The day began early, very early in the morning at 6AM in freezing temperatures by driving to the foot of the volcano
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
We started early as we wanted to being the hike just at sunrise (the colors being amazing at this time):
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
The hike began with a 150m descent first from an outer ridge (in the background) of the secondary crater, leading to a long, that is few-hours long "moonwalking"
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
In order to get a few nice photo shots we climbed some smaller craters:
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
The hike then continued on a mars-like landscape...
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
before reaching the main crater.
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
Note: this photo we did not take during the hike, but two days after from air.
The climb of the main crater was quite a challenge and seemed never-ending as the route went spiraling up, each time giving the impression the summit is "just around the corner" just for a new stretch to unfold.
...forward a couple of hours...
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
...notice the small bump at center left in the background? That is the "small" crater from before...
Going around one of those "corners" offered us an incredible view of the main lava flow
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
and the next corner of the most recent lava flow, both leading down to the ocean (some 2300m below us):
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
Forward a couple of hours more...we finally reached the ridge of the main crater:
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
... a rewarding site it was.
As always, we did not go alone, taking Gulliver with us
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
The descent wasn't particularly easy either, especially walking through the "martian desert" seemed endless, but after the 7-8hours hike, we were both proud to look back to our "achievement":
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| From INDIAN OCEAN - Reunion |
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