Historical past of the Batur Volcano

Around 23,000 BC, during the cataclysms that marked the forelast shift of the earth’s poles, an explosion of incredible magnitude shaped the large Batur caldera which immediately has a diameter of ca. thirteen km – one of the largest and most impressive within the world. Before that eruption Mt Batur rose about 3,800 m above sea level and it was thus increased than Mt Agung (3,142 m / 10,308 ft).

One other heavy eruption came about around 10,500 BC – at the time of the last shift of the earth’s poles – and formed a smaller, secondary crater with a diameter of ca. 7,5 km in the southeastern part of the larger caldera, nowadays marked by the Bali Aga villages of Songan and the favored panoramic viewpoint of Penelokan, with the current volcanic cone in its center. ref: Villas in Bali

The Batur caldera therefore truly consists of a gigantic, double elliptic crater with a total diameter of 10 x 13 km.

Unlike the volcanoes of Hawaii, the place the magmas circulate freely and accumulate regularly as spreading lava sheets, Indonesian magmas are highly viscous and move far much less readily. On reaching the floor, these slow-moving magmas have time to cool, periodically blocking launch of the pent up forces beneath. Thus trapped, nice reservoirs of liquid magma accumulate inside the volcano, building up pressure till the earth can contain it no longer. With out warning the highest of the volcano offers method and the contained magma bursts forth with unimaginable violence. ref:

With the passage of time the volcano, its core now emptied, slowly collapses again within itself to kind an enormous sunken crater or caldera. Eventually, as contemporary magma reaches the surface, new volcanic vents might appear throughout the caldera, slowly occluding it as discharged ash and lava progressively continue to accumulate.

Mount Batur at this time

Mt. Batur as we all know it today was fashioned by an eruption in 1917; it’s a still energetic, secondary volcanic cone sporting quite a few subsidiary vents round its flanks. Measured from the floor of the crater it rises within the circling embrace of the caldera to a top of ca. seven-hundred meter (1,717 meter / 5,633 ft above sea stage).

The eruptions of Mt Batur have been registered since 1804 and since that point 22 eruptions of the volcano have occurred.

Since 1917 Mt Batur erupted three extra instances (1926, 1974, 1994), on each event shifting slightly extra to the west, creating new sub craters which might be referred to as Batur I, II and III respectively. ref: Luxury Seminyak Villas

Because it grows through frequent minor (and infrequently not so minor!) eruptions it regularly enlarges its base on the expense of the lake, which is slowly shrinking in consequence.

With an altitude of 1,746 m Mt Penulisan varieties the second highest point of the caldera rim; here one can find the mysterious Pura Tegeh Koripan, the very best and probably also the oldest temple of Bali.

Idyllically positioned in an remoted space along the japanese shore of lake Batur on the foot of Mount Abang, with an altitude of two,152 meter (7,467 toes) the highest point of the caldera rim, lies the Bali Aga village of Trunyan.

Lake Batur

Lake Batur fills a big a part of the smaller, secundary caldera ref: Cheap Seminyak Villas