A summary of the 3rd eruption of the year at the Piton de la Fournaise

Let the show begin !

At midnight we arrived at the Pas de Bellecombe, the thermometer was showing 4°C and it was a perfectly clear night.
We stopped for a short break at the viewpoint and we could already see the eruption, the beautiful red-orange shades and a magnificent blue moon lighting up the surreal landscape of the Caldera and the superb Dolomieu crater. But we wanted to get even closer, and we were only a few seconds away from the start of the Nez Coupé de Sainte-Rose trail, that leads to the Piton Partage.

After walking for around 30 minutes along a pretty easy footpath, with some rather unusual companions: some cows on the sides of the footpath, we arrived at the viewpoint and we had an amazing view of the eruption and the array of volcanic orange shades.

Let the show begin !

At midnight we arrived at the Pas de Bellecombe, the thermometer was showing 4°C and it was a perfectly clear night.
We stopped for a short break at the viewpoint and we could already see the eruption, the beautiful red-orange shades and a magnificent blue moon lighting up the surreal landscape of the Caldera and the superb Dolomieu crater. But we wanted to get even closer, and we were only a few seconds away from the start of the Nez Coupé de Sainte-Rose trail, that leads to the Piton Partage.

After walking for around 30 minutes along a pretty easy footpath, with some rather unusual companions: some cows on the sides of the footpath, we arrived at the viewpoint and we had an amazing view of the eruption and the array of volcanic orange shades.

Keep your eyes wide open!

Right there in front of our eyes was a crack around 1 kilometre long (according to the Piton de la Fournaise Volcano Observatory) with several eruptive openings to the right.

Eruption du Piton de La Fournaise le 11 septembre 2016

A unique moment to witness !

Lava was spurting out of the main crack, several metres into the air.

A surprising experience from beginning to end

At around 2:30am, we decided to leave the show behind us and head back down to the Bellecombe car park. The temperature had dropped a little, and some ice had formed on the volcanic rock that was lit up with our headlamps, giving the impression that we were looking at a trail of precious stones.

Once we had left the car park, we thought we would have a quiet journey back and that the show was over for tonight, but we hadn’t even considered the landscape at the Plaine des Sables, which was fantastic as the full moon shone down on the ice.

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