Located some 60 km NNW of Naples in the Campanian province of Caserta lies the medieval town of Roccamonfina, cradling the slopes of an old stratovolcano, considered extinct since its last eruption was at least 50,000 years ago. Roccamonfina is famous for its cuisine based on chestnuts and funghi porcini; Penny Buns or Boletus Edulis.…
Reading the comments to Spica’s latest topic, it’s obvious that most people seem to think that in order to be truly dangerous, a volcano must have a potential for a very large, caldera-forming eruption with an exceptionally high VEI, preferably at least a VEI 7. I think it’s high time we had a little chat…
Etna: a very special place Prior to visiting Stromboli we had visited Etna, but I have left what the locals call Muncibeddu until last. It is obviously very well-known to anyone with even the tiniest passing interest in volcanoes, and many thousands of words have been written about its volcanology. Etna has joined a very…
The World’s most ill begotten piece of real estate – Part III The Chinese have a saying, “May you live in interesting times”. And it is in no way a friendly thing to say; on the contrary it is a rather magnificent curse. In Naples people live all their lives in interesting times. If…
The World’s most ill-begotten real estate, Part II Monte Somma is an old volcano, activity started 400 000 years ago. Over the next 375 000 years a massive strato-volcano was built up at around the same location as todays Vesuvius. The main geological component is guarinite, an epitaxy of hiortdahlite, wöhlerite and låvenite. There is no known…
VolcanoCafé 
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