what to see on amalthea

For a scenic view, and an answer-page for Guess The World...

a smooth, cold but not lifeless plain on amalthea

There was nothing moving in sight on the fairly level plane, spawled off by Jupiter's fierce heat when the System was young, whose horizon was a scant mile away.  So they started walking.  Gravitation was surprisingly strong, indicating unusual density.  This fact, plus the intense cold which slows down the dance of the atoms, accounted for the fact that Five still retained remnants of an atmosphere.

The hikers even saw traces of water vapor, in form of frost.  Occasionally they passed clumps of mossy or lichenous growth.  Twice they observed colonies of slug-like creatures growing, reproducing, and dying with amazing rapidity...

Arthur K Barnes, Interplanetary Huntress (1956)

>>  Guess The World - Open

an artificial structure on amalthea

    …The detailed examination of the photos would take several hours; after a while the endless repetition of impact craters, fractured rocks, and occasional patches of frozen gas produced something close to boredom.  But no one could tear himself away from the screen; and at last, after more than half the stored images had been scanned, patience was rewarded.
    The crucial sequence had been taken with a telephoto lens, just as Jupiter V was emerging from shadow.  At one moment there was a black screen; then, magically, a thin crescent suddenly materialized, as the little moon came out of eclipse.
    Kimball was the first to spot the curious oval patch near the terminator.  He froze the picture, and zoomed in for full magnification.  As he did so, there were simultaneous gasps from all his colleagues.
    Part of the side facing Jupiter had been sheared off flat, as if by a cosmic bulldozer, leaving a perfectly circular plateau several miles across.  At its center was a clear-cut, sharply defined rectangle, about five times as long as it was wide, and pitch-black.  At first glance it seemed to be a solid object; then they realized that they were staring into shadow; this was an enormous hole or slot…

Arthur C Clarke, The Lost Worlds of 2001 (1972)

>>  Guess The World - Sixth Series

amalthea  used as an interplanetary prison

“...and now they were sending him to Jupiter, to the little innermost moon, to take his place with those marooned, bestial outcasts of three planets whose luck had fallen down on them when they needed it. (…) Sometimes he thought of that living tomb ahead, where he must fight for food and shelter and life itself among the dregs of three planets — hairy brutes like himself from Earth and the Moon, tall gods without emotion from Venus, little fragile Martians that had run amuck under the strain of conditions on other planets than their own. Once, only once, police landed there to take off a man who had been pardoned, and it was nip and tuck for a while!”

Dennis McDermott, The Red Spot of Jupiter (Wonder Stories, July 1931)

>>  Guess The World - Seventh Series

Note from Zendexor: This extract was sent to me by Lone Wolf about six months ago as part of his commentary on GTW 609, and I marked it at the time for an Amalthean GTW, but what with one thing and another I've delayed its display until now.
    "Dennis McDermott" appears to be a pseudonym, but online research has not revealed his real name.