When I was 21, I spent one hot, sweaty day hiking over loosely-packed to shale to arrive at our destination: the peak of the Volcano on the island of Santorini in Greece. I had envisioned the volcanoes from the movies -- steaming, black and full of red-hot molten lava, but this just looked like a large pile of rocks with a crater in the middle. I mean, it's pretty obvious that hiking up an active volcano wouldn't be safe, but this was still a bit of let-down, especially after a tedious hike after a late night of drinking Ouzo. I've seen better vistas on hikes before than this one. Still, it might be worth a visit if even just to say you've hiked up a volcano.

But there are definitely better volcanoes out there to see, like the ones mentioned on this list of the world's top 10 volcanoes. Here's what made the list:

1. Kilauea - Hawaii
2. Mount Liamuiga Volcano - St Kitts
3. Mount Kilimanjaro - Tanzania
4. Mount Vesuvius - Italy
5. Augustine, Douglas, Illiamna and Redoubt volcanoes - Alaska
6. Niyragongo Volcano - Zaire
7. Yellowstone - United States
8. Shiga volcanic complex - Japan
9. Ambrym Volcano - Vanuatu
10. Mount Taranaki -- New Zealand

To find out why these made the list, check out the full article.

Filed under: Hiking