Pyroclastic Flow

The islands are kind of running together - if I didn't write up each day's trip as we did it, I'd not be able to remember which place we saw the nesting egrets, and which place we saw the lighthouse.

Webcam on TV

Today I finally did the wake-up call as Bob has been telling me to do - instead of pushing the button marked "Wake Up Call" on the phone, I did *93 and then the time I wanted to be waked up. We also ordered room service for breakfast. So this morning, the wake-up call came as ordered and the breakfast came a few minutes later. This was because today's tour is a helicopter tour of Montserrat, and I don't want to be late. We actually had plenty of time - I even had time to take a shower.

The ship backed in to the dock. Next to us - bow in- was Ocean Village, and on the next pier over was NCL Gem.

Ocean Village and on the dock before the tour

I dressed as much as possible to look thin, because there is a 230 lb weight limit for this tour and I think I may be a little over it. We were to meet on the dock at 9:30, so we started out at 8:45. We didn't see the tour person with the sign on the first pass through, and Bob went all the way to the dock entrance. I decided not to do that, and I started back and found the person. Apparently there were to be 5 of us, but it was only 0900, and there was another couple already there. Bob was waiting at the entrance to the pier,

Taxi tour booth at the dock

so I had to go and jump up and down and wave to get his attention to come back. The other lady on the tour came and then we just had to wait for someone from "staff" who proved to be the excursion lady.

We walked around to the taxi, and the excursion lady got into the front seat which annoyed me, because I didn't think she needed to be there and that was the seat I wanted.

We arrived at the airport by 0935 where we were given an instruction card to read, and then shown an instruction video and issued life belts.

Logo

laminated card of directions

Instruction card

There were several dogs at the heliport. One was named Radar and he had beagle coloring but was more the size of a small Rottie,

Radar

and there was a female named Miller Lite because she was originally found at a nearby bar

Bananas at the heliport

Helicopter coming in for a landing

Heliport on Antigua

They lined us up more or less by size and put me second in line behind a larger man. He sat with his back to the pilot and Bob sat next to him. I sat facing him and two of the other two ladies next to me and the wife of the other man next to the pilot. They seat belted us in, and gave us ear phones with a device to push if we wanted to talk.

Bob getting settled

We took off about 10:00.

View from the helicopter

Ship at the dock below

Cruise ships from a helicopter

We flew over the harbor with the ships in it and in 10 minutes we were over the ocean heading to Montserrat

Sandy Island Lighthouse?

Approaching Montserrat - all looks calm

Inhabited part of Montserrat

black sand beaches

House among the trees and Cliff edge

Abandoned Sugar mills

Looking down on a destroyed village

Black sand beach from the helicopter

Bob looking out the window

We were over the old airport by 1020.

Defunct Bramble Airport

Exclusion zone

The pilot was saying that he was going to take us over to the old capitol but then he said - Hey there's a pyroclastic flow that is fresh. I took a short video of it

Pyroclastic flow coming down the mountain

coming down the mountain

It was coming down and turning the sea water to steam

Steam at the edge of the sea from the sea side

Pyroclastic flow boiling the ocean

Ocean water turning to steam

Clouds of ash, smoke; steam from pyroclastic flow

Smoke rising from burning buildings

The buildings that had been there were burning and marked by smoke plumes. So we couldn't get over to the old capitol because of ash in the air. We couldn't see the top of the volcano because it was in a cloud, and we didn't see any red lava or anything - it was all grey.

Lava River

But the flow of ash was very dramatic and we got some good pictures. The pilot tried a couple of ways to get over to the old capitol but was blocked each time by dust clouds (which if they got into the engine would cause the helo to crash).

Mountain with clouds of ash

By 1050 we were on our way back to Antigua

and we were back on the ground by 1100

I bought the DVD that they had of the history of the eruptions.

DVD holder and DVD

By 1120 we were walking back down the dock to the ship. They had divers working on the props

and they were painting the ship in places too. We went to our cabin and rested up and I downloaded the photos.

Card players

About 1400, we walked back to the stern and went out on our deck and took some photos of the town of St. John from that vantage point

Huge catamaran at the dock

and then went to lunch. I got some pizza and an Italian wrap thing which proved to have capers in it. I don't like capers, so I picked them out.

Bob's lunch

We went to trivia which was a Visual Trivia and this time was vocabulary where they gave you a word and three definitions and we were to decide the correct one. The first two words (Twee and Tomalley) were pretty easy. We also got the correct definitions for those two and Kecking and Cretinze. Cretinze means to make into a dwarf, which I'm not sure how to actually DO that

But we missed Jehu (reckless driver) and Fadge, and I thought that Curpin meant one thing but the person doing the writing put down something else. Then I insisted that Ranivorous meant someone who ate frogs, and I was right. So we ended up with 6 right out of 10. Three of the groups had 6 right. So they gave us a tie-breaker and unfortunately it was a true false question. I decided, based on the fact that it was a long detailed question that it had to be true, and two of the groups had true as the answer. Since he didn't have another tie-breaker, he gave us both the prize which was luggage tags.

For dinner, Bob and I both had shrimp cocktail (he had two) and cauliflower soup, and then I had

Shrimp Scampi

which this time had carrot flan. I don't care for the vegetable flans, but I did like the crunchy carrot curls on the top. Bob, of course, had salmon. He had apple pie for dessert, and I had the

Decadent marbled cheesecake