Wanderin' Waldo

“I just spent the last three months vacationing in Indonesia,” Waldo said. “The country is located in the Pacific Ocean near Singapore and Malaysia. I loved it there. I visited every island while I was there and found the people to be friendly, the weather fine, and the food fantastic.

“The most fascinating place I visited was the island of Krakatoa,” he continued. “Krakatoa was a volcanic island that used to rise nearly 2, 700 feet above sea level…used to, that is until the year 1883 when it literally blew its top.”

Krakatoa, he explained, was a rather quiet island until late spring of 1883 when it began to let off steam and blow cinders and ash into the air. Throughout the summer, explosions and minor eruptions on the island created small tsunamis that raced across the sea.

“Finally, Krakatoa exploded on August 27, 1883, destroying two-thirds of the island. The noise from the explosion is said to have been on of the loudest on record. It was so loud it could be heard in central Australia more than 2,000 miles away. The explosion created a tidal wave that rose more than 100 feet in height and swept across the South Pacific, killing more than 35,000 people.

“So much ash blew into the sky that it partially blocked out sunlight across the globe, causing a slight drop in worldwide temperatures for a couple of years. Dust particles hung in the sky for several years afterward, creating beautiful sunsets in countries thousands of miles from Indonesia.

“Things finally calmed down over the years,” Waldo continued. “That is, until 1952 when another volcanic eruption occurred just off shore. This eruption created a new island that grew about 500 feet above sea level and to about a third the size of the original island.

“The locals gave it this new island the name of Anak Krakatoa, or Son of Krakatoa. And if he ever erupts,” Waldo said,” they just hope the Son of Krakatoa doesn’t have the same violent temper that its mother did.”

Did you catch Waldo’s mistake?

Indonesia is made up of more than 13,000 islands. Waldo would have had to visit nearly 145 a day to cover them all in the three months he was there.