THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO

<<Go back to congo tours

Nyiragongo Volcano Tour

A lake of hot lava is one of the most spectacular forms of volcanic activity but are very difficult to see because there is only a few of them in the world. So if you want an impressive lava lake, you have one good option: Nyiragongo.

Nyiragongo Volcano is located in the east of Congo, at around 19kms from Goma town. It is the most active volcano in the world. In 1997 and 2002, flows of lava broke out from cracks in the slopes. They covered 17kms to Goma in just a few minutes, killed dozens of people, and left hundreds of thousands homeless. The eruption temporarily drained the lava lake in the summit crater; volcanic gas suffocated heather forest on the upper slopes. Now the forest is recovering, and the wildlife is coming back. The climb takes 4 to 5 hours; there are a lot of rare birds and small mammals along the trail.

Located in Virunga National Park, it is accessible to visitors from whole the world. The visit can take one to three days with a campsite located at 3470ms on the volcano. Spending one night on the top allows you to observe the sunset and sunrise, but especially to admire the nocturnal spectacle of the lava lake.

The ascension starts behind the patrol post of the national park, on 1900ms of altitude in the forest. After walking about 50 minutes, you will reach the front of the first flow of the lava from 2002. The path then passes the principal cone of Nyiragongo. Along the way you can observe trunks of trees which were burnt by the lava flows. On 2700ms of altitude, you will join the eruptive fracture to the origin of those flows. This fracture has been active in 1997 eruption and is still largely opened and you can find there different active cracks of the 2002 eruption. Leaving this area you will abandon the lava and once again go through altitude forest.. Towards 2900ms you will enter in heather area. At 3100ms, you will reach the affected area where acid gas was released by the volcano; and you will admire the vegetation essentially composed of the heather and other vegetation burned by the lava. Towards 3300ms of altitude, the vegetation starts to disappear and is replaced by rocky slopes to the summit of bubbling lava. <<Go back to congo tours