. I snuck up to the window, camera in hand. And that’s when I saw him: Dr. Hissorkian! I thought he was a legend, but no. There he was in his very own evil science lab inside the volcano. I took a really quick picture but the sound of my shutter going off must have triggered an alarm.

Before I knew it, sirens were blaring all around me. I dashed up the steps, skittering and slipping on rocks the entire way, kicking dirt behind me. Nobody came after me, but I’m still nervous. When I got up to the surface of the crater, the park ranger gave me a disapproving frown.

“I found it,” I said with a tiny laugh and waved my lens cap at him. It was all I could do to keep from completely freaking out. We’ll see if this story gets me in trouble. I hope not, but I have a bad feeling about this.