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Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall are currently on a ten-day tour of the Caribbean. And I will be on the tour as a member of the press. We visited the volcanic island of Montserrat on day five - this was always going to be a highlight of the trip and one which I was looking forward to.

Montserrat is a small island a few miles from Antigua which used to be home to over 40,000 people. However, a series of devastating volcanic eruptions caused many to fell to destinations such as Canada and the USA. Four thousand people now inhabit Montserrat, an island that used to be home to celebs such as Sting and George Michael (artists who favored the natural beauty and relaxed nature of the tropical island).

The capital, Plymouth, was devastated by the volcanic flow but the Prince and Duchess had been given special permission to enter the exclusion zone. Myself, and the other members of the press who have been with the royal party throughout this tour, arrived an hour before the couple to arrange a picture that would best convey the scene. After a visit to the observatory the Prince and Duchess arrived and were given a tour of the area by a local volcanologist. They seemed genuinely interested as the peak loomed in the distance, complete with vapor and steam flowing from the top!

The scale of the destruction was incredible, but difficult to document in a photograph due to the harsh light and high vantage point. The shot which worked the best was an image with a hut that had been submerged in volcanic ash and the actual volcano in the background. For once, I managed to photograph the couple without anyone around them and I felt it was great to catch them during a more relaxed moment exploring their surroundings without having a posed and static picture.

The couple inspected the surreal, almost lunar, landscape before heading back down to the bay and to the royal yacht…the journey will continue to Jamaica…