The Answer

So apparently no one likes riddles anymore. There were two honest attempts.

So the answer we were looking for was 'Mount Etna'. Though most people in American have never heard of it (including me) we should know it, for it is the highest active volcano in Europe. It is listed as an inactive volcano in the Merriam-Webster dictionary I have on my phone, but that is extremely false. As we approached, the beast was spewing hot lava quite high into the air against the setting sun. Upon seeing this we had some doubts about our sanity of driving towards it, but this was an excursion for our son.

Zion has been so enthralled with volcanoes for the last little bit. Many times throughout the last months he will ask me about what can stop hot lava. "Is it stronger than the fireplace? Is it stronger than concrete? What is stronger than lava? What can stop it?" And his weapon is always some sort of lava gun.

In the 1669 it destroyed the city of Catania. The explosions on Mt. Etna are getting more and more common in recent years. The hotel owner at the top of the mountain is predicting it may do that again soon. "All that needs to happen" he tells me, "is that as it is fulling up it needs to find an easier route out of one of the vents. Then the whole world will hear of Etna again." He thinks that the top of the mountain, where his Hotel sits, is in the safest place because it is near the crater, where it already has an easy exit on the top of the volcano, but the people on the sides and in Catania have to stay on their toes. For one day it will make its way out towards them.

- The Latimer's