Photos

White Island (Whakaari Island)is the most active volcano in New Zealand. It is about a 1.5 hour boat ride off the coast from Whakatane... about 50km away!

The island is privately owned and a family business has exlusive rites to provide tours. To reach the island, you take a small inflatable boat, and can walk around the rusted out sulfur mill (which was completely destroyed during one of the many small eruptions).

The tour of the island was quite interesting and we NEEDED to use the supplied gas masks due to all the sulfur fumes.

Took this shot as we were all returning to the main boat to head back to Whakatane. Note the funny yellow safety hats... don't think they would help much if the volcano blew!