It's hard to believe, but after much previous travelling and having climbed several hundred mountains, I had never seen an active volcano until now. And without realising it, the first one I chose to see is not just any volcano. IAVCEI, the international body that monitors volcano activity produces an annual list of the 15 most active volcanoes in the world. The list changes as the activity changes, but Mount Merapi (30km north of Yogyakarta) has been at the top of the list every year since the list was compiled. With four eruptions in the last decade, this is the most active and the most destructive volcano on earth - by a long chalk!

My first view was from the back of a motorbike owned by one of the staff at the hotel where I was staying. He was taking me to a viewpoint on a hill overlooking Borobudur. As I looked to one side, Mount Merapi was silhouetted against the dawn sky. With smoke still billowing from its summit after last November's eruption, it looked like a scene from a comic book. There was absolutely no mistake that this was a volcano!

My second sight of Mount Merapi was at a similar time the following morning. Christian Awuy has been leading his unique trek up the side of Mount Merapi for the last 27 years. No one knows the volcano better than he does. Dressed in an official search and rescue boiler suit, carrying the only permit currently issued which allows him to take visitors into the danger zone, and with a direct line to the seven volcanology stations via walkie-talkie, I felt in safe hands.

Christian's trek changed forever in November when the mountain spewed it's deadly lava down the south face of the mountain. Nearly half a million people had already been evacuated, including 350,000 from the villages around Kaliurang where Christian lives. But this mountain produces no ordinary lava. The pyroclastic gas and super-heated rocks moved down three separate riverbeds at 150km/h, destroying 22 villages over a distance of 15km. The volcano lost 10m off its height, 353 people lost their lives, and the destruction caused to the forests in which we now walked was quite astonishing. We gazed in awe at the volcano from a distance of 3km, from a point in the forest which only 6 months ago would have been too thick with leaves to allow any view at all. Christian points out the flags and explains the danger levels 1 to 4. Although any imminent activity is unlikely, he will not allow us to go any closer.

Posted from Lovina, Bali on 3rd May 2011.