The Gates of Hades

A more perfect cone couldn’t have been made in an ice cream factory, it’s the volcano crater that any child would draw if asked to draw a volcano crater. The ferry to the Eolian Islands has the usual smell you’d expect on a ferry, layers upon layers of sea spray creating a briny musky odour that is comforting and solid. I don’t know if rust has a smell, but if it did, this would be the place to smell it. The island of Vulcano is the first stop of the seven in the archipelago, most people are onward bound to her sister islands, but a handful of locals like to come here from the mainland as it’s their nearest escape. As we disembark, Vulcano pelts rotten eggs at us from the very moment we set foot on it. Right by the port are smouldering sulphur rocks on both sides of the only road that leads out of the port, with a putrid mist rising from them, gassing everyone passing through as if she was deliberately warding people off. The first gates warn but don’t deter, we march through them with the amused satisfaction of a youngster succeeding in a rite of passage. The next thing you see is a bubbling pool of volcanic mud. I wonder how many have already been swallowed up by it. Just beyond, the black beach of volcanic sand is soaking up heat from the merciless sun like a videogame villain soaks up the energy of the fire balls shot at it. It’s so bright that the jet black sand comes off as closer to ash grey and it’s peppered by a multitude of what seem like blinking eyes of some alien creature, but are in fact broken fragments of obsidian shimmering in the light. A fluttering butterfly seems momentarily to give a friendlier welcome but it’s just an illusion, it was only a dried up bougainvillea flower dancing in the wind.

The low houses are of course all white, but a washed out dull white, like driftwood, rather than the brilliant white of some of the more bougie islands. Monumental cacti spill over their garden walls and are so sun-cooked they could be metallic; they could almost be Louise Bourgeois spiders turned on their backs. There’s a palpably wild streak to her. She’s not inhospitable, despite first impressions, but definitely more closed off to the casual visitor. Visitors, however, are not in short supply, everywhere seems either full or the wrong side of slightly too busy.

As we settle down at the beach I look up to the volcano. Volcanic activity is lower this year and it’s allowed to climb up to the crater. The sulphurous smoke plumes aren’t as strong but they still lend a certain latent pungency to the air. I’ve always seen people walk up but never done it myself (it was closed off last year). I’m not sure what to expect. Perhaps I’m worried it will be huge disappointment, at best an anti-climax, or perhaps I’m scared the gates of Hades itself are up there. Last year it was the heat from below the ground that was unforgiving and barred the entrance. This year the heatwave is relentless and the sun hammers down with untold fury. Either way, it seems the gates of Hades are guarded by fire, whether from above or from below, and thou shalt not pass.

I wonder though whether that isn’t Hades at all up there, perhaps that’s actually the way out of it. Perhaps Hades is right here, in the land of the middle, the land of humans. The screaming tourists, the cheesy summer anthems blasting from the aperitivo bars, the bit of transparent plastic wrapping in the sea that makes you jump because at first it looks like a stingy jellyfish, and then makes you boil with anger at the insult to the beauty of these seas. Hades is perhaps the ostentatious forced happiness of the people who must be happy because they’ve paid to be here. But you won’t find any happiness here that you didn’t pack with you. What they sell is the equivalent of a plastic trinket of the Eiffel tower compared to the real thing. Not an issue for me though, I have mine next to me, it’s the brothers I travel with. It’s the knowledge that if I ever needed it, they would give me half of their blood, as I would do for them. It’s the knowledge that if I ever run out of my own happiness, I can borrow a squirt of theirs. I can tell that isn’t true for everyone. You can immediately spot the couples that won’t be coming back next year because they won’t even be a couple next year. Hades is their uncomfortable silence soaked in frustration and hidden sighs. The strained smiles of those who can’t bear the sight of their own children but are wrought with guilt at the thought of it could cut you like jagged rocks. Surely Hades is full of jagged rocks like that. Those so impatient to relax that they become angry. Hades has a deafening echo of anger. Those who are making angry work calls from their sun lounger who aren’t even familiar with the concept of relaxing. Hades is right at the top of their inbox and their itchy fingers keep tapping on it frantically. Hades is the accumulated anxiety that simply refuses to play musical chairs and won’t stop dancing even if there are enough sun loungers for everyone to sit comfortably. Sweat and impatience are the smells just beneath the sulphur that make the air more pungent than it needs to be.

The ferry that brought is here is called Caronte, Italian for Charon, the dutiful ferryer of souls to Hades and it seems so fitting that the wind is hotter than it’s ever been. Air so warm it actually burns the skin. The temperature reached 45 degrees in the port today and everyone around us is clearly feeling it. All the people who came seeking those exotic beasts, the Chimera of peace, the Phoenix of reconnection with themselves, or with their other halves, all seem so lost and dazed. They don’t know where they are and they don’t know where they are. These beasts don’t belong in Hades, not unless you bring them with you. In this Hades you will only find a sea of worn-out souls like the white of the houses, each one bubbling with anguish under the surface like hot volcanic mud.

It's the last day and the heat has slightly subsided. It’s now or never, I will finally make the climb this year and find the dreaded gates. It’s early morning and the sweet nectarine scent of the night before has given way to an earthy smell that’s almost burned and distinctly acidic. No one’s around, so devoid of any reference points I somehow take the wrong turn in the path and as I go up and it soon starts to looks like less and less of a path at all. My feet sink deeper in the volcanic sand at every step on the ascent, making it very tricky. I have totally lost the way, but upwards is an inescapable direction, so rather than turn back and look for a proper path I march on alone, the sun is still low and I’m mercifully on the shady side of the slope until almost the end of the climb. Then the moment comes, and the last few paces open up the view over the crater, Charon draws the curtains slowly over the view of the gates of Hades at last. The sight in front of me turns me into stone, breath suspended, a moment that will last forever. Taking the wrong way up means I land on the edge of the crater without a soul in sight and I feel an intense sense of privilege at having that moment of majesty at the gates all to myself. In that precise moment I feel, with the fullest intensity, the realisation that they are the not the gates to enter Hades, but rather those to escape it. “L’infer c’est les autres”, as Sartre said.

Vulcano isn’t the prettiest of the seven sisters, nor the easiest in character or the most loved. She has a dark and thorny beauty, with a pure and closely guarded spirit, the thorny beauty of a thistle. She’ll reward those who match her wild heart and don’t ask her to be like the others. I love that she’s underappreciated and doesn’t mind it. They’ll tell you she guards the gates of Hades, but, disguised behind a cloud of sulphur fumes, she only ever wanted to show you the way out.