Lesser Antilles Volcanic Arc

The first stop of my tectonic plate boundaries journey is the Lesser Antilles Volcanic Arc. It is a collection of volcanic islands on the eastern side of the Caribbean Plate, in contact with the South American Plate. I looked in my research book, and found out that this eastern boundary is a subduction zone, where oceanic crust of the South American Plate is being subducted under the Caribbean Plate. This process has formed many volcanic islands, from the Virgin Islands in the north to the islands off the coast of Venezuela in the south. This area contains seventeen active volcanoes! I am staying at a little hotel on the island of Guadeloupe, where I can visit La Grande Soufrière: the highest mountain peak in the Lesser Antilles and located at 16°03′N 61°40′W. The last time it erupted was in 1977. This resulted in evacuation, but no loss of life. I arrived early this morning, and didn’t waste any time. I went straight to La Grande Soufrière to begin taking pictures for National Geographic. I’m off now to get some shots of the sunset, just for fun- I’ll post them later!


Picture 1: http://blog.esl-languages.com/en/esl/volcanoes-read/
Picture 2: http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2000/ofr-00-0365/Fig3.htm