I thought these pics would be interesting. I was in Sicily last Nov. and I took an excursion up to Mt Etna. I actually went inside the cone of the vocano as you can see from the pic. The whole town smelled of sulphur and everywhere was lightly salted in ash. The wind on the top of Mt Etna was damn near 100mph. It was hard to stand still. Once I got down inside though, it was still & warm, & no wind.

I actually walked down the path you see, and around the edge of the volcano. The sunken snowy pics are inside Mt Etna.

Lest anyone forget Mt Etna's wrath here are some pics of the 2002 aftermath: