Beautiful Bali: A Photoessay (Part 1)

Day One

Day Two

Day Three

Photoessay: Flying to Volcán de Colima

Flying to a volcano, flying around one of Mexico's most active volcano,  has been the highlight of my time in Colima. I know I haven't finished my volunteering trip but this combines my childhood love of flying with my obsession with volcanoes. I've been looking forward to this opportunity the minute I was told about it (and I had to postpone twice because of other visitors) but it was worth every single penny and seconds I had to wait. Volcán de Colima is absolutely beautiful, from the ground to the sky. 

Getting ready for LIFT OFF

Nick arranges these flights to happen once a month as a way of monitoring the volcano. He needs two volunteers: one to handle the thermal camera and another to take digital photographs. Other volunteers can go on the flight as "tourists" if they are lucky and enjoy the whole ride while the main two have to panic about making sure the equipment doesn't start misbehaving and taking the images of anything that is relevant. 

We waited eagerly for an email from Nick at 7 AM to check if the flight was happening. If there is a single low cloud, the flight is called off. You need the perfect weather conditions. Around 7:05 AM we got an email simply stating "Great conditions! See you at 7:30" and the rest of the day literally flew by.  

The truck was being repaired at the mechanics (again) so we had to take a taxi to the airport.

Check out our six-seater sweet ride. Possibly the smallest plane I've been on. 

The best part of being in charge of the thermal images is that you get to seat on the co-pilot seat!

All the passengers before lift off!

Coming face to face with the volcano

The whole flight is about an hour but the actual flight around the volcano is about fifteen minutes. You can't help but stare out the window for the whole trip, the landscape around the volcano is beautiful too. The land is so green, splattered with a few small towns and farms, and the sky was blue... it was the most scenic combination. I had a permanent grin on face the whole ride through.

An unknown little town as we were approaching the Colima Complex.

This is one of my favourite photos from the whole trip

An attempt to be artistic - the Comlima Complex with a view of the airplane's nose.  You can see the faint outline of the propeller.

My second favourite photo of the trip - where lush forest meets the hostile land. 

Cutting across the plume

Getting close to the summit. You can see the parasitic volcano twin, Volcancito, on the bottom left corner and the northern lava flow. 

The view of the whole Colima Complex from my window...

... And now the pilot's view 

Nevado de Colima and Volcaán de Colima side by side. Does it remind anyone of an old couple?

Although Volcaán de Colima looks taller in the photos, Nevado de Colima has a higher elevation of 4271 m compared to VdC's height of 3839 m. However, VdC is still active and growing, while NdC is being eroded away, so VdC may reign over the whole complex one day. The current activity of the volcano includes vulcanian eruptions and the growth of a lava dome (which began in 2007, I believe) that overspills to form the active lava flows around the volcano and rockfalls (which are beautifully incandescent!).

 Descending - Heading back home

Of course I was dreading the fly back home... "Couldn't we fly around the volcano for five more minutes" was what I really wanted to ask the pilot. A part of me wished I went on the plane as a "tourist" but I was pretty happy to sacrifice the time to take good digital photos just to sit at the front (I'm obsessed with taking photos of the volcano, I know). Despite me thinking the flight went smoothly, I accidentally left the GPS equipment on the plane (you can see where I left it on one of the photos) and the pilot didn't let us take the photos for Nick early enough, d'oh. I kept thinking on the way home that I would love to go for another flight, maybe I should go for it again. A month later, I think once was enough, I don't want to make the experience less special by going on it again (I think you'll only get the awe you feel for the first time once). Saying that... I can't help but glance back on the photos, it was an amazing trip.  

Aviation sunglasses, check. Gelled back hair, check. Collared shirt, check. I do believe we have a pilot here.

More evidence that I was in the co-pilot seat!

Approaching Colima airport

Couldn't help myself :')

Botanic Garden & Lessons Learnt (Never forget your SD card!!)

Next on the to do list: visit the Botanic Gardens!
I'm sure this is on almost every Cambridge student's to do list, since it's free for students, why not? I've been to the Biodome in Canada, which is definitely impressive but I wasn't sure what to expect from Cambridge's biodome. I don't actually remember anyone talking about their visit to the botanic gardens... at most, it's always been 'I should go there'.

The weather was getting quit chilly, so I was hoping to not stay too long (I seem to only tolerate a very small temperature range). I grabbed my dSLR, had a quick lunch at subway and had a pleasant walk. The entrance to the Botanics Garden isn't very exciting, in fact, we almost missed it from the angle we were coming in at. The outdoors part looks like a typical English garden/park, reminds me of Regents part, with different sections for different plants. I did wish we were having a picnic there and have time to lie down and look up to the sky.

The best part in my opinion was the green house. It has a room for each climate: arid, tropical, mountain, ocean islands and more that I can't remember. The tropical/wet room actually got me excited for Malaysia. I'm definitely going to visit the rain-forests in Borneo and Peninsula (did you know Malaysia Peninsula has the oldest rainforest) and the tropical room was a reminder of how hot and humid it's going to be. It's so easy to get caught up reading activities you'd want to do, dream about the adventures, that you forget little details like the climate and... how unfit you are. Anyway, back to the greenhouse, looking at the huge water lilies, wet vines and colourful petals just makes me buzz with excitement for trekking.

The different textures, shapes and vibrancy just wanted to me to get my camera out! So I did, and started snapping straight away, but my camera kept making a weird noise. Turns out, I left my memory card at home, still plugged in my laptop from the time I was uploading the photos from Castle Mount. It's not the first time this has happened. I'm contemplating about buying a second SD card just in case something similar happens or my first one gets stolen. SD cards are not cheap but missing a once in a life shot suppresses that cost. Luckily for this time, James was happily snapping away before I found out I left my SD card. He's actually a better photographer than me and even though we was using his phone camera, he had a better understanding on focus, texture and angle. Plus he loves take panorama shots. I've included some of the photos he took throughout the day.

There's not too much to say about the Botanical gardens. Certainly something kids would enjoy playing around, especially if James had fun running to the top and yelling 'I'm king of the Jungle' in two/three different spots, us students would enjoy having a picnic in. I remember being surprised there was an 'Ocean Islands' room and that it actually referred to geological 'Ocean Islands'. I tried to explain the James what they were but he was too distracted by people having trouble coming into the room, hmph.

Anyway, have fun looking at the photos and hopefully it makes you want to visit too.