You see the new bubble?

One volcano down, two more to go on my Indonesian adventure.

This next one, Lucy, involved much less hiking and no horse-dogs. Mode of transportation was still cool, though. More on this later...

Anais and I pull up to the village of Ponog Atas on the island of Java. Climbing up a canal we overlooked a big lake. This lake wasn't filled with water- it was filled with mud.


You see, what had happened was (this line is for you Ashley!) a gas company was digging for a well, it hit a crack in the earth and mud started spurting out.

That mud spread and swallowed up more than 30,000 homes- or basically most of the village. This is a picture of the very top of a mosque.


To get out there to this spot, we had to hop on the back of motorcycles driven by locals. Dangerous- yes. Fun- yes. I mean where else on earth do you just randomly hop on the back of a bike with a driver you barely know?!


My driver could speak English. He told us the government and the gas company refused to compensate him for the loss of his home. Instead, people were given these badges.


The badges certify them as official "guides" around Lucy. He is supposed to earn money this way and of course the government thinks this is a sufficient deal. Home = tour guide certification. Sounds fair, right?

We pay him to take us around this dirt path on top of man-made levees built to protect surrounding homes and businesses. Click here to see the video.

Part of the mud lake has dried up.

The other part, however, continues to spread- covering farm land, homes and businesses. You see, Lucy is still very active. You can see white smoke billowing out of the 2-year-old volcano and occasionally big bubbles in the mud.


Not sure what the village is going to do about this problem but one thing is certain- making tour guides out of victims isn't an adequate solution.


To listen to a story about Lucy by NPR go to this link: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91066179