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Published: February 24th 2008
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Whale Island
The view of Whale Island from the Whakatane river while still at the dock. Today was to be my tour of the island that the Maori people call Whakaari (White Island to you and me), approximately 29 miles North into the Pacific Ocean from Whakatane. I went to bed the night before with a heavy cloud cover in Whakatane, thinking that once we got to the island the following morning (and the tour for the following morning was confirmed at 7pm the night before, taking weather into account), it wouldn't be very photo worthy as the weather on the night of the 10th was basically fairly heavy fog and misting rain. In any case, I woke up at around 6:30am, looked outside, and the conditions had actually worsened, or so it seemed. I got my workout going, looked back outside about 45 minutes later, and WOW! The fog was receeding, or lifting, or burning off, or something. But I saw blue sky. Amazing timing! I was quite glad. As it turns out, visibility was great all day for the trip.
White Island is an active marine volcano, and it last erupted in 2000. After the 2000 eruption, 3 calendar days elapsed before anybody got back out to the island to inspect what had changed.
Statue of Wairaka
This statue is located at the mouth of the Whakatane River. Some of the crater had been blown out, and scuba divers reported boulders the size of cars newly present in the waters off the island. Additionally, inspections of the island also found many rocks that were still quite warm and could be broken open to reveal what our tour guide described as "gooey" inner contents. That would have been quite cool to see.
It remains active today in that there are countless fumaroles (vents) located on the island, that are largely dispensing a seemingly infinite amount of Hydrogen Sulfide into the air. The fumaroles are highlighted by the yellow sulfur that has accumulated around the border of the vent. While sulfur itself is odorless, its the combination with Hydrogen resulting in Hydrogen Sulfide that yields the rotten egg smell that is pretty prevalent on the island.
The island itself rises some 760 meters from the sea floor, approximately 320 meters of which are above sea level. Would have been fun to have hiked up to the upper reaches of the crater rim for some photos from there as well, but alas, we were not permitted to do so.
The rock that remains on the surface today is
Dolphins off the Bow
This was on the way to White Island. I have also included a video clip of this that is a bit more interesting. very light and porous. Think of the texture of chocolate mousse if had hardened to rock with lots of little air bubbles trapped inside. In any case, to further demonstrate the characteristics of the rock and the surface of the island in general, our tour guide took a bowling ball sized rock and dropped it from about chest height. A hollow sound resulted from the dropped rock, making you think you were merely standing on some kind of shell of rock, that you didn't want to puncture.
There is a known magma chamber located just 1.5km below the surface of the current crater/caldera supposedly, and this contributes to the temperature experienced on the island. The gas escaping from the fumaroles is actually quite hot to the touch, and we were also told that the lighter the color of the rock, the hotter the rock actually is due to what is underneath it. Between the sun, the gas (I never did use my gas mask, nor did anyone else on the tour), and the temperature of the rock in general, I was pretty crispy at the end of that day.
The crater/caldera that exists today, with the dark milky
Dolphins off the Bow
This was on the way to White Island. I have also included a video clip of this that is a bit more interesting. color, has a pH level of -0.5 or thereabouts, and we were told that is very acidic. Additionally interesting is that the temperature of the water in the caldera ranges from between 30 degrees Celcius (86 degrees Farenheit) to 70 degrees Celcius (158 degrees Farenheit) or so. Given the temperature and acidity, not a place to go for a refreshing swim.
We were lucky enough to spot a pod of dolphins on both the boat ride out to the island, and on the way back to Whakatane. I have included some video clips that show that.
Before we got back on the boat to go back to Whakatane, we were each asked to dip our shoes (at least just the soles) in a tray of water. I guess that was to reduce the effects of bringing any chemicals onto the boat itself.
You can check
here for more information regarding tours from Whakatane by water.
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