June 19 Vulcano

 

At the base the landscape is quite sulphureous

I’m coming to the end of my Aeolian volcanic adventures, just one more island to go - Vulcano. My head is full to bursting with info about this part of the Mediterranean but I’m having trouble dipping into the swirling quagmire to pluck out much detail. One thing I do know which I didn’t before is that the English word ‘volcano’ derives from the name of this island, which in turn derives from the Roman belief that the tiny island was the chimney of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire. 

For an island of fire, it’s interesting that it began underwater 400.000 years ago and emerged around 130,000 years ago. Since the last glacial period it has been quite active even violently activity. Like other volcanoes, even ‘dormant’ ones, there is a lot of underwater activity.

Vulcano looking towards Lipari

A lot of the more recent development on the island is due to James Stevenson, a Scotsman and man of science, who travelled the world finally settling in the Aeolian Islands. Here he developed the extraction and exportation of the pumice of Lipari and the sulphur of Vulcano. In 1870 he bought most of the island of Vulcano and, alongside his mining activities, he planting the first vineyards and bottled a unique sulphurous wine. The island is covered with orchards of figs, grapes and fruit trees. Much of the original lushness was destroyed by the volcanic eruption on 3rd August 1889 which continued until May 1890. The volcano covered everything with a rain of sand, ash and what they called ‘breadcrust bombs’ destroying everything that the Scotsman had created. He left the island a disappointed man. But we enjoyed it and the lushness we found.

Bucolic in the extreme

A quite delightful island.  We sat in a restaurant cooled by sea breezes and looking up we could see small fumaroles puffing near the top of the volcano. Vulcan was obviously feeling sated that day.