Foto

Taken from near the place of my last Etna shot but now looking the other way. We are looking down at an old crater here and a tourist restaurant next to it. The lavaflow on the right is from the 2001 outbreak but the crater is from an older one.

Building a house up here, 2000m up the slope of mount Etna is very risky buisness and no insurance company will touch it. You can see how a river of lava has passed within meters of the restaurant here. There are actually pictures on the menus down there of the house on fire, during the 2001 outbreak, while molten lava runs by just outside the window. This is such a popular spot though, that they make enough money to restore and rebuild.

Tech: I cropped the original image, sharpened gradually to make the closest bits sharp but leaving the more distant parts soft. I cloned out alot of cars, rubbish bins and a coach to make the picture less cluttered. Adjusted levels and increased saturation.