KT Cooper is a PhD student in the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol. A carbonate geochemist by training, she is currently on a three-month secondment to Houston, Texas, USA working with Exxon Mobil.
Recently, I was lucky enough to visit a fellow Bristol Earth Sciences PhD student in Vancouver, Washington for a weekend of volcano-spotting (and hiking) in the Cascades. As a non-volcanologist, I was just excited to get some fresh air, good weather and great company for a few days and didn’t really give a thought to the prospect of seeing volcanoes. All I can say, in hindsight, is that I was foolish to think of them as merely a backdrop for our weekend. They were totally breath-taking, awe-inspiring and now I can really understand why so many of my peers are fascinated with them.
Mount Hood in the Cascades, Portland, USA. Credit: Katherine Cooper